KARNATAKA - of Planning Commission

Institutional Reforms for Human Development: Panchayat RajThe primary objective ofdecentralised planningby PRIs is the promotionof rural development byidentifying local needsand prioritising activities.BOX 11.2Evaluation of Panchayat Raj systemmore cost effi cient compared to the centralisedgovernance system? One writer says that it is moreexpensive because the decentralised governancesystem fails to internalise the negative externalityof one bribe transaction on another because oftwo reasons: (i) there is absence of social auditby people and their organisations; and (ii) theinterlocking social and economic relationshipsthat obtain in rural society, and the existence ofsmall proximate groups in the villages, enablethe panchayat functionaries to easily managethe risk of being caught (P. Bardhan, 1996). TheGovernment intends to address some of theseissues by establishing offi ces of Ombudsmen in thedistricts and strengthening the public grievancemachinery.Decentralised planningThe primary objective of decentralised planningby PRIs is the promotion of rural development byidentifying local needs and prioritising activities.Institutional support for local level planning,such as district level planning units and the basicguidelines for carrying out planning activitieshave been provided. The taluk panchayats andgram panchayats have no institutional supportfor planning and monitoring, and this should beprovided as early as possible.The Central and state governments have takenmany initiatives to strengthen planning at thegrassroot level. They are: (i) the merger of JGSYand EAS to create SGRY. The cash allocationis supplemented by an equivalent quantity ofThe National Eleventh Finance Commission has evaluated the Panchayat Raj system in thecountry by using ten parameters and constructing an index of decentralisation. The parametersused in the construction of the index of decentralisation are: (i) enactment/amendment of statepanchayat/municipal legislation; (ii) intervention/restriction in the functioning of the local bodies;assignment of functions to the local bodies by state legislation; (iii) actual transfer of functionsto these bodies by way of rules, notifi cations and orders; (iv) assignment of powers of taxationto local bodies and the extent of exercise of such powers; (v) constitution of the State FinanceCommissions and the extent of action taken on their reports; (vi) election to the local bodies; and(vii) constitution of District Planning Committees. In terms of these parameters, Karnataka ranksamong the top states in the country.food grains under the programme and this hasaugmented the funds available to the GPs andincreased their capacity to plan; (ii) the SwachhaGrama programme launched in April 2001 with90 per cent government funding, which hasenabled GPs to prioritise rural sanitation whichis inadequate in all villages; (iii) the Jal Nirmalprogramme (June 2002) with 85 per centstate funding is GP-centric from concept toexecution; (iv) the Jalasamrakshana programme(August 2002), a cost sharing project betweenthe state and the beneficiary, managed by theGP; (v) under the Sarva Kutumba Sameekshe(November 2003), GPs conducted a house-tohousesurvey and created a database that willbe useful for monitoring human developmentindicators.These recent initiatives by the state willundoubtedly augment the funds available to grampanchayats and strengthen their capacity to plan atthe grassroot level; especially since planning andimplementation have been a mixed experience sofar. Often, inputs for planning are not obtainedfrom the people, and it is the panchayat membersand offi cials who supply inputs in the gram sabhameetings. Consequently, development plansprepared by the panchayats turn out to be plansmade by offi cials and members for the people,and not plans of the people prepared by thepeople. Some panchayats have ensured people’sparticipation at the stage of implementation ofprojects through special committees, and projectsare completed effi ciently and in time. In otherpanchayats, where people are not involved,implementation of projects is ineffi cient and notcost-effective.The District Sector Plan is supposed to be ablend of plans emanating from PanchayatRaj institutions and urban local bodies. Theintegration of plans from all the tiers does notalways result in a seamless document, andinstead, a jumble of projects with no time orproject connectivity is produced. District PlanningCommittees need capacity building if they are tofunction effectively as nodal planning agenciesat the district level.264