Beneficiary Participation in Irrigation Water Management: The Kerala

Canal Committee (CC)
Canal Committee is a federal society of several BFAs coming under one distributory / branch
canal. It is conceived of as the most strategically important tier in the new decentralised operation
and management of the CAD irrigation system. The president of each BFA is an ex-officio
member of the CC in whose absence, any member of BFA, as president-representative, may
attend the canal committee meetings; the committee is entitled to discuss all problems faced by
BFAs in general and its members individually in particular, from time to time with a view to
finding possible solutions. Also the BFA president is expected to convey to the members of the
BFA the decisions of the CC. The extent to which these expectations were realised in the sample
project under study will be discussed presently. A representative each from the departments of
Agriculture and Co-operation, a representative of lending agencies, and five members chosen
from the ayacut area of the canal are the other members of CC. Co-ordination of the working of
BFAs for achieving equitable distribution of water and enforcing uniform cropping pattern in the
ayacut are the major functions of CC.
Beneficiary Farmers Association (BFA)
Beneficiary Farmers Associations are formed at the sluice/sluices level. The affairs of the BFA
are looked after by an elected president, secretary, and other office-bearers, if any, and an
executive committee of not more than seven members, chosen from the annual general body of
the Association. The tenure of the office-bearers (OBs) comes to an end on every 31 March.
In practice, BFAs do not seem to be functioning on expected lines. In the area of our study, we
found that it was the CADA officials who had taken the initiative for forming the CCs and BFAs.
An adhoc committee was constituted in this first meeting convened under their initiative to
proceed with measures for forming BFAs. The adhoc committee formed the general body. The
membership fee was fixed as Rs 5 in most of the cases, Rs.10 in a few cases, and no payment was
insisted upon in the case of a good number of BFAs; but in such cases of non-payment, actual
payment of admission fee was made, not by BFAs directly but by prospective contractors for the
works of field channel lining or by potential office-bearers or even by any interested, relatively
large holders in the ayacut, on behalf of BFA. The adhoc committee summoned the whole body
of registered members formally got the MOU passed by the general body, and elected officebearers
of BFA. This is what happened in the case of several BFAs. In some others it was
reported by the office-bearers themselves that no such preliminary steps had been taken; they
were formed purely on the initiative of a few persons who managed to give shape to BFAs
according to their fancies, which were then duly registered according to rules.
In respect of CCs and PACs, CADA does not stipulate registration. Hence they remained
unregistered and functioned only nominally. They were formed casually and light-heartedly and
they functioned, as we shall see presently, quite ineffectively.
Responsibilities of BFAs
The major responsibilities of BFAs include the following: giving membership to all farmers
in the ayacut, keeping an ayacut register, keeping accounts, summoning annual general
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