Changing Framework of Local Governance and - Create

Changing Framework of Local Governance and Community Participation in Elementary Educationwould be made an integral part of education at all levels. At the primary stage, suitableprogrammes were to be implemented to bring the school closer to the community with thefocus on serving the community in suitable ways (NCERT, 1971:22). It was argued that:School education is predominantly a local-state partnership and higher education is aCenter-State partnership. It is this basic principle that should guide the evolution ofdelicate balance between centralization and decentralization which our planning needs’(NCERT, 1971:848).However, the early 1970s witnessed a reverse, leading to the large-scale nationalisation ofschools, particularly at the primary stage in most parts of the country. With this, stategovernments became the main providers and managers of elementary education. It is withinthis context that the Block Education Offices came into existence. This paved the way for thedeconcentration 4 of power, though considerable authority continued to be vested at the districtlevel, in particular with regard to recruitment, posting and transfer of personnel.Interestingly, while deconcentration was pursued with respect to district level administration,decision-making became more centralised at the state level – to some extent leading to theerosion of authority at the district level. The state secretariat, which within the originalframework dealt only with policy matters leaving all operational matters to the Directorate ofPublic Instruction and its subordinate offices at the district level, assumed greater levels ofdirect responsibility for running the system. This was particularly so with respect to teacherappointments and the location of new schools. This also brought in a new dimension to theissue: what was hitherto mainly an affair of the professional administration came into theambit of political action. The attention of the leadership, therefore, naturally was focused onstreamlining the administration leaving behind the policy of establishing decentralisedgovernance under the panchayati raj framework.Again in the 1980s a revival of interest in panchayati raj was witnessed in some of the states.Significant developments took place in states like Karnataka, The state not only conductedelections of local bodies but also took initiatives for providing block grants and considerableautonomy to the local bodies in using the finances. This prompted many local bodies toallocate funds for educational development activities at the district and sub-district levels. Ofcourse, some of these got reversed with changes in political leadership in the state,demonstrating the vulnerability of such measures to political vicissitudes. Interestingly,Andhra Pradesh moved away from the national pattern of a three-tier local governance systemcomprising district, block and village level bodies. Instead the state adopted a two-tier system,by and large following the recommendations of the Ashoka Mehta Committee (GoI, 1978)with local bodies at the district and mandal (consisting of about thirty villages) levels.However, unlike Karnataka, the reforms in Andhra Pradesh did not include any major move todecentralize governance of education sector. West Bengal also took up the task ofstrengthening the three-tier system for local governance and linking education governance4 Deconcentration is defined as “One of administrative decentralization which redistributes decision-makingauthority and financial and management responsibility among levels of the central government there is no realtransfer of authority between levels of government. It may involve only a shift of responsibilities from federalforest service officials of the capital city to those stationed in provinces, districts, etc” (Gregersen et al. 2004)As Govinda (1997:16) has pointed out “An obvious implication of this process is to move the administrative setup nearer to action setting, but by increasing the weight of bureaucracy”.4