Recasting Citizenship for Development - File UPI

26 SUMI KRISHNA
The 73rd Amendment does not apply to parts of north-eastern India
that have various customary systems of local governance (as in Nagaland,
Meghalaya and Mizoram, and the autonomous district councils that come
under the Sixth Schedule). However, they do apply to the state of Arunachal
Pradesh (formerly the North-East Frontier Agency, NEFA), strategically
located on the India-China border. Till 1987, when Arunachal Pradesh
attained statehood, it was directly administered by the Government of
India. As in other parts of the region, the state has had a strong military
presence and has received large financial outlays. Deepak Mishra and
Vandana Upadhyay (Chapter 8, this volume) argue that in the north-eastern
region as a whole, the state’s relative weakness in protecting property and
providing security has led to the emergence of various ethnic groups,
which use ‘private’ means of securing property, contributing to the growth
of insurgency. However, uniquely, in Arunachal Pradesh, such conflicts
have led to different tribal groups bargaining and negotiating to acquire
a larger share of government resources through ‘quiet pressure’ from
within the system. Mishra and Upadhayay say that while community participation
is part of the rhetoric of development, this does not reflect the
‘elite capture’ of governance structures and development processes. They
see clear indications of the negative implications this has for marginalised
sections among the tribals, including women. They also point to the ‘twin
dangers’ of viewing existing gender relations as egalitarian and of treating
all demands for equality as being against tribal traditions.
Education and the law are critical dimensions of democratic governance.
The traditional subordination of women and their exclusion from
decision-making persists even in Mizoram, where conventional demographic
and economic indicators reflect more gender equality than elsewhere
in India (see Krishna 2005b). Analysing processes of socialisation
and the value system of tribal groups, B. Lakshmi (Chapter 9, this volume)
shows how traditional gender stereotypes in Mizoram are now being
reinforced by development, the modern education system, school languages
and textbooks.
Whether it is governance, education, inheritance of property, or resource
policy, the perception that the community is homogeneous and
that legal/institutional changes will bring about gender equality is
increasingly being questioned. Meghana Kelkar (Chapter 10, this volume)
argues that the agricultural research, education and extension network