The Plagues of Decentralization: A Socio-Economic Perspective

While the encounter of Vikas Dubey dominated and birthed discourse on the condition of law and order over the last few weeks; his existence is merely a symptom of a larger malaise. Institutional positions have been captured by criminals affording them subsequent protection and embolden them to behave as petty monarchs who command lives at will.

On the eve of 26th December 1949, Dr.Ambedkar famously said, “We are going to enter into a life of contradictions. In politics, we will be recognizing the principle of one man one vote and one vote one value. In our social and economic life, we shall, by reason of our social and economic structure, continue to deny the principle of one man one value”. These words eerily hold weight at all levels of government. The upper echelons of all political parties continue to be dominated by upper-caste and upper-class men, and most of the cabinets haven’t gone beyond token representation with regards to women and caste minorities.

While MPs and MLAs became inaccessible and the clamor to make governance accessible grew louder, the Rajiv Gandhi government brought in the 73rd and 74th amendments to the Constitution giving birth to Panchayati Raj in the rural areas and Municipal Corporations in cities and towns. This was a major departure from the initial model of centralized power as envisioned by the founding fathers. Whilst

hailed as a major step towards ensuring good governance and enhancing participation in policymaking, it runs into significant roadblocks by the virtue of the social realities in which it has to work.

Socio-economic impediments

While there are reservations for SCs/STs and women (a first in terms of legislative bodies in India) in local bodies; but this politics of representation has its limits.

The Panchayati raj amendments were brought in 45 years after Independence. By then, the local elite - essentially upper-caste and upper-class men were handed all the power and political clout. Dalits, minorities, and women had no experience of holding decision-making posts or asserting themselves in public spaces due to historically prevalent discriminatory attitudes towards these groups. Hence, while

reservations duly existed, there was no mechanism to educate them about their rights, roles, and responsibilities as public representatives. The dynamic of the village economy make the majority of SCs and STs subservient to the so-called upper

castes. Landholdings remain grossly unequal; 45% of all ST agricultural households hold less than 2.5- acre land while this percentage goes up to 70% for SC agricultural households, and about 35.5% of STs and 56.5% of SCs do not own any land except their homesteads. Hence, many of these communities are invariably dependent on the landed local elite for their employment; which in turn prevents them from

taking decisions in favor of the oppressed. Oftentimes, when Dalit pradhans are found to be asserting themselves, they are thrown out through no-confidence motions or are subjected to violence and brutalization by the upper castes.

On the other hand, the case of women in panchayats has still been encouraging. In a study involving women representatives from Birbhum and Udaipur, it was found that the presence of a woman pradhan was linked with better delivery of goods and services prioritized by the women in that particular village (mainly accessibility of water). In the same breath, the study also finds that villagers are less likely to be

satisfied with the quality of the water when posts of Gram Pradhans are reserved for women, despite receiving objectively better service.

In the states of Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan, and Uttar Pradesh, only 3.7 and 6.2% elected women had family members on the natal and affinal family side with experience in panchayats, and the majority of women are first time entrants in panchayats and related institutions. About 41% of women representatives come from families that are below the poverty line, and 51.1% of the women representatives are illiterate. While this points towards the inclusion of women from the lower rungs of

the village society in Panchayati raj institutions, their disadvantaged socio-economic standing leaves them vulnerable to undue influence from the local elite.

Legal restrictions

Andhra Pradesh, Gujarat, Maharashtra, Odisha, Rajasthan, and Haryana have a bar on persons with more than 2 children contesting local body elections. The average size of households in Gujarat, Rajasthan, Odisha, and Haryana borders 4-5 members, and this figure is often higher for SC/ST households. Clearly, this law simply overlooks the fact that many women in rural India have lack reproductive health agency, and lack birth control access {STs in India have the highest total fertility rate (3.12), followed by SCs (2.92), and OBCs (2.75) and contraceptive use is the lowest among women from ST (48%) followed by OBC (54%) and SC (55%) 4 }. Additionally, the policy has the unintended effect of increasing sex-selective abortions and worsening the sex ratio, as people would now prefer to make sure that they have a son whilst adhering to the two-child cap. The educational requirement for contesting elections is another huge impediment. Rajasthan (now-discontinued) and Haryana became the first states to introduce such a yardstick in 2015. This law disbars 68% of SC women, 41% of SC men, and over 50% of all women in Haryana from contesting a panchayat election. Interestingly, no such minimum education criterion is in place for contesting state or general elections. The state governments of Gujarat, Haryana, Himachal Pradesh, and Rajasthan bar people not having a functioning toilet from contesting Panchayat elections, although more than 29% households in rural areas have no permanent residence – the homeless surely cannot own a toilet – 27%

of the households have grass or thatched roof homes, 38% have mud floor homes and 25% live in single room accommodation.

Issues with reservations

There have been several instances of panchayats not having any members from the SC/ST community or women when the post of the sarpanch was reserved for these categories, leaving the sarpanch marginalized and effectively vetoing their decisions.

Article 243D clearly directs that the reserved seats, both for SCs and STs as well as women shall be allotted by rotation to different constituencies in a panchayat. This has been interpreted to mean that such rotation should take place at the end of every five years. If this interpretation is given effect to, no SC, ST or women member will ever get the opportunity of occupying the same seat for a second term, as it is highly unlikely that these persons would be allowed to contest from the same constituency, when the reservation is removed.

There are also other issues- problems of lack of funding, an insufficient delegation of powers and the refusal of the bureaucracy, MLAs, and MPs to cooperate with leaders of local bodies- that reduce local bodies to just means of implementing orders from the top, instead of full-fledged and autonomous institutions of governance and decision making.

The ills plaguing decentralization reforms are products of transposition of a liberal system unto a largely illiberal and unequal society, and making citizens out of erstwhile rulers and subjects.

References-

1. Census 2011

2. The Impact of Reservation in the Panchayati Raj: Evidence from a Nationwide Randomized

Experiment by Raghabendra Chattopadhyay and Esther Duflo

3. https://www.cwds.ac.in/wp-content/uploads/2016/09/WomensExperiencePanchayats.pdf

4. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6469373/

5. https://thewire.in/law/the-supreme-courts-judgement-is-frightening-in-its-implicatons

By-

Madhav Chadha

An accidental B-School student who reads feminist theory for fun.