kurukshetra may 2013

S.O. 463(E).- In exercise of the powers conferred by sub-section (1) of section 6 of the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural

Employment Guarantee Act, 2005 (42 of 2005), and in supersession of the notification of the Government of India in the

Ministry of Rural Development number S.O. 578(E), dated the 23rd March, 2012, except as respects things done or omitted

to be done before such supersession, the Central Government hereby specifies the wage rate payable to the unskilled

manual workers under column (3), in respect of the State or the Union territory mentioned in column (2), of the Schedule

given below, working on various Schemes under the said Act, with effect from 1st day of the April, 2013, namely:-

(Rs. per Day)

S. No.Name of State/Union territoryWage rate in Rs. per Day

(1) (2)(3)

1AssamRs. 152.00

2Andhra PradeshRs. 149.00

3Arunachal PradeshRs. 135.00

4Bihar Rs. 138.00

5GujaratRs. 147.00

6HaryanaRs. 214.00

7Himachal PradeshNon-scheduled Areas-Rs. 138.00Scheduled Areas-Rs. 171.00

8Jammu and KashmirRS. 145.00

9KarnatakaRs. 174.00

10KeralaRs. 180.00

11Madhya PradeshRs. 146.00

12MaharashtraRs. 162.00

13ManipurRs. 153.00

14Meghalaya Rs. 145.00

15Mizoram Rs. 148.00

16NagalandRs. 135.00

17OrissaRs. 143.00

18PunjabRs. 184.00

19RajasthanRs. 149.00

20SikkimRs. 135.00

21Tamil NaduRs. 148.00

22Tripura Rs. 135.00

23Uttar PradeshRs. 142.00

24.West BengalRs. 151.00

25.ChhattisgarhRs. 146.00

26JharkhandRs. 138.00

27UttarkhandRs. 142.00

28GoaRs. 178.00

29Andaman and NicobarAndaman District

Rs. 198.00

Nicobar district

Rs. 210.00

30Dadra and Nagar HaveliRs. 175.00

31Daman and DiuRs. 150.00

32LakshadweepRs. 166.00

33PuducherryRs. 148.00

34.ChandigarhRs. 209.00

Schedule

State Wise Wage rate for Unskilled Manual Workers

Ministry of Rural DevelopmentNOTIFICATION

Licensed U (DN) 52/2012-14 to post without pre-paymentAt RMS, Delhi ISSN -0021-5660

Reg. Number DL(S)-05-3232/2012-14RN 702/57-Delhi Postal

Printed and Published by Ira Joshi, Additional Director General and Head, Publications Division, Ministry of I&B, Govt. of IndiaSoochna Bhawan, New Delhi-110 003 on behalf of Ministry of Rural Development, Govt. of India, New Delhi-110 011,

Printed at Chandu Press D-97, Shakarpur, Delhi-110092 and Published from Soochna Bhawan, New Delhi-110003. Editor : Kapil Kumar

Empowering Gram SabhaVol. 61 No. 7 Pages 52 May 2013 Rs. 10/-







(Rs. per Day)

S. No. Name of State/Union territory Wage rate in Rs. per Day

(1) (2) (3)

1 Assam Rs. 152.00

2 Andhra Pradesh Rs. 149.00

3 Arunachal Pradesh Rs. 135.00

4 Bihar Rs. 138.00

5 Gujarat Rs. 147.00

6 Haryana Rs. 214.00

7 Himachal Pradesh Non-scheduled Areas-Rs. 138.00Scheduled Areas-Rs. 171.00

8 Jammu and Kashmir RS. 145.00

9 Karnataka Rs. 174.00

10 Kerala Rs. 180.00

11 Madhya Pradesh Rs. 146.00

12 Maharashtra Rs. 162.00

13 Manipur Rs. 153.00

14 Meghalaya Rs. 145.00

15 Mizoram Rs. 148.00

16 Nagaland Rs. 135.00

17 Orissa Rs. 143.00

18 Punjab Rs. 184.00

19 Rajasthan Rs. 149.00

20 Sikkim Rs. 135.00

21 Tamil Nadu Rs. 148.00

22 Tripura Rs. 135.00

23 Uttar Pradesh Rs. 142.00

24. West Bengal Rs. 151.00

25. Chhattisgarh Rs. 146.00

26 Jharkhand Rs. 138.00

27 Uttarkhand Rs. 142.00

28 Goa Rs. 178.00

29 Andaman and Nicobar Andaman District

Rs. 198.00

Nicobar district

Rs. 210.00

30 Dadra and Nagar Haveli Rs. 175.00

31 Daman and Diu Rs. 150.00

32 Lakshadweep Rs. 166.00

33 Puducherry Rs. 148.00

34. Chandigarh Rs. 209.00

Schedule








The Monthly Journal

MINISTRY OF RURAL DEVELOPMENT

Vol. 61 No. 7 Pages 52

May 2013

Kurukshetra

CONTENTS

Kurukshetra seeks to carry the message of Rural Development to all people. It serves as a forum for free, frank and serious discussion on the problems of Rural Development with special focus on Rural Uplift.The views expressed by the authors in the articles are their own. They do not necessarily reflect the views of the government or the organizations they work for.The readers are requested to verify the claims in the advertisements regarding career guidance books/institutions. Kurukshetra does not own responsibility.

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Empowering Rural Voices of India Anupam Hazra 3

Grama Sabha - A Milestone For Sustainable Development In Rural India Dr. H.D. Dwarakanath 5

Gram Sabha In Fifth Scheduled Areas Precept and Practice Dr. Mahi Pal 10

Empowering Gram Sabha Through Social Audit Dr. Ajai Pal Sharma 16

Empowering Gram Sabha Barna Maulick 21

From The Ground People’s Participation in Gram Sabha of Bihar Dr. Ramesh Kumar Singh 26

Strategic Action Plan For Direct Benefit Transfer Scheme Dr. Amrit Patel 30

Dimensions of Child Labour Dr. Subhash Sharma 36

Power of Social Media K V Venkatasubramanian 42

From The Ground A Unique Case of Mgnregs Worker from Rajasthan Shankar Chatterjee 45

An Apple A Day- Keeps the Doctor Away Anita Kumari 47 Purva Jaggi

CHIEF EDITORRAJESh K. JhA

EDITOR KAPIL KUMAR

JOInT DIRECTORVINOD KUMAR MEENA

COVER DESIGnSANJEEV SINgh

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Empowering GramsabhaVol. 61 No. 7 Pages 52 May 2013 Rs. 10/-

Kurukshetra May 201322

InsIde

The Gram Sabha is a concept intending to represent ordinary people’s needs and wishes which appeals to the general mass of population irrespective of class, caste, gender distinction and political partisanship. It refers to supremacy of the people.

The Gram Sabha enables each and every voter of the village to participate in decision making at the local level. It is a constitutional body consisting all persons registered in the electoral rolls of a village Panchayat. It provides a political forum to people in the village to meet and discuss their common problems, and consequently, understand the needs and aspirations of the community. It also provides a forum to meet, discuss, debate and analyse the development and administrative actions of elected representatives and thereby ensure transparency and accountability in the functioning of the village Panchayat.

In this issue we discuss the effectiveness of the system on the ground.

By making the Gram Sabha effective we can reduce the gap between the desired impact and actual impact of several programmes of the government involving crores of Rupees. By strengthening the institution of Gram Sabha we can bring the gains of our democracy and economic prosperity spreads evenly across the country.

Every five years, about 3.4 million representatives are elected by the people through the democratic process, out of whom one million are women who head about 175 district panchayats, more than 2,000 block Panchayats and about 85,000 gram panchayats. Likewise, more than 30 city corporations and about 600 town municipalities have women chairpersons.

India has created history in fiscal federalism in the world through the landmark 73rd and 74th Amendments to its Constitution in 1992 which adds a three tier of local self-government to its federal structure. The 73rd Amendment Act has given Constitutional recognition to rural local self-government institutions enabling decentralization in governance through panchayati raj institutions.

The participatory approach helps us to reduce development cost, increase perceived and actual benefits and increase awareness among the people and help in the mobilization of local resources, facilitates smooth and easy project implementation. It further enables people to have access and control over the resources and ensures that the benefits reach to the legitimate claimants. It also creates sustainability aspect and gradually empowers the socially and economically disadvantaged people.

Kurukshetra May 2013 3333

EmpowEring rural VoicEs of indiaAnupam Hazra

The three-tier Panchayati Raj system constitutes the foundation on which stands the entire edifice of rural development in India. The

basic philosophy of Panchayati Raj system is that the villagers should think, decide and act for their own collective socio-economic interests. On 2nd October, 1959, Pandit Jawahar Lal Nehru, the first Prime Minister of India laid the foundations of Panchayati Raj at Naguar in Rajasthan and in 2009, the Panchayati Raj Institutions have completed fifty years of its inception. The Golden jubilee Celebrations were marked with the observance of year 2009-10 as ‘The Year of the Gram Sabha’. The Gram Sabha is explained in the context of the Constitution of India as a body of all adult members of a village who has the right to vote; it has been conceptualised as a forum of village people to ensure the accountability of the elected representatives at the village level and has been recommended to act as a watchdog on the working of gram panchayats

besides facilitating the rural people’s participation in the decision-making processes.So, decentralization in India has taken a huge step with the formation of Gramsabha as a constitutionally mandated body, which is supposed to play a central role in promoting participatory democracy not only by working as an institutionalized platform to represent each and every section of the community and their needs but also by functioning as a mechanism to monitor and evaluate the development activities carried on by Panchayat.

The present scenario of functioning of Gramsabha, however, is a bit critical considering the assumptions with which it was introduced. It cannot be denied that it is not easy for a mandated body to perform its function, especially when it concerns people, contesting with the social realities of stark power imbalances. Though there are provisions for representation of the weaker section of the society in terms of caste, tribe and gender, implying the same

The realisation of the concept ‘Gram Sabha’ is totally dependent on a change in the attitude of the local people, who are the members of the Gram Sabha. So, let us promote and campaign towards conducting Gramsabha in rural India.


on the ground is a different story all together. Effective functioning of Gram Sabha will only be possible when the common people will start recognizing its importance and their role in it. Lack of awareness among the Gramsabha members often contributes to limited presence and participation. This is more so for the marginalized section of any community who are in a worse position than others. Thus there is a need to provide support to both the community members and also to the elected representatives to understand the importance of Gramsabha, its roles and their significance in the whole process of sustainable development.

In Country like India with so much of diversity and unevenness, any mandate is not so easy to put into practice. Creating an institutionalized space in the form of ‘Gram Sabha’ for empowering people to effectively use that space is similar to the issue of policymaking and its practical implementation. Non-participation of the rural people has hobbled the development of the Gram Sabha, denying the true benefits of this institution to the people. The concept of gram sabha has also not been grasped clearly, right from the policy-makers to the villagers. The difficulty lies in motivating the villagers to attend the Gram Sabha meetings. In most of the backward villages, in the absence of a common public, the vested interests are likely to influence the proceedings which may not be in the felt need or real interest of the community. Therefore, the office bearers of various village level organisations such as schools, colleges, cooperative societies, banks, mahila mandals, youth groups, farmers’ associations and voluntary agencies should take part in the meetings as these institutions are expected to safeguard the interests of the community. Some of these institutions can also assume the role of facilitators of the Gram Sabha and form a link between the Gram Panchayat and Gram Sabha. With good team work at the village level in the form of Gram Sabha, the community will be able to monitor the services provided by the Government. There are instances where the members of the village self-help-groups (SHGs) monitor the attendance of school teachers and Anganwadi and Health Workers. Such groups have prevented vested interests from mismanaging the Gram Panchayats and have elected new members and therefore ensured transparency. A gram

sabha needs to generate a feeling of belonging. The real challenge now is to ‘reconnect’ the sabha, by communicating clearly its function and purpose both at the individual and public levels.

The realisation of the concept ‘Gram Sabha’ is totally dependent on a change in the attitude of the local people, who are the members of the Gram Sabha. So, let us promote and campaign towards conducting Gramsabha in rural India. If people, as responsible citizen participate in the process of governance and decision making process through Gramsabha - most of the issues will be resolved at the village level and within the village itself ; and if Gramsabhas function with the true spirit, then it is inevitable to achieve sustainable development in rural India by ensuring grass-root democracy. For the rural local governance to be effective, energizing Gram Sabhas is a real challenge. There is a need to evolve mechanisms for regular and meaningful meeting of the Gram Sabha, active participation of its members and monitoring its functioning. However, some civil society organizations have been working actively for strengthening gram sabhas. As a result of their efforts and the initiative taken by some honest Panchayat Pradhans and other villagers, some successful examples of the active and purposeful functioning of gram sabhas are already available. These have helped to break the myth that it is not possible to hold meaningful discussions in a large gathering of villagers. The government is to be congratulated for recognizing the unrealized potential of the gram sabha.

At the end, while concluding I must say that had Dr. Babasaheb Ambedkar been with us today, he would have been delighted to notice that the serious apprehensions he had nurtured about panchayati raj at the time of drafting the Constitution, no longer remain in the same measure as its bottom most strata ‘Gram Sabha’ is aspiring to achieve Mahatma’s vision for a true ‘Gram Swaraj’ - where each villager will have a say in rural governance and where every rural poor will be a party to all deliberations, discussions and decisions regarding the plans, programs and policies for the advancement of rural India and its socio-economic, cultural and political progress.

[The author is Assistant Professor in Department of Social Work at Assam (Central) University, Silchar –788011; Assam: E-mail: [email protected]]


grama saBHa - a milEstonE for sustainaBlE dEVElopmEnt in rural india

Dr. H.D. Dwarakanath

The 73rd Amendment to the Indian Constitution (1992) is a milestone in the evolution of Panchayats in India which

carved out the third tier of the Indian Political System. While the Panchayats have been the backbone of Indian villages to achieve economic development and social justice in rural areas.

Grama Sabha which is an entity of constitution of India is legitimized statutory body to do multi-faced work at the village level.

The main objective of introducing Grama Sabha is to have decentralized planning and evaluation with peoples participation at the grass root level. The concept of eradication of discrimination and facilitation of peoples participation from all walks of social life in the management of affairs of their

locality were the foundation for the emergence of comprehensive society called Grama Sabha. Transparency and intimacy becomes part and parcel of their institution. The realization that people’s participation alone can bring sustainable development through good governance at the base level. Hence, it becomes inevitable that collective wisdom of Grama Sabha guides the Panchayati Raj Institutions in their planning and execution of developmental functions, social auditing as an integral part of Grama Sabha that ensures transparency in administration and accountability of Panchayati Raj Institutions. In Tamil Nadu Grama Sabha is described as “A body consisting of persons registered in the electoral rolls relating to a village comprised with in the area of Panchayat at the village level.

The constitution 73rd Amendment Act 1992 has recognized the Grama Sabha as a statutory unit. It is defined as a body consisting of persons recognized in the electoral rolls relating to a village comprised with in the area of Panchayati Raj at the village level.


Grama Sabha Act in Different States

The significance of Grama Sabha was recognized first by Maharastra government as early as in 1959. The Bombay village Panchayat Act of 1959 provided for a minimum of two meetings of the Grama Sabha to be held in a year. It is obligatory on the art of Panchayat to place efore Grama Sabha manual statement of the accounts and report of the administration of the proceeding year the development and progress of works for the ratification of Grama Sabha. The significant role that Grama Sabha could play in Maharastra can be understood from the fact that Maharastra land reforms review committee recognized it even in the vital matters like complementation of tenancy acts. It is a paradoxical truth that in several neighbouring states of Maharastra. The Grama Sabha is emerging as a vibrant body of decentralized administration.

In fact the Karnataka act No.20 of 1958 passed by the erstwhile Janata government introduced the body called Grama Sabha an important competent of decentralized administration without mentioning abut the specific functions of Grama Sabha. However, Diwakar Committee (1963) had brought to light the difficulty caused by Grama Sabha as it does not have any constitutional rights to control the functioning of Panchayats at the grass root level.

The Karnataka Act revels that Grama Sabha was expected to prepare and promote more development schemes for the rural development. But in reality there is no evidence to show that the Grama Sabha had performed the function. There is no substantial evidence to show that Grama Sabha had mobilized voluntary labour and contribution in kind and cash for Community Welfare Schemes.

Grama Sabha in Tamil Nadu

Under section 3 of Tamil Nadu Panchayats Act 1994, Grama Sabha is envisaged for every village Panchayat consisting of persons registered in the roll released to the Panchayat. In Tamil Nadu Grama Sabha is an instrument through which public directly enjoy the power and feel the pulse of administration. Collective wisdom of Grama Sabha guides the Panchayati Raj Institutions in their planning and execution of developmental functions. Apart from this social auditing is an integral part

of Grama Sabha in Tamil nadu, which ensures transparency in administration and accountability to all in the village development.

Functions of Grama Sabha

Grama Sabha is the basic foundation of the grass root level democratic institution and constitutionary mandated body would perform following 12 functions.

1. To examine annual statements of accounts, audit report, audit note and to seek clarification from the Panchayat.

2. To discuss report on the administration of the preceding year.

3. To review programme for the year, any new programme and review all kinds of works under taken by the Gram Panchayat.

4. To consider proposals for fresh taxation or for enhancement of existing taxation.

5. To approve the selection of schemes, beneficiaries location, identification and implementation of various development programmes.

6. To mobilize voluntary labour and contribution of kind and cash.

7. To undertake programmes for adult education and family welfare with in the village.

8. To promote unity and harmony among all the sections of the rural community.

9. To seek clarifications from the Mukhia and members of the Grama Panchayat about schemes, income and expenditure.

10. To consider the budget prepared by the Gram Panchayat and future development programmes and plans.

11. To maintain a complete register for all development works undertaken by Gram Panchayat or any other department.

12. To approve village plan of action.

However, here is no unanimity among the states in implementing the function devolved. Most of the states are not serious in implementing the functions to achieve sustainable economic development in the villages. The constitutional right empowered to Gram Sabha has miserably failed in


bringing transformation among the rural poor. The grave reality is that in Assam, Arunachal Pradesh, Chandigarh, Himachal Pradesh, Uttar Pradesh, Madhya Pradesh, Haryana and Uttaranchal villages are not aware of the meetings of Grama Sabha and its functions. Most of the Panchayts have failed to execute the decisions taken of the Grama Sabha. However the recent experience reveals that there is a growing awareness among the rural people about the significance of Grama Sabha functions. For example the states like Karnataka, Kerala, Tamil Nadu, Rajasthan, Sikkim have successfully implementing the decisions of Grama Sabha while in Assam, West Bengal, Uttara Padesh the functions of Grama Sabha are only confined to ratification of budget and audit report, review programme of the work undertaken by the Panchayats and seeking clarification from the Mukhia about the schemes income and expenditure.

Grama Sabha Meetings – A Myth

One of the most important recommendations made by the 73rd Constitution Amendment that the Grama Panchayat should invariable conduct Grama Sabha meetings regularly and elicit the opinion of the voters about the priority of development works and in turn implement them to achieve sustainable development.

It is unfortunate that a majority of state governments could not show any seriousness and have failed to conduct Grama Sabha meetings which is mandatory. Unless the people of the village participate and ventilate their opinion in a democratic way Panchayatari Raj Institutions cannot be strengthened.

The operational functions reveals that there is a diversity in the operarationalisation of the concept of Grama Sabha in different states. The Table-II indicates that in states like Andhra Pradesh, Bihar, Haryana, Uttar Pradesh and West Bengal only two meetings held annually. But in states like Arunachal Pradesh, Assam, Chandigarh, Goa, Kerala, Orissa and Tamil Nadu the functions of Grama Sabha is much better with four to six meetings held in a year. It is a paradoxical truth that Madhya Pradesh government has paved the way for the better governance at the grass root level by conducting 16 meetings held annually. By observing the Grama Sabha meetings and its performance, it may be

difficult to arrive at a conclusion that, how Grama Sabha is operationalised are important factor that has evolved is the decision of the Grama Sabha has become mandatory over the Grama Panchayats. This has ultimately paved the way for the practice of good governance at the grass roots and where the concept of economic development and social justice have become the core of all operations.

However, the collective wisdom of Grama Sabha guides the Panchayat Raj Institutions in their planning and execution of developmental functions. Social auditing is an integral part of Grama Sabha which ensures transparence in administration. However, the Tamil Nadu government issued instructions to conduct Grama Sabha on 26th January, 15th August, 1st May and 2nd October without fail.

Grama Sabha Committees

Constituting Grama Sabha committees to supervise the operational aspects of Gram Panchayat as one of the vital concept of decentralized administration. The observation reveals that most of the state governments are not serious towards formation of Grama Sabha committees. Few states like Bihar, Goa, Himachal Pradesh, Manipur, Rajasthan and Tripura have formulated vigilance committees to ensure transparency at the grass root democracy.

Though Grama Sabha is empowered to participate in decision making process of the Panchayat meetings, none of the state government formulated Grama Sabha with development committees at the village level. In order to ensure sustainable development of each individual citizen in the village. Hence, it is necessary to formulate following 18 committees for the total transformation of the Panchayat administration in rural India.

Grama Sabha Needs Legal Knowledge

In a vast country like India Grama Sabha needs basic legal knowledge to educate the local people on Panchayati raj administration in general and Gram Panchayat in particular. Grama Sabha becomes alive to the legal issues and develop legal knowledge with the help of constant “Legal Literacy Campaign(LLC)” to attain maturity with greater sustainability of development initiatives.


In recent times efforts are made to create legal awareness among the rural people, the Madhya Pradesh government launched a noval method of spreading legal knowledge to the village habitants including SC & STs of the Scheduled Tribes Act2006 which empowers Grama Sabha on Information Act. A small booklet in tribal dialects published and distributed in all the tribal areas in Madhya Pradesh. Added to this innovative audio materials on the provisions of the act were developed and distributed among 8000 tribal villages to create awareness about functions and responsibilities of Grama Sabha. The right to information act has made specific provisions on National Rural Employment Guarantee Act, Panchayati Raj guidelines, Food Security, Forest Environment Act, Child Labour Eradication Act, Employment of Rural Women and Controlling Social Evils in rural society. The Right to Information Act (2005) is a bold step towards creating transparent system of governance through Grama Sabha.

The constitution of India has provided Grama Sabha a body consisting of voters of Panchayat to which Gram Panchayat is accountable and answerable. The body being a forum of village level planning and a venue of social audit has a crucial role to play in developing rural infrastructure.

Need for Effective Peoples Participation

The goal of inclusive growth as envisaged by the government cannot be achieved without the effective participation of local people and the Panchayati Raj Institutions and these institutions should be considered as an integral part of the governance of the country. In this context several suggestions are made by the experts and voluntary organizations towards effective peoples participation.

1. Grama Panchayat should be made responsible to conduct Grama Sabha meetings twice in a year under the direct supervision of Mandal Development officials and the Revenue officials.

2. The exact date of conducting Grama Sabha can be left to the discretion of the village Panchayat and its members.

3. Beneficiaries of various schemes should be identified and approved only in the Grama Sabha meetings. All the benefits of various schemes should be distributed tin the Grama Sabha only, so that benefits would go to right persons only.

4. Information regarding all government activities in connection with the village Panchayat should take place through Grama Sabha. This would create interest among the people to participate in the meetings.

5. A film show explaining the public policies and programmes under taken by the government in the field of Agriculture, Rural Health, Education Minimum Needs Programme, Right to Information, Drinking Water to all the local public, Public Distribution System would attract the people towards Grama Sabha meetings.

6. A collective participation of the villagers along with Grama Panchayat ward members would go a long way in solving the developmental issues in the village in turn this would help in achieving integrated development in the village Panchayat.

7. Print and electronic Media should play an important role in providing adequate information about the growing importance of Grama Sabha and create social awareness among the people.

8. The salient features of Grama Sabha and the various activities to be constituted during Grama Sabha meetings and agenda has to be informed to the villagers well in advance.

9. Ward members/public representatives must disseminate the information about the Gram Panchayat function to the local people in their respective wards and they should motivate them to participate in the Grama Sabha.

10. Ward wise Grama Sabha would enable every voter to participate in the deliberations. The village Mukhia and ward member should apprise the ward people about the government programmes sanctioned to the village.

[The author is Associated Professor (Retired) and Coordinator, Research Institute for Rural Development and Management, Vikarabad, Ranga Reddy District in Andhra Pradesh – email. [email protected]]


gram saBHa in fiftH scHEdulEd arEas PrecePt and Practice

Dr. Mahi Pal

The idea of the Gram Sabha (Village Assembly) is not new, although it got more currency after the 73rd Amendment to the

Constitution and particularly after extension of this Act to 5th Scheduled Areas by Provisions of the Panchayat (Extension to the Scheduled Areas) Act, 1996(hereafter referred to Extension Act). States of Himachal Pradesh, Rajasthan, Madhya Pradesh, Chhattisgarh, Jharkhand, Orissa, Maharasthra, Andhra Pradesh and Gujarat covered under fifth scheduled of the Constitution. In pre-independence days also under British regime the idea of associating villagers with the panchayat administration was accepted and incorporated in some of the provincial panchayat legislations like Bombay Village Act of 1933, which had the provision of assembling all the adults at a common place

where the panchayat would read out the report on the village administration for the preceding year and activities to be taken up in the ensuing year. But the Gram Sabha was not empowered to make changes in the proposals made by the Panchayats. This was obvious because not much was expected from the alien government.

However, not much interest in strengthening participatory democracy by way of making Gram Sabha as corner stone of the Panchayati Raj System. As elections to the panchayats were not held regularly, the legal provisions made by some states regarding the Gram Sabha have remained on paper. The Article 243A of the 73rd Constitutional Amendment Act has given the backing to make the constitution of the Gram Sabha mandatory


in the states. But the powers and functions of the Gram Sabha have been left to the discretion of the state legislatures. As a result, different states have developed powers and functions to this body differently. In some states it has been made a discussing body, in some others it is made a recommendatory body whereas some states have gone to the extent of making it is an approving body of the schemes and programmes taken up panchayats. But the Extension Act is a watershed in the sphere of devolution of powers and authority at local level, as it has empowered this corporate body in taking decisions about all vital issues including jal, (water), jungal (forests) and Jamin (land) in the hands of tribals.

Present paper focus on provisions about powers and authority contained in the Extension Act and as to what extent these provisions have been interwoven in the State Panchayat Acts in the 5th Scheduled Areas States of the country. Paper also focuses on as to what extent conformity legislations of the States have been amended to give effect of the provisions of the Extension Act.

Salient Features of the Extension Act

Although Article 243(1) of the Constitutions prohibits extension of provision of the 73rd Constitutional Amendment Act 1992 to tribal areas and Scheduled Areas referred in Article 244 Clause (1) and (2) of the Constitution, Article 243M(4)(b) empowers the Parliament to make laws to extend the provisions of the Act to these Areas subject to certain conditions. But without making a law by the Parliament, the states like Andhra Pradesh, Himanchal Pradesh and Rajasthan have extended 73rd Amendment Act to the Scheduled Areas. This was an unconstitutional step on the part of the states. Tribal leaders considered it another step by the state against the autonomy of the tribal people. They mobilized tribals around this issue. The matter was also taken up with the Andhra Pradesh High Court by the tribals and by some activists, which had termed State Act ultravirous to the Constitution. Keeping in view of the agitation by the tribals and judicial verdict of the Andhra Pradesh High Court, a need was felt for extending the provisions of part IX of the Constitution to the Scheduled Areas by

enacting a law in the Parliament. This resulted in constituting of a high level committee under the chairmanship of Mr. Dileep Singh Bhuria with the purpose to recommend as to how the Scheduled Areas could be recovered under the provision of the 73rd Amendment Act. Accordingly, in view of the recommendations of this committee a Bill was introduced in the Parliament and passed on December 19, 1996 which subsequently, after getting President’s assent on December 24, 1996, extended 73rd Amendment Act to the Scheduled Area mentioned under Clause(2) of Article 244 of the Constitution, It became mandatory on the part of the states to amend their existing Panchayat Acts in conformity with the Extension Act within a year i.e. by December 24, 1997.

By the Extension Act panchayats have been extended to the tribal areas of the States mentioned above. Following are the salient features of the Act.

(1) Every legislation on the panchayats in 5th Scheduled Area be in conformity with the customary law, social and religious practices and traditional management practice of the community resources.

(2) Gram Sabha has been vested with following powers:

a) Ownership of minor forest produce.

b) Approval of development plans and programmes.

c) Selection of beneficiaries under various programmes.

(d) Prior consultation on land acquisition matter.

(e) Management on village markets.

(f) Control money lending to STs and prevention of alienation of land.

(g) Control on institutions and functionaries in all social sectors.

(h) Give utilization certificate of funds used for the projects and programmes of social and economic development etc. to the village panchayats.

(i) Prior recommendation for granting licence or mining lease for minor minerals.


(3) Reservation for the scheduled tribes shall not be less than half of the total number of seats at all tiers (i.e. Gram Panchayat, Panchayat Samiti and Zila Panchayats) of Panchayati Raj System and reservation for other communities mentioned in part IX of the Constitution shall be on the basis of proportion to the population of these communities.

(4) The chairpersons at all levels of the panchayats shall be reserved for STs.

(5) In case of STs have no representation at intermediate or district level panchayats ,the state government shall nominate such underrepresented Scheduled Tribes but such nomination should not exceed one tenth of the total elected members of that panchayat.

(6) State legislatures while devolving powers and authority to panchayats to enable them to function as institution of self-government, it should be ensured that the panchayats at the higher level do not assume the powers and authority of any lower level panchayats or the Gram Sabha.

(7) The state legislatures shall follow the pattern of the Sixth Scheduled areas to the Constitution while designing the administrative arrangement for the panchayats at district level.

Thus, the Extension Act has given an important legislative framework for the tribal to have their control and rights over natural resources and conserve and preserve their identity and culture in participatory manner through the institution of the Gram Sabha.

The state legislatures should keep in mind the following aspects while amending their respective Panchayat Acts.

a) Gram Sabha should be made a corner stone of entire scheme of decentralized governance, planning and development by way of awarding independence in managing, protecting and preserving natural resources and formulation of socio-economic development programmes, projects and schemes for tribal people.

b) Relationship between the Gram Sabha and panchayat should be similar to the

one existing between legislatures and the government. In the other words, panchayats should take approval of the Gram Sabha in all matter effecting rural economy and society.

c) The underlying spirit of the Extension Act is on devolution of powers and authority (rather than delegation of powers) to the Gram Sabha which represent participatory democracy rather than empowering representative decentralized democracy in the form of gram panchayats and higher tiers of Panchayati Raj System. And while devolving powers and authority on panchayat or Gram Sabha, state legislature should ensure that panchayats at higher level do not assume the powers and authority of any panchayat at lower level or of the Gram Sabha. In other words, principle of subsidiary is to be followed i.e the function which can be performed better should be given to that tier of the government and not to the other tiers of it. Such provisions are not contained in the 73rd Amendment Act.

State Panchayat Raj Acts

As the tribal societies are homogenous and monolithic and have the cultural and tradition to work collectively, the participatory democracy through the Gram Sabha is very appropriate for them. Keeping in view of the participatory culture of tribal the Bhuria Committee has recommended to make the Gram Sabha the corner stone of entire scheme of decentralized governance. In view of above, let us examine as to what extent the conformity legislations contained this philosophy of decentralized governance for these areas.

Table 1 presents state wise details whether the provisions of the State Panchayat Acts have been legislated in conformity with the Extension Act. As per section 4(d) of the Extension Act every Gram Sabha (GS) shall be competent to safeguard and preserve the traditions and customs of the people , their cultural identity, community resources and the customary mode of disputes resolution. Secondly, as per section 4(e) of the Extension Act GS approve the, plans, programmes and projects for social and economic development. Thirdly, as per section 4(f) of the Extension Act every panchayat at village level


shall be required to obtain utilization certificate of the work done in the areas from the GS. It may be seen from table 1 that these provisions have been made in the State Panchayat Acts.

Section 4(i) of the Extension Act says that GS or Panchayats at appropriate level shall be consulted before making the acquisition of land in the Scheduled Areas for development projects. This is very important provision of the Act as issue of land is involved , which is very important for the point of view tribal. It may be seen from table that this provision has been provided in all the State Acts except Chhttisgarh, Jharkhand and Madhya Pradesh States. Section 4(k) of the Extension Act says that recommendation of the GS or the Panchayat at the appropriate level shall be made mandatory prior to grant of prospective licence or mining lease for minor minerals in these areas. About this , the table shows that States of Chhattisgarh, Gujarat, Jharkhand and Madhay Pardesh have not legislated these provisions in their Panchayat Acts.

Section 4(m) of the Extension Act says that while endowing Panchayats in Scheduled

Areas , State Legislature shall ensure that the Panchayats at the appropriate level and the GS are endowed with powers enumerated in para 2 under salient features of the Extension Act. Table 2 depicts state- wise status of these powers to GS. It may be seen from the table that enforcement of prohibition has not been provided in the States of Chhattisgarh, Gujarat, Jharkhand and Madhay Pardesh. Ownership of minor forest produce has been endowed in GSs in all the States except Chhattisgarh and Madhay Pradesh, Another important power is prevention of alienation of land. Out of nine States , this provision has been provided only in four States namely Andhara Pradesh, Odisha, Maharathra and Rajasthan. Power of managing village markets has been given to GS in all the states except Maharathara. Power of control over money lending to GS has not been provided in the State Acts of Chhattisgarh, Jharkhand and Madhya Pradesh. The power of control over institutions and functionaries in all the social sectors has been given to the GS in all the States except Gujarat.

Table 1: Compliance of State Panchayati Raj Act with Section 4 of Extension Act

(d)Gram Sabha’s

competency for safeguard

(e)GS’s

Approval plans etc. and identification

of beneficiaries under Poverty

Alleviation Programmes

(f)Utilisation Certificate from Gram

Sabha

(i)Consultation with

Gram Sabha for acquisition of land

for Development Projects & before

re-settling or rehabilitating

persons affected

(k)Recommendation of Gram Sabha prior to grant of Licence or

minimum Lease for minor

minerals

State

Andhra Pradesh Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes

Chhattisgarh Yes Yes Yes No No

Gujarat Yes Yes Yes Yes No

Himachal Pradesh

Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes

Jharkhand Yes Yes Yes No No

Odisha Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes

Maharashtra Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes

Madhay Pradesh Yes Yes Yes No No

Rajasthan Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes

Source : Annual Report( 2011-12) of the Ministry of Panchayati Raj


Making provisions is important for enabling the GSs to control over resources in their respective jurisdiction. But more important is as whether the respective state legislations have been conformed with the State Panchayat Acts. For example, consultation with the GS is mandatory for any land acquisition in the area as per the State Panchayat Act. But to make this provision effective and operational, the respective State Acquisition Act should be conformed with the State Panchayat Acts. In other words, the power relating to land acquisition mentioned in the State Acquisition Act must be deleted otherwise it may create an environment of confusion which lead to no empowerment of GS and their members about taking decisions regarding land issues.

In view of above, let us examine as to what extent the important subject laws having bearing with Extension Act have been compliance with by the States.

Table 3 depicts such status across States in the country. It may be seen from this table that in case of land acquisition, State Acts of Andhara Pradesh, Gujarat, Jharkhnad Odisha, Mahrathara and Rajasthan have not been compliance with. In case

of excise, State Acts of Andhara Pradesh, Himachal Pradesh, Jharkand, Maharasthara, and Rajasthan have not been compliance with. In case of forest produce, the situation is very bleak as except Odisha, none of the state made any progress this regard. In case of mines and minerals situation is not encouraging as table indicts. Interestingly, in case of agricultural produce and market, except Madhay Pradesh none of the States has made any progress in this regard. Almost, similar is the position in case of moneylenders across the States

Above analysis of the Acts shows that not much interest has been shown by the States in putting in practice of the Extension Act in letter and spirit for improving self-governance.

On behalf of the Ministry of Panchayati Raj, IRMA had carried out an independent assessment of the functioning of the panchayats across the States. Some of the states which come under 5th Scheduled Areas have also been covered. Based on the findings of this assessment, an evaluation has been done about the grassroots realities. In case of Andhra Pradesh, although several mandatory provisions of the Extension Act

Table 2: Compliance of State Panchayati Raj Act with Section 4 (Para M) of Extension Act

(i)Enforce

prohibition by Gram Sabah

(ii)Ownership of minor forests

produce by Gram Sabha

(iii)Prevent

alienation of land by

Gram Sabha

(iv)Manage Village

Marketsby Gram

Sabha

(v)Control money lending by Gram

Sabha

(vi)Control over

institutions and functionaries by

Gram Sabha

State

Andhara Pradesh Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes

Chhattisgarh No No No Yes No Yes

Gujarat No Yes No Yes Yes No

Himachal Pradesh

Yes Yes No Yes Yes Yes

Jharkhand No Yes No Yes No Yes

Odisha Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes

Maharashtra Yes Yes Yes No Yes Yes

Madhay Pradesh No No No Yes No Yes

Rajasthan Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes Yes



have been incorporated in the state Act, actual implementation lacking. In case of Himachal Pradesh, in practice, most of the functions are handled by the States. In some States as Chhattisgarh some of the provisions such as enforcement prohibition, control over money lending are not clearly stated. In case of Rajasthan, conditions have not been created in the tribal areas to give effect of provisions of the Extension Act at the ground level. This might be on account of deficiencies in the legal framework and due to inability of tribal to seize the opportunities of the Act for their empowerment and self-governance.

Conclusion

It was expected that the Extension Act would lead to bring about participatory democracy which would be instrumental in ushering in the era of self-governance and empowerment. The Extension Act in real term is such piece of legislation which provide framework to establish Gram Swaraj as envisaged by Father of Nation. But it could

not be happened due to lack of political will and administrative support at different levels. Another important factor is that the tribal could not seize this opportunity due to lack of awareness on their part about the implication of this Act. Broadly, areas where Extension Act is applicable, are suffers from LWE. Ineffective implementation of the Extension Act might be one of the reasons of discontent leading to extremism in the tribal areas. There is an urgent need to implement the Extension Act in letter and spirit.

Among others, plan of action to establish the rule of Gram Sabha includes removing of deficiencies from the State Panchayat Acts, amendment of conformity legislations making Panchayat Acts more effective and build the capacity of functionaries implementing the Extension Act.

[The author belongs to Indian Economic Service. Views expressed are personal. [email protected]]

Table 3: Compliance of Conformity Legislations of the States with State Panchayati Raj Acts in reference with the Section 4 (Para M) of Extension Act

(i)

In force prohibition

(ii)

Ownership of minor forests

produce

(iii)

Prevent elimination of

land

(iv)

Manage village

markers

(v)

Control money landing

(vi)

Control over institutions and

fund

No No No No No No

Yes Yes No Yes No No

No N.A. No No No No

Yes No No Yes No No

No No No No No No

No Yes Yes Yes No Yes

No No No No No No

Yes Yes No Yes Yes Yes

No No N.A. Yes No Yes


As elections to the panchayats were not held regularly, the legal provisions made by some states regarding the

Gram Sabha have remained on paper.


Gram Sabha is the fulcrum of the entire Panchayati Raj System in India as it enables each and every voter of village

to participate in decision making at local level. Panchayat is supposed to convene a meeting of all adults of the village (Gram Sabha) and to read out all the financial statements and audit reports of the preceding year and the proposed work programmes for the current year. In contract nothing worthwhile happen in this direction due to lack of awareness among villagers and indifferent attitudes of village heads and other officials. It has also been observed that in most of the cases villagers even do not know about their rights and responsibilities which they possess being a member of the Gram Sabha. Even most of the members of

EmpowEring gram saBHa tHrougH social audit

Dr. Ajai Pal Sharma

Gram Sabha are not able to distinguish between Panchayat and Gram Sabha. For the knowledge of the villagers it is mentioned that Gram Sabha is the Corporate Body and Panchayat is the Executive Body in the Panchayati Raj System.

It has been also noted from time to time that citizens’ participation in the Gram Sabha is not satisfactory and wherever they have participated the outcomes are impressive because it creates pressure on the functioning of Panchayats for the betterment of the village. The fact also can’t be denied that these institutions operate in a complex social environment where the issues of caste, class, gender and religion can be seen openly. In actual practice the Gram Sabha has not raised to the expectation of the law makers too

Gram Sabha acts as a ‘Watchdog’ for supervising and monitoring the functioning of Panchayat and is authorized to examine the annual statement of accounts and audit reports. All these might have raised the hopes of the people high but the real picture at the grass roots level is little bit different and mixed.


and even the spirit of the Constitution of India. The socioeconomic and political realities of India with illiteracy, prevailing caste and gender biases, the rigid caste hierarchy and the powerful patriarchal norms are also not conducive to legislations bringing desired changes. So there is urgent need to discuss the measures to strengthen and empower the Gram Sabha.

Social Audit

Social Audit is one such strong measure through which this target can be achieved. Social Audit is a process in which details of the resources, both financial and non-financial, is used by public agencies for development initiatives and is shared with the people often through public platforms. Social Audits also allow people to enforce accountability and transparency and thus providing the ultimate users an opportunity to scrutinize all the development initiatives taken by the Panchayats. Social Audits are mandatory as per the 73rd Constitutional Amendment in 1993, through which the village communities are empowered to conduct social audit of all the development work in their respective villages and the concerned authorities are duly bound to facilitate them. Social Audits are expected to contribute to the process of empowerment of the beneficiaries and generate demand of the effective delivery of programmes. Special Gram Sabha may be arranged to conduct Social Audits of all the previous works in addition to ongoing development works as an item of discussion in meetings. But it has been noted that there are various factors affecting the Social Audit like;

l Lack of awareness among Gram Sabha members and their rights

l Lack of education at village level

l Dirty politics and infighting at Gram Panchayat level

l Lack of interest in people about the village activities due to their livelihood reasons

l Lack of information and awareness about various Government schemes

l Over dependency by villagers on panchayat members

Benefits of Social Audit

Awareness must be created among the Gram Sabha members that Social Audit is desirable for bringing transparency, quality and proper implementation of all the developmental activities being carried out at village level. The benefits may be cited as under:

l It will bring transparency and accountability in the functioning of panchayat system

l It will improve the quality of work and service delivery at all levels

l It will help improve people’s participation at Gram Sabha level

l It will create awareness and knowledge among the Gram Sabha members about the development works being carried out at village level

l It will force the Panchayat to keep proper records and accounts of the spending made against the grants received from the government and other sources.

l Through Social Audit all the stakeholders will be able to gain control over the implementation of development works undertaken by Gram Panchayat.

Other Ways for Empowering Gram Sabha

Creating Awareness: Awareness need to be created at village level about the rights and responsibilities of the Gram Sabha members which they are empowered through Constitutional Amendments but not making proper use of those. They must be educated and motivated to use their Constitutional rights.


Education: It has been noted that in rural areas the level of education is very low which need to be strengthened through transformations in education policies especially keeping rural areas in focus.

Right to Information: Right to Information Act 2005 passed by the Government has proved to be very successful weapon in bringing transparency and accountability in the functioning of the public bodies but it is not being utilized to its fullest at the village level because of low level of awareness about this Act among the rural people. If the Gram Pradhan is indifferent to the village people and functioning as per his own requirements and not ready to give any details of the expenditure made in the development process than RTI Act can help them to know about all the details of the work done. But what is required to be done is to spread awareness, knowledge, benefits and the process of using this act among the rural people.

Regular Meetings of the Gram Sabha: It has been observed in most of the rural areas that the Gram Sabha or Ward Sabha meetings does not take place regularly because of the lack of knowledge among the villagers or indifferent attitude of the Panchayat members. It is advised that these meetings should be held regularly at least quarterly and the minutes of meetings should be sent to BDPO (Block Development and Panchayat Officer) duly signed by some of the senior Gram Sabha members. It is also to be making sure that these meetings take place in a cordial atmosphere and fruitful manner.

Supervision by Senior Villagers: The supervision of the development works being carried out at all the village level should be done either by senior Gram Sabha members or any specific individual deputed/designated by the government itself.

Training of Panchayat Members: It has also been observed that in most of the villages the Panchayat members are either un-educated or under educated and are not able to function in effective way as desired. In addition to personal greed, internal politics and infighting at village level play an important part in selecting and electing the Panchayat members. So what is needed is that elected members should be trained and educated

either at district or block level about their roles and responsibilities towards their Gram Sabha and should be motivated to raise themselves above the internal politics being practiced at village level.

Increasing Participation of People: Participation of the people should be increase in planning, budgeting and auditing of all the development work to be carried out at village level, and this will create a sense of responsibility for both Panchayat as well as Gram Sabha. In the context of Panchayati Raj institutions, strengthening people’s participation in the Gram Sabha is a critical prerequisite for making Panchayats accountable to the people.

Better Coordination among Gram Sabha members: Due to internal fighting and bad politics as village level it is being observed that there is low level of coordination among the Gram Sabha members and the Panchayat make better use of that for their greed and selfish works. So villagers should be educated and motivated to practice better coordination among themselves for the development of their village through Panchayat activities.

Capacity Building of Villagers: Because of the socio-cultural reasons and the mindset of being ruled and inability to ask questions in addition to the feeling among the villagers that Gram Sabha meetings are dominated by a few people and Sarpanch play an important role in low representation of the people in Gram Sabha. So the capacity building of the villagers needs to be done through education, awareness, training, increased participation in development works and many more so that they are motivated to attend these meetings and can raise themselves to ask questions from the Panchayat in those meetings. This can also be done by regular visits and attending Gram Sabha meetings by BDPOs too.

Displaying Information of Notice Board: Gram Sabha should demand from the Panchayat to display all the information, about the works being carried out or planned in near future, on Panchayat notice board time to time so that the members who could not attend the Gram Sabha meetings due to one or another reason can have access to all those information.


Women Empowerment: Government might have taken various steps for the empowerment of the women and in many rural villages some of the panchayat seats are being reserved for the women. But in actual practice it has been noticed that the elected women representatives only become a signatory authority and all the work is being done by their husband or male members of the family. In most of the cases women representatives even do not aware about the activities and the work being taken in the village. This is not the empowerment but the harassment with the women, they should be allowed to conduct Gram Sabha meetings (so that more and more female members are motivated to attend) and carry out other development work especially related to women affairs which male generally used to avoid, then only it will be real empowerment to the women.

Role of Media: Media is considered to be the fourth pillar of the democracy. But in the present scenario media may not be focusing on the issues related to rural areas to the desired standards. Media should also take responsibility to reach to the rural areas and spread the awareness through their designed programmes focusing on the issues of the rural concerns especially Gram Sabhas.

Conclusion

There is no doubt that Gram Sabha has been described as the institution for direct democracy through participation of local community in decision making, fixing priorities about the development works, analyzing and approving the forthcoming programmes, perusing annual

reports and conducting social audits of all the works being carried out at village level. But the big question arises whether it is being done or allowed to be happening by the Sarpanch or Pradhans. This is because of the low level of the education among Gram Sabha members at village level, lack of awareness about their rights and responsibilities, fear of being exploited, indifferent attitude of the Panchayat representatives, infighting and bad politics at village level, low participation of the people, lack of coordination among the Gram Sabha members, etc. The need of the hour is that the people should be educated and aware about their rights and responsibilities toward society through capacity building of asking questions and raising their voice against the odds. Social Audit is one of the leading measures to move forward in this direction about which people should be informed and educated. It should be made sure that Gram Sabhas should take place time to time and all the reports are being presented in those meeting for the information and evaluation of the Gram Sabha members to bring transparency in the functioning of the Panchayats. Media (either public or private) can also play an important role in spreading the awareness and education among the Gram Sabha members thorough their specially designed programmes for this purpose.

(Dr. Ajai Pal Sharma is Assistant Professor, Department of Management Studies, School of Law, Governance, Public Policy and Management, Central University of Haryana, Jant-Pali Villages, Mahendergarh, e-mail: [email protected], M: 08930767222)

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According to Article 40 of the Indian Constitution, the respective state governments shall take steps to organize

village panchayats and endow them with such powers and authority as may be needed to enable them to function as the units of self-governance. Finally, legislative infirmity about PRI was removed in 1993 through the 73 Amendment of the constitution which made a three-tier system of Panchayati Raj a mandatory practice in all states. The 11th Schedule of the Constitution lists 29 subjects to the Panchayati Raj institutions which include almost all the aspects of rural development.

The basic objective of the democratic decentralization through reactivation of the

EmpowEring gram saBHa

Barna Maulick

Panchayati Raj system was to realize Gandhiji’s concept of ‘Swarajya’. Mahatma Gandhi favoured Village Swarajya, strengthening of village Panchayats and giving them centrality in local governance but Ambedkar believed that the village represented regressive India, a source of oppression. Hence the new state had to build safeguards against such social oppression. The Panchayats and their organisation was ,therefore, placed as Article 40 under the Directive Principles of State Policy in the new Constitution in 1950, which were not reasonable .Thus, there were two divergent views for village Panchayats.

The concept of Rural Development

The Government’s concept of Rural Development hitherto remained limited only to the

The Gram Sabha is expected to be an epitome of participatory and direct democracy, and is the only body, which should provide valuable inputs to Gram Panchayat to lead local government effectively. At the same time, Gram Sabha is also to act as a watchdog in the interest of village communities by monitoring the functioning of the Gram Panchayat.


anti-poverty programmes which are implemented by the Ministry of Rural Development. Considering the vast magnitude of rural poor, poverty alleviation has been a major objective of the entire planning process initiated since the beginning of fifties. The rural poor largely consists of small and marginal farmers, and agricultural and non agricultural labours. There are various dimensions of poverty and those relating to health, education and other basic services have been included in the development process. Both the Central and State governments are making sufficient allocation for the health, education and other services for the well-being of the rural poor.

Since independence, various schemes and programmes have been taken up both by the centre and state as anti-poverty measures. These included Community Development Programme, Small Farmers Development Agency (SFDA), Food For Work Programme (FWP), Minimum Needs Programme (MNP), Antyodaya Programme, Drought Prone Area Programme (DPAP), Hill Area Development Programme (HADP), Integrated Rural Development Programme (IRDP), Swarna Jayanti Gram Swarojgar Yojana (SGSY), Jawahar Rojgar Yojana (JRY), Employment Assurance Scheme (EAS), Sampoorna Gramin Rojgar Yojana (SGRY), Pradhan Mantri Gram Sadak Yojana (PMGSY), etc. Since the year 2005, National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme has been initiated in all the states by merging wage employment programmes like Food For Work Programme (FWP), Sampoorna Gramin Rojgar Yojana (SGRY), Employment Assurance Scheme (EGS), etc. The scheme is meant to provide 100 days of employment in a year to a family registered under the scheme. All the programmes of rural development were well formulated to fulfill the specific objectives.

Yet, the results were not on expected lines. The basic reason was that all these anti-poverty programmes were planned and implemented through the agencies created like District Rural Development Agency (DRDA), etc. There was, however, no involvement of Panchayati Raj Institutions as such. These programmes failed to become the people’s programmes. Thus, the Indian State felt that implementation of development programmes would be most effective if local people were involved, especially for identification of beneficiaries for

development programmes and to a smaller extent, for decisions on how to spend the funds available for different local projects. This explains the continuous emphasis in poverty alleviation programmes on entrusting selection of beneficiaries and locations of development works to the Gram Sabha.

Taking lessons, the government has now involved the Panchayati Raj Institutions in a big way in the planning and implementation of development plans. Now the Gram Panchayats and Gram Sabhas would plan and decide the types of works to be undertaken in the rural areas. The Gram Sabhas would also discuss and approve the plans. They would also supervise and monitor the rural development programmes being executed in the villages. The responsibility of development in the rural sector is now on the villagers themselves. The villagers’ fate no longer remains in alien hands.

Bharat Nirman

In order to create basic amenities in rural India, Bharat Nirman has been announced by the Central Government. It is a paradigm shift with a view to enabling the country to use the resources for building infrastructure and bringing basic amenities to rural areas. As a matter of fact the role of community participation through village panchayats becomes significant for achieving the six objectives of the Bharat Nirman, which included rural irrigation, rural housing, rural electrification, roads and rural telephony. It is peoples’ own-programme where every village will have electricity, road, safe drinking water, telephone, etc.

Eight Flagship Programmes

Besides Bharat Nirman, there are eight centrally sponsored flagship programmes of the Government relating to development viz. Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan, Mid-day Meal Scheme, Rajiv Gandhi Drinking Water Mission, Total Sanitation Campaign, National Rural Health Mission, Integrated Child Development Services, National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme and Jawaharlal Nehru National Urban Renewal Mission.

An analysis of the 73rd Amendment

The 73rd Amendment reveals that Panchayati Raj Institutions had to be vested with such powers


and authorities as would have enabled them to function as effective institutions of self-government. It implies that by vesting of such authority and power by the state legislatures, the Panchayati raj institutions could have turned democratic in nature with allocated values, priorities and policies and should have been able to provide its members with an opportunity to participate in the process of self-governance through Gram Sabha. The 73rd Amendment included the Gram Sabha or village assembly as a deliberative body to decentralised governance along with a three-tier structure of Panchayats from village to the district. Article 243(b) defines Gram Sabha as “a body consisting of persons registered in the electoral rolls relating to a village comprised within the area of the Panchayat at the village level” and in clause(g) village means a village specified by the Governor by public notification to be a village for the purpose of “Part IX The Panchayats” and includes a group of villages so specified.

Accountability of Gram Sabha

The Gram Sabha is expected to be an epitome of participatory and direct democracy, and is the only body, which should provide valuable inputs to Gram Panchayat to lead local government effectively. At the same time, Gram Sabha is also to act as a watchdog in the interest of village communities by monitoring the functioning of the Gram Panchayat. The idea of involvement and participation of villagers in their development through the institution of Gram Sabha was incorporated in the Village Panchayat Acts passed by some of the provincial legislatures in British India

Article 243A of the Constitution introduced by the 73rd Amendment and which is concerned with this institution says that “A Gram Sabha may exercise such powers and perform such functions at the village level as the legislature of a state may, by law provide”. The result is seen in entrusting of functions such as to endorse, to recommend, to suggest, to consider annual accounts and administrative reports and audit notes etc. to the Gram Sabha. Implementation of the suggestions and recommendations of the Gram Sabha could be ignored by the Gram Panchayat as these are not binding on the latter.

Implementation and Experience

Cynics and vested interests are often dismissive of Panchayati Raj as amounting merely to the decentralisation of corruption. While corruption in any form or at any level of governance is, of course, to be deplored and eliminated, the answer lies in putting in place systemic measures which would cap, reduce and eventually eliminate the scope for corruption. With this objective in mind, the Sixth Round Table organised at Guwahati by the Ministry of Panchayati Raj put together a series of recommendations for:

i) transparency in PRI transactions;

ii) formal audit through procedures recommended by the Comptroller and Auditor General and the Institute of Public Accountants; and

iii) social audit through the Gram Sabhas.

The Ministry of Panchayati Raj has since been urging State Governments for adoption of a variety of procedures which would make Panchayati Raj in the country more transparent and accountable, and, therefore, more corruption free, than hitherto, including (a) Activation of the Gram Sabha, preferably by statutorily endowing Gram Sabhas with the duty of: (i) approving all projects and programmes and plans of the Panchayat (ii) authorising the issue of utilisation certificates by the Panchayat bureaucracy and (iii) formation of the sub-committees of the Gram Sabhas to liaise with the counterpart Standing Committees of the Panchayat ((b) The constitution of Ward Sabhas to facilitate participative social audit; (c) The convening of Mahila Sabhas immediately prior to meetings of Ward Sabhas/ Gram Sabhas; and (d) Involving the Right to Information Act, and associating public-spirited NGOs, to make Gram Sabhas truly a people’s parliament to furnish the checks and balances, advice and consent on which depends the success of the democratic functioning of an elected executive authority.

The Challenge and the Way Forward

Gram Sabha is one of the integral and central features of the 73rd Amendment and it is also seen as a means to ensure direct democracy in rural areas. While the hopes raised through the amendment


State-wise Number of Panchayati Raj Institutions in India (2010)

States/UTs Districts District Panchayats

Blocks Block Panchayats

Village Level Rural Local Bodies Panchayats

Gram Panchayats

Equivalent RLBs

Andaman and Nicobar Islands 3 3 9 9 67 0Andhra Pradesh 23 22 1121 1098 21843 0Arunachal Pradesh 16 16 157 155 1756 0Assam 27 21 239 193 846 1766Bihar 38 38 534 534 8460 0Chandigarh 1 1 1 1 17 0Chhattisgarh 18 16 146 142 10058 0Dadra and Nagar Haveli 1 1 1 0 10 0Daman and Diu 2 1 2 0 14 0Delhi 9 0 0 0 0 0Goa 2 2 11 1 191 0Gujarat 25 25 225 224 14184 0Haryana 21 21 119 119 6234 0Himachal Pradesh 12 12 77 77 3241 0Jammu and Kashmir 22 22 142 142 4146 0Jharkhand 24 24 218 218 4559 0Karnataka 30 30 176 176 5720 0Kerala 14 14 152 152 999 0Lakshadweep 1 1 9 0 10 0Madhya Pradesh 50 49 313 310 23028 0Maharashtra 35 33 355 352 30554 0Manipur 9 4 41 0 160 2635Meghalaya 7 0 39 0 1463 0Mizoram 8 0 26 0 0 768Nagaland 11 0 52 0 11 1110Odisha 30 30 314 314 6234 0Puducherry 4 0 14 10 98 0Punjab 20 20 141 141 13603 0Rajasthan 33 33 242 242 9206 0Sikkim 4 4 27 0 163 0Tamil Nadu 32 30 385 385 12736 0Tripura 4 4 40 40 1040 0Uttar Pradesh 71 71 820 820 52206 0Uttarakhand 13 13 95 95 7555 0West Bengal 19 18 341 333 3352 0India 639 579 6584 6283 243764 6279

Source: Ministry of Rural Development, Govt. of India

are high, the real picture at the grass roots level is different and mixed.

While to a large extent, citizens’ participation in the Gram Sabha is not satisfactory, the outcomes are impressive where they have participated.

PRIs operate in a complex social environment. Caste, class and gender hierarchies have a crucial bearing on institutional processes and democratic practices. Participation in the Gram Sabha is affected by the apathy of the villagers. This indifference has


its roots in the long historical background of non participation in governance, entrenched with caste, class and gender hierarchies, which are quite un-participatory.

The political culture promoted since independence has also been one of patronage and it has certainly not encouraged the participation of people in institutional processes. Where the Gram Sabha did take place, the issues discussed were important and participation was genuine (ibid).

Gram Sabha meetings can take place in a fruitful manner only when there are institutional mechanisms to make people aware about the importance of participation (campaigns supported by governments).

Institutional measures are taken to divide larger Gram Sabha in functionally possible units like Ward Sabhas and functional relationship between Gram Sabha and other bodies (Gram Panchayats, CSOs, Project Specific Committees etc.) are institutionally defined and delineated on paper in clear-cut terms.

Gram Panchayats should be accountable to the Gram Sabha and the process of making Panchayats accountable should be the business of the Gram Sabha.

While democratic institutions provide opportunities for achieving democratic ideals, it is democratic practice through which these can be realised. While both democratic institutions and democratic practice are important for good governance, the latter is not guaranteed by the former (Dreze and Sen ,2002). In the context of Panchayati Raj institutions, strengthening people’s participation in the Gram Sabha is a critical prerequisite for making Panchayats and the system accountable to people (Vaddiraju, et. al, 2004). A strengthened Gram Sabha is more effective both in the short run for immediate accountability and in the long-run for building a healthy decentralised democracy (ibid). Gram Sabha has been described as the institution for direct democracy, for participation of the local community in decisions on their concerns, programmes and projects, fixing priorities, selecting beneficiaries, receiving annual reports and accounts, approving

the coming year’s programmes, conducting social audit, etc.

But the enthusiasm of scholars and policy makers has not caught the imagination of the local citizens and the extent of participation has remained a matter of concern. Measures suggested and sometimes even implemented (e.g., smaller size of Gram Sabha, holding meetings in the ward/village as Palli Sabha, Ward Sabha, appointing nodal officers to ensure that Gram Sabha meetings are conducted on the days/dates every quarter or six months fixed) in different states and even changed. While participation has been described in the Indian context, not only as a means to an end but also an end in itself, the results are not satisfactory. It remains a centrally provided, centrally driven exercise even after 20 years. Where some civil society efforts have been made for mobilisation, the impact has not been sustained after the mobilisation phase. Panchayats have not shown any tendency to convene Gram Sabha on their own, these are convened on the directions of state government where the majority of participants are poor, backward or close supporters of the Panchayat member conducting the meeting. There are limitations in a government-driven programme for local participation, especially when it ignores local realities of divisions, power structure, economic relations and dependencies and vulnerabilities unless it is preceded or accompanied by sustained capacity building and unless it is driven by a sustained vision and not only part of a government scheme/programme.

Summing Up

Finally, it is proved that non-participation of the rural people has obstructed the development of the gram sabha, denying the true benefits of this institution to the people. The concept of gram sabha has also not been grasped clearly, right from the policy-makers to the villagers. A gram sabha needs to generate a feeling of belonging. The real challenge now is to ‘empower and connect’ the sabha, by communicating clearly its function and purpose both at the individual and public levels.

[The author is Visiting Faculty, Department of Rural Studies, Patna University & Research Faculty in Centre for Economic Policy and Public Finance, Asian Development Research Institute.


The legislative empowerment of the gram sabha in India is a political development of outmost important, because it marks the

clearest break from the most dominant political orthodoxy of this century. This recent faith in gram sabha is based on the belief that the objective conditions of the poor are directly involved in the process of formulation and implementation of decisions affecting their lives.

It is important to recognise that this faith in the gram sabha is based on several extremely important but largely untested assumptions. It is assumed firstly that even ina village society with deep schisms of caste, class and gender,

an organic community still exists and that given appropriate legal and institutional spaces, it can act cogently and responsibly as a community. The second assumption is that the collective of the gram sabha would be a more reliable vehicle of good governance the a relatively unencumbered bureaucracy or local elected representatives.

The gram panchayat works under the overall supervision of the gram sabha. The membership of gram sabha constitutes of all the voters in a village. It is the decision- making body for the entire village. It is required to meeting at least twice a year- (a) To approve the annual budget of the gram panchayat and (b) To review the performance of the gram

pEoplE’s participation in gram saBHa of BiHar Dr. Ramesh Kumar Singh

Gram sabha or people’s forum has always been an integral part of the concept of a gram panchayat. The gram sabha is as ‘watchdogs’ coming between the politician-bureaucratic nexus. It is unfortunate that both grassroots leadership and grassroots bureaucracy both could not strengthen the gram sabha.

From the ground


panchayat. It has been the provision to assess the development schemes by gram sabha up to gram panchayat level. It is the gram sabha which justify the works done on different schemes through gram panchayat and local government bodies. It also keeps its eye on the expenditure and takes report on the completion of works. This way the concept of social auditing comes on the surface through the gram sabha. The MNREGA 2005 has also recognised the role of gram sabha.

l Gram sabha will monitoring of all schemes in gram panchayat.

l Gram sabha will regularly social auditing of all schemes which is done by gram panchayat.

l Gram panchayat will available all needy documents like master role, bill voucher and others to gram sabha.

Under this procedure there is a provision to call on a meeting of labourers to focus the light on the activities and the importance of the working schemes. All the members of gram sabha can take part in this meeting. In this meeting vigilant members are elected for gram sabha. In this committee poor section of the society has given the due representation. It keeps watchful eye on the development of the works and its merits.

After the completion of work once again a open scheme meeting is held in which the report of the complete works are produced will full details. After discussing in detail on all questions and verifying the facts completion certificate will be issued. With this completion certificate the last report of vigilance committee will be attached and forwarded to the coming gram sabha meeting.

The experience of panchayat raj in Bihar indicates that the state act has been amended from time to time to make it more effective in establishing gram sabha as genuine structure of grassroots democracy. Bihar panchayati raj act introduce in 1947 and enacted in 1949. Again, Bihar panchayati raj act has amended in 1959 and passed three tier panchayati raj-gram panchayat on village level, panchayat samiti on block level and zila parished on district level.

Some main features of Bihar panchayati raj act 1993:(i) election of panchayati raj institution by state election commission (ii) organisation of gram sabha is essential (minimum population 250) (iii) three tier panchayati raj- at the lowest level-gram panchayat, middle level panchayat samiti and the highest level zilaparished (iv) gram kachahari setup to materialize of village’s disputes. (v) panchayat finance commission setup.(vi) 1/3post reserved for woman in all panchayat institution. Bihar is the first state of India where 50 per cent for woman, 20 per cent extremely backward caste seats reserved and SC and STC seats reserved on base their population in the gram panchayat since 2006 gram panchayat election under the first term NitishKumar government.18 zilaparished seats out of 38 districts in the state have reserved for women.

It is evident from the experience of panchayat raj that the level participation of people at grassroots level was low and gram sabha were almost a formal institution with no role in various assigned works related to rural development. Limited and confine role of people in gram sabha

has been a significant reason for the increased status of mukhia at gram panchayatlevel. Even this hegemonic scenario has prompted to speak panchayat raj as mukhia raj. More than 60 countries worldwide have experimented with some sort of democratic decentralisation over the last 20 years or so. But evidence currently available indicates that none has gone for direct democracy at the local level to the extent.

Gram sabha or people’s forum has always been an integral part of the concept of a gram panchayat. The gram sabha is as ‘watchdogs’ coming between the politician-bureaucratic nexus. It is unfortunate that both grassroots leadership and grassroots bureaucracy both could not strengthen the gram sabha. The institution of gram sabha is dysfunctional due to the lack of leverage of local leaders to initiate meaningful participation in the sabha and their in capability to persuade people to support local initiatives.

The gram sabha as ‘watchdogs’ is coming between

the politician-bureaucratic nexus.


It has been evident that meetings called were mostly without prior and adequate notice. In most places, only a formality was observed; proxy meetings, at time were convened and proceedings were written even without the knowledge of those who attended. Meeting, if arranged, either proved to be abortive or unsuccessful because of thin attendance with the panchayat or discussion. It is certain that unless we have a vibrant gram sabha, we cannot have empowered and accountable panchayat.

Fieldwork The main focus of this paper is the gram sabha within the panchayat raj system in Bihar. The major concern of the paper is to explore the nature of people’s participation in gram sabha in Bihar. Two districts of the states are selected purposively for the micro level study. The selected districts are Patna and Rohtas.

For a proper specials coverage one block was selected from each selected district. From the selected blocks, five gram panchayat were selected where due representation was given to women- headed gram panchayats. A village listing schedule was administered in the selected villages.

The data was based on a village-listing schedule administered amongst villagers during the survey. The responses could be gathered only from those families that were available at home during the survey.

According to the study the households represented in panchayats vary from village to village. However, the average representation ratio is high and if the rotational system of representation allows maximum households to represent the panchayat, the system would throw up a seasoned, experienced and informed lot of members in the village.

The revival of gram sabha has been an issue of serious concern for government .It is known for certain that to make the gram sabha vibrant and hub of all activities, gram Swaraj system was introduced. With this perception in mind, households of selected villages were asked about their participation in gram sabha meetings.

The study found that out of 800 households only 23.88per cent reported that they regularly participate in gram sabha meetings whereas

33.00per cent responded that they seldom attended the meetings. Remaining 43.12per cent household pointed out that they never participated in the meeting.

Since the required quorum for the gram sabha meeting is one-fifth of the total member, the requisite number is maintained. But few number in every village attends the meetings regularly while a considerable high number never attends meetings. It is surprising to note this apathy of the villagers, particularly when the panchayats have been given powers to make them units of self governance. The feedback that we got from our respondents was that many unaware of the amendment package.

The study also found that that all the members do not attend gram sabha. Usually men or specific group of them go to attend the gram sabha meeting. Looking into this dynamic, it was asked to the households that from their family who attend the gramsabha meeting. Out of 800 households, only 3.76 per cent households are of the view that all men and women attend the meetings of gram sabha. 26.87 per cent households points out that only men of the family attend the gram sabha meetings. Only 3.12per cent households argue that head of family attend gram sabha meeting. Remaining 66.25per cent households are of the view that nobody attends the meetings. It is clear from the above analysis that in majority cases nobody attend the meeting whereas a significant number opine that only men attend the meetings. Despite having a statutory provision of one-third representation of women, mandatory for the quorum of gram sabha meeting, a clear-cut apathy is discernible among the households. I have found out some problems that- ·Now the election are held regularly and enthusiastically but gramsabha is not held regularly and not shown enthusiastically participation in the gramsabha meeting. · The most state government have not transferred significant power to the local government/gram sabha. · Gram sabha has not been given adequate power.

Conclusion-Participation in gram sabha meetings has been low despite the people knowing about the inbuilt advantages of the Gram Swaraj. Low participation can be mainly attributed


MGNREGA wage rates revised to protect workers against inflation

The government has revised the wage rates of Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (MGNREGA) with effect from 1st of April 2013. The maximum wage of Rs 214 has been fixed for Haryana and a minimum of Rs 135 for North Eastern States. Rural Development Minister Sh Jairam Ramesh made a statement in both Houses of Parliament specifying the new wage rate. The notification regarding revising MNREGA wage rates is linked to the Consumer Price Index for Agricultural Labour (CPIAL) from 1st April every year. In March 2011, after inter-ministerial consultations, the government had decided that the revision of MNREGA wage rates indexed to the CPIAL would be done annually. Thereafter, in July 2011, it was decided that this revision would become effective on April 1st each year. The decision to index MGNREGA wage rate to CPIAL was done to ensure that MGNREGA workers are protected against inflation.

to the strongly entrenched caste system, class differentiations and gender divide in villages. Mukhia and other influential people dominate in decision- making process. There are two prominent and sharply contrasting groups leading the panchayats- the group of traditionally influential representatives and the other of new as well as raw entrants. The importance of participation in the activities of panchayats as an important part of panchayat raj has not been realised in practice by the common man. In fact, in retrospect, it seems that some persons of status and influence stay away from larger community participation. The need of the hour is to utilise their capacities for village development.

For this, gram sabhas are to be made effective, active and creative so that the expected result could be accessible to the rural society. It is foremost responsibility of the panchayat raj representatives to convey to the people the real nature, function and the real spirit of gram sabha. Meeting of gram sabha can be a good platform for the solution of various day-to-day problems pertaining to the village society. This platform can also be used for the initiation of community work.

Most of the basic rural problems, which have hardly any cost effect, can be solved through motivation among the villagers and the gram sabha is the right forum to discuss all such issues. The vibrancy and efficacy of gram sabha will remain dismal. If it does not posses the capacity to perform assigned roles and responsibility. This question

becomes more pertinent in a socio-cultural milieu where human resource development is low and society is deeply fragmented and hierarchical. And therefore it is urgently needed that marginalised sections of society which has been out from the process of decision making have to be taken in mainstream through sensitisation and capacity building. Personal experience suggests that (i) To remove ruling mentality through enhanced education, knowledge and awareness in the rural people and to promote them for active participating in the social audit (ii) To remove ruler mentality through transparency, accountability and sensitive quality in the executive body and to promote them for become public worker. It leads to culture of transparency and accountability, and pressurised class will be become more capable. Resulted, they will be flow in the mainstream of development. The resource flow in gram sabha and its ever-increasing powers and authority have of late generated some interested in people. It is expected that this interested is retained, intensified and translated in practice into a more broad based and participative practice at grassroots level. The need is to address the issue of awareness generation among the masses. Training camps, awareness campaigns and audio-visual mediums can be of critical importance for the purpose of sensitisation and capacity building of the people. This process can lead the panchayat people close to the real objectives of Gram Swaraj of the dreams of Mahatma Gandhi.

(The author is Asstt. Prof. in Economics, Patna, Bihar.)


stratEgic action plan for dirEct BEnEfit transfEr scHEmE

Dr Amrit Patel

The Government from time to time has introduced a plethora of welfare schemes involving, inter alia, provision of subsidy or

subsidized goods for the socio-economic upliftment of poor in the country. However, numerous surveys and studies reveal that subsidized goods and welfare benefits have not been reaching to intended beneficiaries. The system of providing subsidies under various schemes of the Government has proved to be inefficient. The Central Government spent Rs.2.16 lakh crore on subsidies during 2011-12 accounting for 2.41%of country’s GDP. The

budget for the year 2012-13 proposed disbursal of subsidies amounting to Rs.1.9 lakh crore.] Government expects to reduce the cost and subsidy bill through better targeting. Union budget 2012-13, targets subsidies below 2% of GDP and below 1.75% of GDP in the next three years. It is in this context, this article briefly highlights the scheme, its benefits, Government’s initiatives and strategic action plan to complete the task in three years focusing on productively utilizing existing institutional infrastructure, creating awareness, resolving pressing issues, among others.

There is need to formulate Strategic Action Plan [SAP] for three years [2013-16] indicating month-wise and State/ district/ block-wise targets for issuance of UID Numbers and opening bank account in urban India comprising metropolitan, urban and semi-urban centers which have significant number of branches of public and private sector banks and urban cooperative banks.


Scheme: The Direct Cash/Benefit Transfer scheme provides for direct transfer of money into the bank accounts of eligible persons for pension, scholarship, payments under the Employment Guarantee Scheme and benefits/subsidies under other Government welfare programs. This can facilitate beneficiaries to use this money to buy goods and services in quantity and of quality from the market at competitive prices. Under the scheme the difference between the market price and subsidized price is directly transferred to the beneficiary in cash in proportion to the quantity uplifted from the market.

The scheme depends upon basic two requirements viz. Aadhaar, the Unique Identification (UID) Number and Bank Account. Aadhaar is a 12-digit individual identification number issued by the Unique Identification Authority of India [UDAI]to serve as proof of identity and address. The cash transfer will be enabled through ‘Aadhaar,’ a numerical biometric identification that is currently being given to all citizens of the country.The bank account is the most important criterion for the scheme.

On 1 January 2013, Government commenced implementing DBT scheme in 20 districts covering seven programs by crediting cash directly to bank account of eligible beneficiaries involving old age pensions, widow pensions, maternity entitlements and educational scholarships for SC/STs, OBCs, and minorities. Under the scheme, money meant for recipients of welfare programsis transferred to bank accounts linked to their UID Numbers. The scheme will be extended to 11and 12 more districts in February and March2013. Scheme would benefit more than 200,000 people initially, and would cover the entire country in December 2013. Cash handouts will replace the money the Government currently spends on subsidies on food, fertilizers and fuel, among others, under 42 Government programs and is expected to improve standard of living of 720 million people in the course of time.

Benefits: The scheme aims at minimizing incidence of corruption, eliminating falsification and duplication with regard to payments of subsidies. Incidentally, other benefits include [i]

bringing transparency into the subsidy system [ii]significant improvement in the governance of Government programs as benefits would reach the beneficiary without any intermediation and delay [iii] elimination of fraudulent claimants and saving“considerable” amount. [iv] direct cash through bank account would empower poor because they can decide how best to spend the cash to meet with their emergencies for which surveys exhibit they are compelled to borrow from informal money lenders [v] effective implementation of this scheme leaving cash in the hands of people would lead to higher demand for goods, spurring manufacturing and eventually boosting economic growth [vi] impact of cash transfer is robust when the beneficiary is a woman or the household is headed by a woman [vii] create “multiple effects” for good governance without any confrontation with dominant caste and elite groups. [viii] scheme envisages to target BPL families and deposit Rs.3.2 lakh crore per year in the bank accounts of 100 million poor families that will improve financial inclusion and bank’s liquidity position.

Initiatives: Government has directed banks to reach half a million unbanked villages through bank branches, BCs and Common Service Center [CSC]. Banks would add this year 45,000 BCs to already 65,000 at present. CSCs would be ready in terms of equipment, connectivity, biometric device, card reader and printer within three months. Government will incentivize banks by paying a transaction fee and developing a business model to help banks recoup transaction costs.With the efforts put in by the UDAI to invite applications from approved commercial banks deploying micro-ATMs to enable Aadhaar-based payments, it is possible that these ATMs will be operational in due course. By end of August 2013, every gram panchayat, mandal and district will be on the micro ATM network. Beneficiaries need not to run to banks or post-offices to get money but will receive at their doorsteps. Today, it is one bank, one business correspondent, one beneficiary. The new model would be one bank, multiple BCs and one beneficiary. The beneficiary will have choice of BC. In 43 districts camps are organized to enroll every beneficiary of 34 welfare schemes and 3500 machines are deployed each


with a capacity of about 50 enrolments per day and put in place accelerated process of generating Aadhaar for these beneficiaries.

Strategic Action Plan : The success of the DBT scheme depends upon Government’s commitment to address fundamental issues viz. [i] appropriate definition of poverty line, identification of intended beneficiaries under individual social welfare programs and accuracy in targeting only eligible beneficiaries including BPL households [ii] effectively subsidizing the poor for food, fertilizer and fuel once the prices are market determined and are liable to fluctuate [iii] devising appropriate system, method and procedure to instantly transfer the cash subsidy to the poor and enabling them to withdraw hassle-free and [iv] State Government’s endeavor to initiate fundamental reforms to streamline PDS, if food is kept out of the scheme. However, currently there are serious constraints viz. [i] only 222 million people in India have so far enrolled into a biometric identity scheme and most poor families do not have bank accounts [ii] only 40% of country’s population has bank accounts. The current banking network does not have adequate penetration to handle expected number of accounts. Financial inclusion and availability of information technology infrastructure are grossly inadequate to transfer cash. Government expects more than 600 million, or about half of the country’s population, would receive the Aadhaar cards by 2014.

Institutional infrastructure : Existing institutional infrastructure to speed up the implementation of the scheme should be productively utilized, viz. District Rural Development Agencies, District Industries Centers, Block Development Offices, Gram Sabhas, Gram Panchayats, Panchayat Samitis, Zilla Parishads, State Level Bankers Committees, District Level Coordination Committees, Block Level Bankers’ Committees, Lead Bank Office, NABARD’s District Offices, Financial Literacy and Credit Counseling Centers in each district, Rural Self-Employment Training Institutes in each district, among others. Effective coordination is a sine qua non among State and Union Government, UIDAI, RBI and Banks to achieve a collective goal.

Action Plan: Need is, therefore, to formulate Strategic Action Plan [SAP] for three years [2013-16] indicating month-wise and State/ district/ block-wise targets for issuance of UID Numbers and opening bank account in urban India comprising metropolitan, urban and semi-urban centers which have significant number of branches of public and private sector banks and urban cooperative banks.

Rural Areas: [i] In rural area existing public and private sector banks have been providing banking facilities in about 90,000 villages with population above 2000out of 700,000 villages. For these 90,000 villages, immediate need is to formulate SAP indicating village-wise and month-wise targets for issuing UIDs and opening bank account. This task should be completed in 2013. Banks can consider providing banking facilities in few villages around their existing branches particularly in the Service Area which the RBI has allocated to each branch since April 1989 and bank staff is much more familiar and gained field experience while financing IRDP and SGSY [ii] The Union Government in consultation with State Governments can consider involving all viable Primary Agricultural Credit Societies and rural post offices as BCs [iii] Progressively existing banks need to formulate SAP to provide banking facilities in all unbanked villages in five years [iv] Simultaneously, exercise to identify eligible beneficiaries under each of the social welfare programs of the Government should continue throughout the country covering all villages, block and district headquarters and completed in two years.

Monitoring: Banks through their SLBC, DLCC and BLBC should be provided a list of all existing UID holders with full addresses to facilitate opening bank accounts [ii] State Governments should utilize existing SLBC, DLCC and BLBC for a for opening bank accounts of all UID holders in a time bound plan on lines of financial inclusion program. In fact, SLBC should direct all banks to introduce a three years Bank Account Opening Plan for their branches. BLBC must monitor progress based on targets every month, DLCC quarterly, SLBC half-yearly and RBI/Ministry on an annual basis. A


robust information system should be put in place at block level with website in public domain.

Awareness campaign: Government can consider announcing in its ensuing budget to celebrate 2013-14 “Direct Benefit Transfer “Year to create awareness among all stakeholders through a systematically designed massive result-oriented campaign. Awareness has to be created to sensitize all stakeholders for issuance of UID Number, opening bank account, identifying eligible beneficiaries under social welfare programs of the Government, crediting benefit in the form of cash in the bank account and facilitating hassle-free withdrawal of the cash. The print, electronic and other mass communication media along with Government, banks, MFIs and SHGs can spread the details of the scheme among all citizens of the country through holding seminars, discussions, interviews, village meetings, among others. .

Issues: Issues that need to be sorted out expeditiously to speed up implementation of the scheme include, among others, viz. [i] Issue of the collection of biometrics data for Aadhaar and the National Population Register [a comprehensive identity database being maintained by the Ministry of Home Affairs]. [ii] Millions of people are being enrolled for UID without any legal safeguards. The UIDAI’s draft bill rejected by the parliamentary standing committee should be expeditiously reconsidered to support UID enrollment with legal framework. The committee had urged the government to “reconsider and review the UID scheme as also the proposals contained in the Bill in all its ramifications and bring forth a fresh legislation before Parliament.”[iii] Problems viz. fingerprints, connectivity, power failures, truant BCs etc. [iv] Single women, disabled persons and the elderly/sick persons who cannot easily move around to withdraw their cash [v] Inflation will easily erode the purchasing power of cash transfers accentuating poverty and starvation. DBT must be indexed to inflation, thereby giving no excuse to reduce welfare subsidies. [vi] UIDAI estimated 300 million people of 1.2 billion population have no official identification documents, viz. no electricity bill, voting card,

bank account . This prevents them from opening bank accounts [vii] Budget allocation for food and fertilizer subsidies in 2012-13 was 136,000 crore, which is expected to rise in the revised budget-estimates. The Commission for Agriculture Costs and Prices [CACP] has recommended direct cash transfer of food and fertilizer subsidies to beneficiaries could rise to Rs.200,000 crore next year. CACP estimated Government’s savings of Rs.20,000croreby direct cash transfer of subsidy to farmers.

According to UIDAI, apart from the herculean task of enrolment of eligible beneficiaries, it needs to be ensured that the authentication platform must not fail [it has to be 24x7 instantaneous and real time], operationally the system should not breakdown, no bugs or glitches in the system, to build with every delivery system that uses Aadhaar authentication for service delivery, an exception management system so that Aadhaar authentication failure does not become an excuse for denial of services to the people.

Need for: Measures that are needed include [i]The banking system may have to expand its network of both brick and mortar branches as well as branchless banking operations through technology adoption. Besides, integrating the existing vast network of post office network in rural areas, Primary Agricultural Credit Societies operating in 95000 villages, Non-Banking Finance Companies engaged in micro-finance operations, urban cooperatives, reputed NGOs, registering corporate houses as BCs and operating the scheme in a Public-Private-Partnership Mission mode would in course of time yield expected results. For example, Ujjivan Financial Services, a micro finance institution is servicing about one million people. But only 20% to 30% of its clients have bank accounts.[ii] When the Government expects Aadhaar penetration in 51 districts to be above 80 percent by December 2013, simultaneously the banks in these districts need to gear up their efforts to put in place at least branchless banking through technology adoption and ATMs [iii] Private-owned BCs whose performance is unsatisfactory and fraught with malfeasance needs to be


relooked [iv]Banks have opened millions of no-frills accounts in rural areas which they through their ingenuity and professional knowledge can convert into business model and build capacity of clients to operate these accounts hassle-free [v] To expedite the implementation, bank accounts can initially be opened for one member per household. The withdrawal can be done at bank branch and ATM through debit card and through BC model using smart card, PoS devices etc. [vi] To minimize vulnerability to fluctuating market prices, prices can be averaged out yearly based on forecasts [vii] Beneficiaries need to have flexibility in the choice of commodity while receiving cash subsidy. The amount of subsidy should be calculated based on the number of individuals per households rather than assuming an average household size [vii] Expand and improve cash transfers without waiting for UID.Appropriate people-friendly uses of modern technology can be explored and exploited [viii] Persons receiving pension from the local post offices can continue till UID system is perfected [ix] State Governments and PRIs must be serious to improve considerably the literacy level of poor people including adult persons to facilitate

them to understand the scheme and empower to access modern technology and operate ATMs, minimize incidence of frauds and redress their grievances [x]Ahead of the cash disbursal, the top executive of the State Government, say, the Chief Secretary should hold a video conferencing with senior officials in the district administration and banks.

Conclusion: One of the most successful cash transfer social innovation programs has been Brazil’s ‘Bolsafamilia ‘. It contributed significantly to the drop in poverty during 2000. Most important lesson has been meticulous targeting the beneficiaries. The DBT scheme cannot be termed a panacea for all evils but it is certainly a significant step in the right direction to transfer benefits to intended beneficiaries and contain subsidy burden. Concern by the legislatures and commitment by bureaucracy accompanied by the accountability will surely yield better results.

[(The author is Ex-Deputy General Manager consultant, Bank of Baroda, and has served as a in Kazakhstan, e-mail: [email protected])

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dimEnsions of cHild laBour

Dr. Subhash Sharma

In developing countries child labour, in one form or other, is a serious problem. Many children are working in the worst forms of labour like

bondage, semi-slavery, prostitution, civil wars and so on. According to International Labour Organisation publication ‘Child Labour and Targeting’ (1996), the number of working children in the age group of 5-14 years in all developing countries was 120 million but ILO later estimated in 2000 that there were about 180 million child labourers in the world and if secondary activities are included the number might reach to 250 million. Again the number of child labourers is highest in South Asia and therein India has the highest number of about 20 million (as per estimate of the Planning Commission of India in 2000). However, if we add the number of marginal child labourers to the number of main child workers, it would be around 25 million. Though poverty is the cause of the child labour, it is not the only cause. For instance, food insecurity, malnutrition, adult illiteracy, big size of the family, natural calamities, under- employment in agriculture, lack of awareness, bad habits of elders, etc are also

the causes of child labour, especially in developing countries like India. Usually the prevalence of child labour is high in those regions where the problems of poverty, hunger, illiteracy, malnutrition and low adult wages are prevalent. Undoubtedly, in India, more than 300 million people are victims of food insecurity, chronic or seasonal. Hence one may easily guess the range and depth of the problem of child labour in India.

Concept

The concept of child labour is highly complex and contentious. This aspect relates to age, place of employment, payment, exploitation, deprivation of childhood, and denial of full development of the child. It is really surprising that our national law, Child Labour (Prohibition and Regulation) Act 1986 does not define the term ‘child labour’ at all. The first question is concerned with age. Hence this law defines ‘child’ as a young person below fourteen years of age. But even the term ‘child’ has been defined differently in different Indian Laws. For instance, in Indian Penal


Code 1860, an enactment of colonial govt., section 82 defines a child as some one below seven years, that is, any deviant rganiza or unexpected/unusual action of a child below seven years is not considered a crime. Our constitution (Article 45, 39, 24) itself defines a child as some one below fourteen years of age. Similarly the Census of India, Apprentice Act 1961, Beedi and Cigar Workers Act, 1966, and Motor Vehicle Workers Act 1961 define a child as one below fourteen years. However, in most of the United Nations Conventions, especially Convention on Child Rights (1989) as well as ILO Conventions (15th and 16th of 1921) define child as a young person below 18 years of age. Interestingly India consented and signed the Convention on Child Rights (1989) on 12th November 1992. Thus there is a contradiction between international laws and national laws as well as between different national laws far as the age /definition of the child (hence child labour) is concerned. As one is considered adult at the age of 18 years, hence in my view all persons below 18 years of age should be included in the definition of child.

Employment

Second issue relates to place of employment. That is, whether a child employed in the family works may be considered a child labour or an outside employment is a necessary condition for being a child labour? The answer to this question would depend on how we look at the issue – narrowly or comprehensively. In a narrow sense, one may think that children’s working in the family agriculture tasks, petty business works, (shop keeping) small artisan works (carpentry, pottery, blacksmithy etc) or services should not be considered as child labor because these are their ‘own tasks’ or family tasks, not other’s tasks. Here the cultural identity of ‘we’ versus ‘them’ immediately arises – our family, our works, our needs versus their family, their works and their needs. But the question may also arise whether these family tasks are full time or part time? If these tasks are full time, that is, the child has to work for the full day as his parents and other adult members do, then certainly it comes under the definition of child labour. On the other hand, if a child performs family tasks only part time and his family takes care of his schooling and other requirements, he may not be branded as a child labour. But here we include both types as child labour because both full time

and part time employment of child deprives him/her from childhood.

Third aspect is paid versus unpaid work of the child. That is, whether for being child labour one is to be paid or even unpaid work of a child would come under the definition of child labour. For instance, first a child is engaged by an employer for grazing of his cattle or at a tea shop and is given only food or only clothes or both but no payment of wages in cash or grains etc. Second, a child performs the works of an employer without any payment or even food for the advance or debt taken by his family from the latter. Third, a child is given raw materials (like tendu leaves for beedi-making, or wool for carpet-making, or yarn for weaving of cloth, etc) by an outsider employer through a middleman to work at the farmer’s house itself on piece rate basis. Fourth, a child works as a domestic help in the house of an official and is given food and clothes in return as well as some rupees on monthly basis. To my mind, all these four categories of work by children come under child labour because the child works under certain compulsions and unfavourable conditions of employment with or without any return.

Exploitation

Fourth aspect is the exploitation. The question arises as to whether every type of child labour is necessarily exploitative. In this regard we are reminded of the report (1979) of Gurupadaswamy Committee, constituted by the Govt. of India, which distinguished between ‘child labour’, and ‘child labour exploitation’. According to this committee report, a child labour takes the form of ‘child labour exploitation’ if the following conditions are attached with it1:

a) The child is to work beyond his capacity;

b) When his work hours interfere in his education, entertainment and leisure;

c) When his wages are not in accordance with his work;

d) When the concerned occupation or production process is hazardous to his health and safety.

This committee was against the child labour exploitation but not against the child labour per se. However, such distinction is difficult to be made on ground because the social


reality is usually gray, not black and white. For instance, an employer may show payment of full wages to child labourers on parity with adult labourers on paper; he may show far less number of work hours than actual work hours; parents of child labourers may easily get their wards enrolled in a school; and an employer may easily show the protection and safety measures but without implementing them or the nature of work itself may be hazardous.

Education

Finally, there is a deprivation aspect. In practice, many children work as ‘unseen hands’ (unpaid and unacknowledged). As Ramachandran rightly says, a ‘large number of children are denied their right to childhood in all its connotations – the freedom to play, to learn and to develop to their fullest potential and, as such, must be classed as child workers, whether or not they are recognized as child labour’. This broad definition encompasses all the deprived children, working full time or part time, inside family or outside and even those how are neither working nor studying in the schools, whom D. P. Choudhary rightly calls ‘nowhere children’. D.P. Choudhary classifies that many children were enrolled in schools but later dropped out due to family compulsion or incapacity of the schools to retain them. Actually the proportion of boys from the poorest households who dropped out is 396 per thousand compared to 94 per thousand among boys from richer households. Thus, in his view, the problem of dropouts in rural schools may be attributed manly to the poor quality education a supply side problem. Similarly the PROBE also found that because of the poor quality of education imparted in govt. schools the enrolled children from poor families are dropping out and thus immediately joining the group of child labourers or becoming potential child labourers4. Shanta Sinha and her M.V. Foundation, Rangareddy, (Andhra Pradesh), engaged in the eradication of child labour since 1992, take the most comprehensive definition encompassing denial of child’s full development and rightly propound five postulates about child labour which are as follows5:

a) Every child not going to schools is child labourer;

b) Whether a child gets wages or not, works at

his family or under others, works in hazardous conditions or non-hazardous’ conditions, works on daily basis or piece rate, he work as a child labourer;

c) To eradicate child labour from India, the only way is to remove child labour system in rural areas;

d) Every work is harmful to child because it affects his development;

e) Different logics like family’s difficulties, poverty, child’s earning as additional income to family, family’s disinterestedness in sending child to school, school being boring to children and education being unhelpful in providing employment are against the holistic development of the child.

Thus I tend to agree with the last comprehensive and activist definition of child labour. This definition is ‘from below’, hence it encompasses both actual and potential child labourers on the one hand and, on the other hand, it tends to actually go beyond the realm of academics, and attempt to eradicate the problem of child labour. That is why she and her rganization have been fully involved in identifying the child labourers, motivating them, involving the community, engaging them in ‘bridge course’ and finally enrolling them in formal mainstream schools.

[II] Issue of Child Labour at National Level

During 1920’s in colonial India also the issue of child labour was raised both officially and unofficially. For instance, in 1929, the Royal Commission on Labour in India was established and it submitted its report in 1931 in which the pathetic status of child labourers was described in terms of taking work for long period (10-12 hours), prevalence of the condition of almost slavery, bondage and forced labour, corporal punishment for petty mistakes, pledging of children by their parents to some employers, nexus of moneylenders, landholders and factory owners in multiple exploitation of child labourers, no food, no interval, no weekly holidays and no leisure. It had noted the practice of pledging of children by their parents to employers, especially in carpet and beedi-making tasks, particularly in Amritsar and Ahmedabad. On the other hand, in 1931, at the Karachi session of Indian National


Congress, a resolution was passed for the protection of the labourers, including child labourers, which specifically emitted that the children of school-going age should not be employed in hazardous works like factories and mines. Consequently Labour Sub-Committee of Indian National Congress included following points in its report submitted in 1940:

i) work and life conditions (including work hours) could be regulated;

ii) correlating with the education system, the minimum age of employment should be slowly raised to 15 years;

iii) Work hours should be limited to 9 in a day and 48 in a week;

iv) Such a method of wage fixation should be used so that the labourer may get living wage and minimum wage.

Legal Initiatives

Needless to mention here that the political guru of Mahatma Gandhi, Gopal Krishna Gokhale, in the capacity of the President of Indian National Congress, had appealed in early twentieth century to the British Govt. for free and compulsory education of all the children so that they may not be deprived of the golden opportunity of getting knowledge and may not suffer as child laborers. However, the British govt. had already made a law – Factories Act 1881 – wherein it was provided that the children below seven years could not work in factories. Further children were not allowed to work in two factories and/or to work for more than nine hours. For the first time this law provided four days leave in a month but this law was applicable only in those factories where there were one hundred or more labourers. Further law had narrowly defined the children as those below seven years of very tender age whereas most of the child labourers start working after 7 years. To be fair, in the light of the recommendations of Royal Commission on Labour in India (1931), the British govt. made the first significant law in favour of child labour in 1933, known as Children (pledging of labour) Act 1933. This law clearly declared the pledging of child laborers by their parents to some employers through written bonds by taking some advances from the latter as illegal. It defined young person below 15 years as child labour.

Later another law, known as Children’s Employment Act 1938, was made by the British govt. It fixed 14 years as the minimum age for employment in carriage of passengers at railways and holding of luggage at port, beedi-making, carpet-weaving, cement-manufacturing, cloth-printing, dyeing and weaving, making of match boxes, cutting of mica and tanning works. Their age certificate was made compulsory in such employment but unfortunately the term child labour was not defined in this Act, rather it allowed the children above 14 years but below 17 years to work in prohibited category of works/industrial processes/occupations. After independence a central law, known as, Children’s Employment (Amendment) Act, 1951 prohibited the children of the age of 15-17 years to work at night a railways and ports. Secondly, it made mandatory for the employers to maintain registers regarding the young persons below 17 years employed by them. Again Children’s Employment (Amendment) Act 1978 was made by the govt of India where the children below fifteen years of age were prohibited to pick up coal and clean cinders in railway complexes, to work in construction works, catering establishment, and work near railways lines or between two railway lines. But this law, too, was not comprehensive. Later, in 1986, government of India legislated Child Laobur (Prohibition and Regulation) Act 1986. It has defined child as a young person of 14 years of age but it, too, did not define the term ‘child labour’. Its salient features are as follows:

a) Maximum work hours can not exceed six;

b) Half an hour’s rest in between 6 hours is to be given;

c) Children are not allowed to work from 7 PM to 8 AM;

d) prohibition to take work for more than three hours at a stretch;

e) One weekly holiday;

f) To maintain a register for children employed and in case of any dispute regarding age a certificate is to be issued by a competent medical officer;

g) The competent government (Central or State) to make rules regarding sanitation, health care and facilities for labourers;


h) In case of violation of the provisions of the Act, the employers of child labourers will be punished–minimum three months’ imprisonment and maximum one years’ imprisonment or minimum 10,000/- rupees as fine and maximum 20000/- rupees as fine or both for the first time offenders; for second time offence minimum 6 months’ and maximum two years’ imprisonment;

i) The Act (as amended till now) prohibits the employment of children below 14 years of age in 16 occupations and 65 industrial processes.

However, the Child Labour (Prohibition and Regulation) Act 1986 does have following lacunae:

a) under section 2 (x) the definition of ‘workshop’ does not include those complexes given under section 67 of Factories Act 1948. Therefore the employers take undue benefit of this loophole.

b) Under section 2 (5) there is a pretty scope that an employer may employ his family’s children even in hazardous works. Actually some employers, who run their economic activities at their residences, employ child labourers there but claim that they are their family members. The Employment of Children Act 1938 was stronger than this Act in this regard as that law provided that without hiring children from outside only family children could be employed.

c) This act is not applicable to Govt schools and govt aided/rganizati schools; thus many private schools engage child labourers in taking the undue advantage of this provision.

d) Under section 2 (x) ‘Industrial Process’ is mentioned but it is not as comprehensive as any production process since the latter also includes non-industrial productive processes.

e) Under section 7 it should be added that the children can not be employed at piece rate, so that the employer is bound to pay the minimum wages to child labourers like adult labour.

f) Under this act simply regulation of certain works/processes is not sufficient because any work due to which the child labourers

are deprived of their education, play and childhood, becomes hazardous for them.

g) regarding the medical certification of age it is quite probable that given the prevalent corruption the medical officer will act as per whims of the rich employers. Instead, there should be provision that the onus for age proof should be on the employer, that too, before the employment of the children. Age certificate produced must have been issued by the Registrar of Birth and Deaths or schools.

h) Under this Act there is no provision for imposing tax on the employers for creation of national Child Labour Welfare Fund, so that it may be utilized for children working in regulated activities.

i) The biggest failure of this Act is that it is not applicable to informal activities wherein 90% of child labour is engaged.

j) Under this Act the term ‘child labour’ has not been defined; only child has been defined as a young person below 14 years. Further as per ILO conventions and UN convention of 1989 (CRC) as well as some national laws (Motor Vehicle Act, Merchant Shipping Act, etc), this age should be raised up to 18 years because only then a person becomes adult and till then one may get at least 10-12 years of schooling.

k) Under the Act the definition of ‘place of work’ is every narrow, it should include agricultural activities, fishery activities, afforestation, process of domestic production, micro enterprises operated by family members and the like.

l) Earlier the Employment of Children Act 1938 duly provided that it was compulsory for the employer to inform the labour/factory inspector before starting any industry of prohibited processes for children, but unfortunately Child Labour Act 1986 does not have such provision, hence the employers take undue advantage of this loophole.

m) The act should have a provision to publicise all the hazardous occupations and production processes for children, so that common people


may be aware of these and do the needful in case of their violation.

n) The penal provision should be made more tough and both the fine and imprisonment should be enhanced to 50000/- rupees and two years for the first offence and its double for the subsequent offence.

o) In addition to labour/factory inspectors, a panel of the rganizati trade unions, accredited journalists and NGOs should also be allowed to check whether child laborers work in an enterprise or not. They should then report the matter to the concerned labour/factory inspectors or superior officials.

Now we need to discuss about the constitutional provisions regarding child labour. In part III of Indian constitution fundamental rights to citizens are provided and therein Article 24 clearly provides that any child below 14 years would not be employed in a factory or mines or other hazardous employment. This provision is mandatory and therefore any aggrieved person may move to High/Supreme Court for its implementation in case of any violation. However, there, too, the term ‘hazardous’ has not been defined. Hence its undue advantage is taken by the employers. On the other hand, in Part IV of the constitution, Directive Principles of State Policy also have some provisions in this regard. For instance, under Article 39 (E) the State has to ensure that children’s tender age is not misused and any Indian citizen should not work under compulsion such tasks/occupations which are against his age or strength. Similarly Article 39 (F) provides that State should provide such facilities and opportunities so that the children may development with freedom, dignity and in a healthy way and their childhood and adulthood should not suffer physically and morally. Further Article 45 clearly says that State shall endeavor to provide free and compulsory education to all children below 14 years within ten years from the date of the enforcement of the constitution. Our constitution came into effect on 26th January 1950 and by 26 January 1960 all children should have been given free and compulsory education. But it did not happen and still about 1/3 rd of our population is illiterate (literacy being 65% only). Actually in the light of this Article there

was no national law (and rules) legislated by the Parliament. Now our constitution has been amended and under Article 21A educating has been made a fundamental right and the law has come into effect since April 2010. But Supreme Court in K.P. Unnikrishnan Versus Union of India declared free and compulsory education a fundamental right by extending the Article 45 way back in 1993. Moreover, under Article 47 of Indian constitution the state should take steps, as its primary duty, to provide nutrition, raise standard of living and improve the public health of the citizens. With the increasing literacy, mass awareness, and public pressure, the State is bound to pay heed to these directive principles in course of time.

From the above analysis, we may draw following conclusions:

First, the various international and national laws are full of loopholes, hence these should be removed in the interest of the children in general and child labour in particular.

Second, our goal should be the eradication of child labor, hence any law that provides for merely regulation is not acceptable because child labour is not regulatable at all considering the vast area, huge population, loopholes in laws, dishonesty of employers and prevailing corruption among law enforcing authorities.

Third, child labour is to be seen in the broadest sense as any kind of deprivation or denial of full development of the child must be construed as child labour, hence to be removed.

Fourth, merely legislation, how much progressive it may be, is not sufficient for eradication of child labour. Actually along with full and regular enforcement of labor laws, it is urgently required that labour officials, prosecution and judicial officials should be sensitizes towards child labourers’ woes.

Finally, a genuine mass awareness drive should be launched by the proactive voluntary organizations and citizens to bring all child labourers to schools, public or private.

[The author is Secretary BRDB, Ministry of Defence New Delhi] D-71, Nivedita Kunj Sector-10, R.K. Puram New Delhi - 110022)


powEr of social mEdia

K V Venkatasubramanian

A few decades ago, strangers would explore friendship and exchange messages by snail mail within and outside their countries and

wait eagerly, patientlyand hopefully for a response. It took a long time to know each other as postal mail exchanges took days and weeks. The source of long-distance ‘pen friendship’ was the paper and the ink. Handwritten letters carried much sentimental value and added thrill. Technology has changed all that.

Over the years, pen pals or pen friends have moved over, in droves, to social media—goaded by technological advancements. Computers facilitate a vast majority of interactions today and have become indispensable for communication. The Internet has spurred a social revolution. Letters sent via snail mail have decreased and not many people even practice “pen-paling’. But anybody can be a virtual pen pal as long as Internet access is available through phones, tablets or laptop.

Social media use web-based and mobile technologies to turn communication into interactive dialogues. Social media may be termed as a blending of technology and social interaction for the co-creation of value. Andreas Kaplan and Michael Haenlein define social media as “a group of Internet-based applications that build on the ideological and technological foundations of Web 2.0, which allows the creation and exchange of user-generated content.”

Distinction from traditional media

Social media are distinct from traditional or industrial media, such as newspapers, television and films. They are relatively inexpensive and accessible to enable anyone to publish or access information, compared to traditional media, which generally require significant resources to publish information. On the other hand, people gain information, education, news, etc., by electronic


and print media. However, both social media and traditional media reach small or large audiences; for example, either a blog post or a television show may reach zero people or millions of people.

Social Networking

Over the years, social media have transcended to a subcategory social networking. While social media are tools for sharing and discussing information, social networking is the use of communities of interest to connect to others. One can use social media to facilitate social networking. Or, one can network by leveraging social media. They have been instrumental in many major events around the world; but they are not one and the same.

Social networking sites (SNS) are about mutual communication and enable netizens to connect with other people. The foundation is the human side. Users network for pleasure or work and can also build relationships through these sites. The basic difference is that social media helps people to make the connection while social networking enhances that connection. People get together because they have common interests, passions and causes and they continue to strengthen their relationships as they get to know each other through interaction over time.

SNS began as online hangouts--such as chatting, posting updates about oneself, exchanging photos and planning parties etc. Through the years, these sites have become a melting pot of opinions and ideas and allow users to share activities, events and interests within their individual networks.

The rise and popularity of social networking sites have been phenomenal partly due to the immense freedom it affords. The Internet made the world a global village, while social networking sites have brought the world within the confines of the four walls.

The number of social media users in urban India was nearly 62 million in 2012 and it is expected to reach 66 million by mid-2013. About 74 percent of all active Internet users (about 80 million) in urban areas use social media. The growth could be attributed to the rise in Internet penetration

through increasing affordability of smart phones and consequent mobile Internet use, according to a report on ‘Social Media in India” by the Internet and Mobile Association of India (IAMAI) and Indian Market Research Bureau (IMRB).

Social media have become a craze, specifically among the younger generation. Years ago, Friendster was one of the top social media use. It was followed by Facebook, a social utility created by a Harvard University drop-out Mark Zuckerberg. A little later, LinkedIn and the micro blogging site Twitter surfaced. The most accessed website is the Facebook with 97 per cent of all individuals using it followed by Google+ and LinkedIn.

Now, with these social media, photos can be instantly uploaded or even shared to the world on your Facebook wall or Instagram or TwitPic. The whole world can know one’s profile and location and much more. People can easily become friends or even business partners with anyone around the world. One need not wait for weeks to get an answer to a question.

Social media are enjoyable, habit-forming and can be over-consumed.For some social media are an obsession, for others they are an addiction. But, experts have different views. Online friend-forming affects teenagers’ development. Researchers say social-networking sites are shortening attention spans, encouraging instant gratification and making young people more self-focused.

A British neurologist has warned that extended use of the sites actually rewires the brain, causing teenagers to require constant reassurance that they exist. Other dangers are more subtle. Children may no longer spend time completely alone, enjoying the benefits of reflection and solitude. Yet they may feel isolated because they are less likely to be communicating with the real humans at their homes, schools or elsewhere outside. Finally, teenagers may focus even more on all the worries that accompany adolescence. So instead of escaping from their problems, they dwell on them even more.

Through social networking sites youngsters, longing to be admired, may find comfort in having a large number of “friends”. But they also need


authentic friendships with people who can help them grow, the experts say.

The surging popularity of SNS is because of teenagers, who spend the bulk of their online time connecting and chatting with friends. Besides, celebrities, young and old, too have hiked on the bandwagon. Actors and politicians, who have an account, regularly or periodically express their views on personal matters and general issues. Newspaper and television reporters follow these with a hawk’s eye and promptly report them.

Sometimes, it becomes viral. A film song ‘Why this Kolaveri Di’ sung by Tamil film actor Dhanush became a sensation on Twitter and Facebook and went viral registering millions of hits.For the first time, the power of social media became apparent in August 2011 when urban youths came out on the streets to support the anti-corruption movement led by Team Anna Hazare. The action resonated even outside India through, mainly, Facebook and Twitter.

Many successful brands have a social media engagement plan. No marketer ignoresthe strength – in number and influence – of women who use social media. Social networking services facilitate spread of information, and also advertisingwith the minimum cost. The way companies and brands communicate have also changed. Various platforms (LinkedIn, Facebook, Twitter, YouTube etc) allow businesses to connect, share information and even collaborate on projects online.

A crucial social media tool is creating buzz that can become viral by posting and sharing newsworthy articles, videos, tweets or blog entries. It is this buzz which makes social media work for both marketing and networking purposes because it replicates messages through user-to-user contact rather than through an advert.

The expansion of the global reach of social media platforms such as Twitter and Facebook has raised important questions about digital freedom and free expression. Opinion and ideas in these

SNS generally target government, government officials and politicians. These provoke extreme reactions— sometimes, user contents either show communal hatred, disharmony in society, criticism of the government or disaffection towards government.

In November 2012, a 21-year-old girl from a small town Palghar, Maharashtra, was detained for questioning, in her Facebook account, a citywide shutdown to mark the death of a regional leader. Her friend who ‘liked’ her comment was also detained. The two faced charges under the Sec. 66A of the Information Technology (Amendment) Act 2008. However, the charges were dropped following a massive public protest.

Earlier, a Puducherry businessman was arrested under Sec. 66A of IT Act for launching a smear campaign, through Twitter, against a senior Cabinet minister and his son. In another case, two Air India employees in Mumbai werearrested and held in custody after they apparently insulted the prime minister and the national flag in their Facebook posts. In Chennai, a professor was arrested and another person detained on charges of harassing singer ChinmayiSripada on Twitter.

In view of these and other developments, the government had said last year that the though it had no plan to censor social media, the “companies must obey the laws of the land”.

BLURB

Social networking sites (referred to broadly as social media) have propelled connectivity among strangers, acquaintances and friends to immense heights. These free-for-all platforms are driving new forms of interaction, helping people to follow breaking news, contribute to online debates or learn from others; but, periodically, users may be transgressing freedom of expression.

[The author is an Independent Journalist and Educator. Email: [email protected]]

Social media have become a craze, specifically among the younger generation.


a uniquE casE of mgnrEgs workEr from rajastHan

Shankar Chatterjee

With the implementation of Mahatma Gandhi National Guarantee Scheme (MGNREGS) under MGNREG Act has

showered lot of joy and happiness to the rural people as during lien season they were unable to work, even they could get work in landlords’ house as agricultural labour but with low wage rate they had to struggle to sustain livelihoods. With the implementation of MGNREGS, in addition to generate employment opportunities assets in the rural areas have also been created. Before MGNREGS time to time different wage employment programmes were introduced in the country. Some of these were Rural Manpower Programme (RMP), Crash Scheme for Rural Employment (CSRE), Pilot Intensive Rural Employment Programme (PIREP), and Food for Work Programme (FWP), National Rural Employment Programme (NREP), Rural Landless Employment Guarantee Programme (RLEGP), Jawahar Rozgar Yojana (JRY), Jawahar Gram Samridhi Yojana (JGSY), Employment Assurance Scheme (EAS) and Sampoorna Grameen Rozgar Yojana, (SGRY). During 2009-10, through an amendment the NREGA has been rechristened as the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (MGNREGA) and as Scheme it is known as Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme.

Some of the salient features of MGNREGS are presented below.

l Employment is to be provided to every rural household whose adult member volunteer to unskilled manual work. Such household is to be provided work for 100 days in a financial year.

l This is a demand based Programme and demand emanating from the Village through the village assembly (in India called Gram Sabha).

l Every person who has done the work to be provided minimum wages. Disbursement of wages to be done on weekly basis but not beyond a fortnight.

l Work should ordinarily be provided within 5 kilometers radius of the village or else extra wages of 10 per cent are payable.

l Each employment seeker to be registered by village level local self-government, called Gram Panchayat in India, after due verification and the household to be provided a Job Card.

l Village level local self-government (Gram Panchayat) is the authority for planning, registering, issuing job cards to the beneficiaries, allocating employment and monitoring of works.

MGNREGS has showered lot of joy and happiness to the rural people as during lien season they get work. This study conducted on 22 March 2013 based on MGNREGS work in Sri Ganganagar district of Rajasthan reveals even 90 years aged person was working on a road work. And many other workers were above 60 years of age. I suggest through this article to the Government of India if possible in the districts like Sri Ganganagar etc, where rural people only survive through wage employment MGNREGS may be extended up to 240 days that is minimum for 8 months (minimum).

From the ground


l Wages have to be paid through bank/post office accounts.

l At-least one-third of the workers should be women.

l Contractors/machineries are not permitted. l Mainly water conservation, droughts proofing

including plantation and afforestation, flood protection, land development and minor irrigation works are permitted.

l Employment will have to be provided by the village panchayat (local self governing body) within 15 days of work application or else unemployment allowance has to be paid.

Unique case of MGNREGS workerIn this article a unique case of MGNREGS

worker along with some other workers is presented from Sri Ganganagar district of Rajasthan which is a border district close to Pakistan. To get an idea about the MGNREGS workers, the field study was carried on 22nd March 2013 at the village 17Z of Sri Ganganagar block of Sri Ganganagar district of Rajasthan. During study, a brick work on an internal road at 17Z village was going on. The objective was to make a fair weather road to all weather one through brick soling. The length of the road was 425 feet and width 12 feet. The work started on 8th March 2013 and expected to complete by 31st March 2013. The sanctioned amount for the work was Rs.1.34 lakh with the material component of Rs.1.07 lakh and labour cost of Rs.27000 and it is expected to generate little more than 200 man-days of work as minimum wage rate (while conducting the study) was Rs.133 for one man-day of labour.

During the course of the study it was reported around 11 people were working in the project mostly women who mainly eke out their livelihood by selling their labour. Of the total labourers, six were individually contacted for the study to get an idea about their opinion of MGNREGS work.

Again among the six, one unique case of old person namely Sri Surjan Singh around 90 years of age belonging to SC, Sikh Community is presented here. Sri Singh and his wife mainly earn their livelihood by selling their labour. Both have five children but after their marriage they started to live separately. So both Sri Singh and his wife survive on their labour and at the age of 90 years he had to work to get two square meals a day. Although Sri Singh and his wife get Government pension @ Rs.500 each per month

and thus total income comes to Rs.1000 per month but it is too meager to sustain a family of two. While interacting with Sri Singh, he gladly informed that he would be happy to work throughout the year under MGNREGS type of work as it was better than working on in private land. The main advantage to work in MGNREGS project is that without any hassle and corruption within 15 days their wage is deposited in the Oriental and Commercial Bank of India and thus developed banking habit also. According to him, exploitation on private parties’ land in many occasions crop up while such exploitation is totally ruled out under MGNREGS. Sri Surjan Singh along with others in unison informed that they did not face any problem from the staffs who were monitoring the MGNREGS work. The other members who were personally interviewed were Smt. Sukhdev Kaur, 50 years agod. She informed with four children and no agricultural land working in MGNREGS was the main source of income and in other season she and her husband work as agricultural labour on others land. Sri Hari Singh, 62 years and Smt. Kartar Kaur (60 years) both husband and wife with no agricultural land struggles for survival. Working in MGNREGS and in other days working on private land were the only source of their earning. The case of Smt. Kamrai, 65 years of age, SC woman studied at primary level and with sick husband, an amount of Rs.1000 as pension (Rs.500 each) was not sufficient to maintain the family and as sequel MGNREGS is the ray of hope for the family’s livelihood. Smt. Rani, 35 years illiterate SC woman with three children also informed that both husband and self had been struggling to get two square meals a day as she and husband want to see children get good education and they can lead a quality life.

Conclusion

This study reveals that the MGNREGS has ushered a new hope for the workers and even at the age of 90 years a person sought work and many other workers were above 60 years. I suggest through this article to the Government of India if possible in the districts like Sri Ganganagar etc, where rural people only survive through wage employment MGNREGS may be extended up to 240 days that is for 8 months (minimum).

(Dr Shankar Chatterjee is Associate Professor National Institute of Rural Development Hyderabad Email: [email protected])


an applE a daY- kEEps tHE doctor awaY

Anita Kumari and Purva Jaggi

India produces all deciduous fruits including pome fruits (apple and pear) and stone fruits (peach, plum, apricot and cherry) in

considerable quantity. These are mainly grown in the North-Western Indian States of Jammu and Kashmir (J&K), Himachal Pradesh (H.P.) and in Uttar Pradesh (U.P.) hills. Out of all the deciduous fruits, apple is the most important in terms of production and extent. Apple was introduced into the country by the British in the Kullu Valley of the Himalayan State of Himachal Pradesh as far back as 1865, while the colored ‘Delicious’ cultivars of apple were introduced to Shimla hills of the same State in 1917. The apple cultivar ‘Ambri’, is considered to be indigenous to Kashmir and had been grown long before Western introductions. The apple forms a tree that is small and deciduous, reaching 3 to 12 metres (9.8 to 39 ft) tall, with a broad, often densely twiggy crown. The flowers are white with a pink tinge. The fruit matures in autumn, and is typically 5 to 9 centimeters (2.0 to 3.5 in) in diameter.

Scientific classification of Apple fruit (Malus domestica)

Scientific classification

Kingdom: Plantae

Order: Rosales

Family: Rosaceae

Subfamily: Maloideae or Spiraeoideae

Genus: Malus

Species: M. domestica

Apple Producing States

States Area (000’ ha)

Production (000 M)

Jammu & Kashmir 138.1 1373

Himachal Pradesh 99.6 280.1

Uttaranchal 32.4 114

Arunachal Pradesh 12.8 10

Tamil Nadu 0 0.1

TOTAL 282.9 1777.2

Nutritional Value Per 100g of Apple Fruit

Nutritional components

Energy 218 kJ (52 kcal)

Carbohydrates 13.81 g

- Sugars 10.39 g

- Dietary fiber 2.4 g

Fat 0.17 g

Protein 0.26 g

Water 85.56 g

Vitamin A equiv. 3 μg (0%)

Thiamine (vit. B1) 0.017 mg (1%)

Riboflavin (vit. B2) 0.026 mg (2%)

Niacin (vit. B3) 0.091 mg (1%)

Pantothenic acid (B5) 0.061 mg (1%)

Vitamin B6 0.041 mg (3%)

Folate (vit. B9) 3 μg (1%)

Vitamin C 4.6 mg (6%)

Calcium 6 mg (1%)

Iron 0.12 mg (1%)

Magnesium 5 mg (1%)

Phosphorus 11 mg (2%)

Potassium 107 mg (2%)

Zinc 0.04 mg (0%)

Source: USDA Nutrient Database


Storage: Commercially, apples can be stored for some months in controlled-atmosphere chambers to delay ethylene-induced onset of ripening. The apples are commonly stored in chambers with higher concentrations of carbon dioxide and high air filtration. This prevents ethylene concentrations from rising to higher amounts and preventing ripening from moving too quickly. Ripening continues when the fruit is removed. For home storage, most varieties of apple can be held for approximately two weeks when kept at the coolest part of the refrigerator (i.e. below 5 °C).

Value added products: Commercially the fruit is utilized for the preparation of following products:

1. Beverages (RTS beverage, squash and syrup)2. Jam

3. Jelly

4. Chutney

5. Dehydrated apple rings

6. Preserve

7. Candy

health benefits of apple fruit1. Protection against osteoporosis: Flavanoid

found in apples can protect post-menopausal women from osteoporosis and may also increase bone density. Boron, another ingredient in apples, also strengthens bones.

2. Effective in cancer prevention: Laboratory cell-based studies have shown that apple peel extract possesses strong anti-proliferative effects against cancer cells. There is particularly strong evidence for the consumption of apples in preventing mouth, oesophagus, lung and stomach cancers.

3. heart Disease: Apple is known to reduce the risk of cardiovascular diseases, such as heart attack and stroke.

4. Cholesterol: Apples have been shown to have a cholesterol lowering effect. In one study the researchers found that eating three apples resulted in the reduction of the cholesterol level by about 5-8% as it contains pectin which helps in lowering the LDL levels.

5. Weight Loss: Research further suggests that the polyphenols found in apples may regulate the fat metabolism in healthy people with relatively high body mass index (BMI).

6. Type 2 Diabetes: Apples also have a low GI (Glycaemic Index), in the range of 28-44, which may be a contributing factor to the prevention of diabetes.

7. Allergy: Apples can reduce the incidence of atopic dermatitis. Apples can alleviate some of the symptoms of respiratory allergy such as sneezing.

8. Asthma: Apples can lower incidence of asthma and bronchial hyperactivity. In fact, a related study found that pregnant women who consume apples may provide their unborn babies protection against developing childhood asthma and allergic diseases. Another recent study shows that children with asthma who drank apple juice on a daily basis suffered from less wheezing than children who drank apple juice only once per month. Another study showed that children born to women who eat a lot of apples during pregnancy have lower rates of asthma than children whose mothers ate few apples.

[Anita Kumari is from the Department of Food Science and Nutrition, and Purva Jaggi is from the Department of Family Resource Management, College of Home Science, CSKHPKV, Palampur (H.P).

There is evidence that consumption of apples prevents mouth, oesophagus, lung and stomach cancers.







(Rs. per Day)

S. No. Name of State/Union territory Wage rate in Rs. per Day

(1) (2) (3)

1 Assam Rs. 152.00

2 Andhra Pradesh Rs. 149.00

3 Arunachal Pradesh Rs. 135.00

4 Bihar Rs. 138.00

5 Gujarat Rs. 147.00

6 Haryana Rs. 214.00

7 Himachal Pradesh Non-scheduled Areas-Rs. 138.00Scheduled Areas-Rs. 171.00

8 Jammu and Kashmir RS. 145.00

9 Karnataka Rs. 174.00

10 Kerala Rs. 180.00

11 Madhya Pradesh Rs. 146.00

12 Maharashtra Rs. 162.00

13 Manipur Rs. 153.00

14 Meghalaya Rs. 145.00

15 Mizoram Rs. 148.00

16 Nagaland Rs. 135.00

17 Orissa Rs. 143.00

18 Punjab Rs. 184.00

19 Rajasthan Rs. 149.00

20 Sikkim Rs. 135.00

21 Tamil Nadu Rs. 148.00

22 Tripura Rs. 135.00

23 Uttar Pradesh Rs. 142.00

24. West Bengal Rs. 151.00

25. Chhattisgarh Rs. 146.00

26 Jharkhand Rs. 138.00

27 Uttarkhand Rs. 142.00

28 Goa Rs. 178.00

29 Andaman and Nicobar Andaman District

Rs. 198.00

Nicobar district

Rs. 210.00

30 Dadra and Nagar Haveli Rs. 175.00

31 Daman and Diu Rs. 150.00

32 Lakshadweep Rs. 166.00

33 Puducherry Rs. 148.00

34. Chandigarh Rs. 209.00

Schedule














(Rs. per Day)

S. No.Name of State/Union territoryWage rate in Rs. per Day

(1) (2)(3)

1AssamRs. 152.00

2Andhra PradeshRs. 149.00

3Arunachal PradeshRs. 135.00

4Bihar Rs. 138.00

5GujaratRs. 147.00

6HaryanaRs. 214.00

7Himachal PradeshNon-scheduled Areas-Rs. 138.00Scheduled Areas-Rs. 171.00

8Jammu and KashmirRS. 145.00

9KarnatakaRs. 174.00

10KeralaRs. 180.00

11Madhya PradeshRs. 146.00

12MaharashtraRs. 162.00

13ManipurRs. 153.00

14Meghalaya Rs. 145.00

15Mizoram Rs. 148.00

16NagalandRs. 135.00

17OrissaRs. 143.00

18PunjabRs. 184.00

19RajasthanRs. 149.00

20SikkimRs. 135.00

21Tamil NaduRs. 148.00

22Tripura Rs. 135.00

23Uttar PradeshRs. 142.00

24.West BengalRs. 151.00

25.ChhattisgarhRs. 146.00

26JharkhandRs. 138.00

27UttarkhandRs. 142.00

28GoaRs. 178.00

29Andaman and NicobarAndaman District

Rs. 198.00

Nicobar district

Rs. 210.00

30Dadra and Nagar HaveliRs. 175.00

31Daman and DiuRs. 150.00

32LakshadweepRs. 166.00

33PuducherryRs. 148.00

34.ChandigarhRs. 209.00

Schedule








kurukshetra may 2013

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