From rxpgnews.com
Index soon to assess devolution of power to panchayats
By Indo Asian News Service,
Nov 23, 2006 - 2:10:27 AM
New Delhi, Nov 22 (IANS) India is preparing a national index to gauge how far the state governments have shed their powers at the grass-root level of governance to panchayats or village councils.
'The National Council for Applied Economic Research (NCAER) is preparing the devolution index, which should be ready by December-end or January beginning, which for the first time will help us to properly judge the performance of states,' Panchayati Raj Minister Mani Shankar Aiyar said Wednesday.
He was addressing a press conference ahead of the release of a 1,600-page appraisal report of the ministry by Prime Minister Manmohan Singh.
The three-volume report, 'The State of Panchayat', traces the development of panchayats since the Panchayat Raj ministry was created 30 months ago.
Working at a hectic pace to ensure that the constitutional provision for according more financial resources and functional autonomy to panchayats is realised, the minister called it the 'greatest experiment undertaken in history'.
There are currently around 3.2 million elected representatives including at panchayat and zila or district levels. In the case of panchayats alone, there are 2.2 million elected representatives of which 1.2 million are women - more than the 33 percent seats reserved for them.
While many women have benefited because of the caste and other reservations, 'as many as 50,000 women have been elected without any reservation or quota provisions. They have contested elections against menfolk and won fairly,' said Aiyar.
As per the constitution, 29 matters including education, sanitation and public health are subjects where the state governments have been asked to assign more powers and resources to panchayats in executing projects with direct bearing on the life of the people in villages.
'The new index will help us judge better how much power has been assigned by different state governments to panchayats and whether this has been implemented in actual and is not merely on paper,' Panchayati Raj Secretary Meenakshi Datta Ghosh said.
For a better implementation of central projects like employment guarantee scheme and building of rural roads, the states have been asked to chalk out activity maps and have in place a window for faster clearances and flow of funds to the panchayats.
Simultaneously, the ministry is working out a plan to introduce electronic tracking and tagging with the help of banks and the state government treasury for better accountability.
'So far 14 states have accepted the software for the tagging. We would like early activation of the programme,' said Aiyar.
As far as devolution of powers to panchayats is concerned, Kerala and Karnataka were among the top performing states on the basis of a set of parameters decided by the pachayats. Two other states that are likely to emerge at the top in 2006-07 are Sikkim and Punjab.
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