Rajasthan Panchayati Raj (Second Amendment) Ordinance, 2014

What is it make? 

Rajasthan state government has passed an ordinance (Jan 5,2015) fixing the minimum educational qualification for the panchayati raj elections. For the post of sarpanch, Class VIII is the minimum qualification, while posts in the zilla parishad require a Class X pass. 

Government Justification

There are three lines of justification advanced by the BJP government: 

1. first, that PRI representatives play an executive role and are embroiled in corruption cases and often use their ignorance of law/rules as an excuse when they are investigated. 
2. The second line of justification, advanced even by the BJP government at the Center is that this idea was originally mooted by the Congress-led government in Rajasthan and thus the Congress party cannot reasonably oppose this amendment now. 
3. Other supporters of the ordinance have sought refuge in its alleged legality citing the Supreme Court, which held that the right to contest elections is a statutory not fundamental right and the states are competent to legislate eligibility criteria in the appropriate statute. 

Criticism: 

• Hence this ordinance is a major setback to ensuring gender equality in panchayati governance.

The literacy level in Rajasthan is one of the lowest, more so among the women and tribals which is the absolute lowest in India. According to 2001 census, this will keep around 82.5% of people out of the democratic process. nearly, 90% of them will be women and tribals. In this way, the ordinance will make the panchayati raj institution elitist, gender-biased and out of reach of people whose talents and capabilities do not have a certificate of formal education institutions.

1. Benchmarking the Qualification is no guarantee of good governance. 

2. It has an inbuilt threat of women elite capture.

3. About 80% of rural female will be excluded. This challenges the entire gamut of women empowerment through reservation.
4. The above change is unacceptable unless similar proposal is issued for state and union election.
5. There are several examples of illiterate women sarpanches who have received national and international recognition for their exemplary good governance.
6.It runs opposite to participation and gender equality fostered in Article -14.

2011 cenus

as per 2011 census in Rajasthan male literacy--79% female 48%......also going by report of NIRD GOI

AT 3 level women participation(pre ordinance period) are
zilla panchayat --37.4%
intermediate level --38.3%
village panchayat---35.2%
these figures though avg, are like various other states and not encouraging...so there is no proof/claim that without ordinance there was full gender representation.

Census definition of Literate = 7 years  old and anybody who can read and write one language. So, census figures cant be used to check exclusion of candidates because of this ordinance.

• Executive Roles by Panchayats

BRGF

The Backward Region Grant Fund (BRGF) is a Programme implemented by the Ministry of Panchayati Raj (MoPR) in 272 identified backward districts in all States of the country except Goa. The erstwhile Rashtriya Sam Vikas Yojna (RSVY) has been subsumed under BRGF Programme. The BRGF Programme is designed to redress regional imbalances in development. The fund provides financial resources for supplementing and converging existing developmental inflows into identified districts to:

• Bridge critical gaps in local infrastructure and other development requirements that are not being adequately met through existing inflows,
• Strengthen, Panchayat and Municipality level governance with appropriate capacity building, facilitating participatory planning, decision making, implementation and monitoring, to reflect local felt needs,
• Provide professional support to Local Bodies for planning, implementation and monitoring of their plans,
• Improve the performance and delivery of critical functions assigned to Panchayats.

BRGF CONSISTS OF TWO FUNDING WINDOWS NAMELY:

• Development Grant : BRGF Development Grant are used by Panchayats and Urban Local Bodies (ULBs) by transparent norms and they use these funds to address the critical gaps in integrated development, identified through the participative planning processes cited in BRGF Guidelines. The annual entitlement of per district is fixed by Ministry of Panchayati Raj (MoPR) on identified criteria, from time to time.
• Capacity Building: The annual entitlement per district is Rs. 1.00 crore. These funds are used primarily to build capacity of Elected Representatives (ERs) and functionaries of Panchayati Raj Institutes (PRIs) in subjects such as planning, implementing, monitoring, accounting and improving accountability and transparency of developmental works.

Funds are released by the MoPR to the Consolidated Fund of the States which need to be disbursed to the Implementing Entities/Agencies within 15 days.

• PESA

Self governance, Empowered Gram Sabhas make decisions on management of Natural resources etc.

• Fund flow in flagship schemes:

MNREGA ; SSA ; NRHM ; MDM ;

CAG has highlighted issues of corruption, non-coordination , lack of accountability as few aspects leading to failure of schemes in certain states while in some states they have performed better.

• Panchayats with assitance from Gram Sabha identify the beneficiaries.

• Status of PRIs -2012 IIPA : Devolution Index on 6 parameters 

study assesses the enabling environment that the states have created for the panchayats to function as institutions of self-government. The enabling environment created by a state is ompared with that of others in terms of various monitorable indicators identified in the study.

3Fs = funds + functions + functionaries , 73rd act framework , capacity building, accountability.

Ranks :
1- Maharashtra
2- Karnataka
3- Kerala
4-Rajastan

17- Punjab
18- Bihar
19- J & K
20-Jharkhand

Middle Paths  and Solutions to Governance or capacity Deficit :

• More education infrastructure in place to build capacity of young
• Training and capacity building of already who are members
• strengthening Gram Sabha

Schemes by government

• Panchayat Sashaktikaran Abhiyan 

The goals of the RGPSA are to enhance capacities and effectiveness of Panchayats and the Gram Sabhas; Enable democratic decision-making and accountability in Panchayats and promote people’s participation; Strengthen the institutional structure for knowledge creation and capacity building of Panchayats; Promote devolution of powers and responsibilities to Panchayats according to the spirit of the Constitution and PESA Act; Strengthen Gram Sabhas to function effectively as the basic forum of people’s participation, transparency and accountability within the Panchayat system; Create and strengthen democratic local self-government in areas where Panchayats do not exist; and Strengthen the constitutionally mandated framework on which Panchayats are founded.

The scheme recognizes the fact that States have different needs and priorities and therefore allows for State specific planning, whereby States can choose from a menu of permissible activities.  Moreover 20% scheme funds are linked to States’ performance on devolution and accountability. States prepare perspective and annual plans to access funds under the scheme. A Central Steering Committee headed by the Union Minister, Panchayati Raj provides policy level guidance, while a Central Executive Committee headed by Union Secretary, Panchayati Raj oversees the implementation of the scheme.

• e-Panchayat Scheme

TWO Articles written by Ruchi Gupta , www.DailyO.in.

• Panchayat Raj Ordinance

Ruchi Gupta

  @guptar

The last minute ordinance promulgated by the BJP-led Rajasthan government, which mandates minimum educational attainment of Class 8 and Class 10 pass, for candidates wanting to contest Panchayati Raj elections has elicited some rather bizarre justifications. There are three lines of justification advanced by the BJP government: first, that PRI representatives play an executive role and are embroiled in corruption cases and often use their ignorance of law/rules as an excuse when they are investigated. The second line of justification, advanced even by the BJP government at the Center is that this idea was originally mooted by the Congress-led government in Rajasthan and thus the Congress party cannot reasonably oppose this amendment now. Other supporters of the ordinance have sought refuge in its alleged legality citing the Supreme Court, which held that the right to contest elections is a statutory not fundamental right and the states are competent to legislate eligibility criteria in the appropriate statute. All three arguments deliberately blur important distinctions to cover blatant illegality and arbitrariness.

First, the BJP government in Rajasthan has made these changes through an ordinance and not a legislation. Given the timing - mere days before panchayat polls and while the courts are on vacation - the ordinance is in effect an executive fiat. An ordinance ought to be promulgated only in instances of great emergency when the legislature is not in session. Considering that the BJP government has itself stated that this issue has been under consideration for a while, it is difficult to understand why it did not bring these amendments for deliberation in the entire one year that it has been in power. The ordinance route is an interim measure and must be ratified by the legislature. This means that there is scope for both rejection and amendment. However in this case, bringing the ordinance just before panchayat polls means that the legislature will have no scope for rejection or amendment since the polls would have already concluded with these conditions in place - and would necessarily have to rubber-stamp what is in effect an executive decision. The fact that the BJP has an absolute majority in the Rajasthan legislature is no guarantee that it would have managed to pass these amendments as evident from the fact that its own legislators scuttled its amendments to the land bill.

Moreover, since 23 of its own legislators do not meet the standards laid down by this ordinance, it is difficult to understand how they would have voted in its favor. Members of the BJP organisation have also publicly voiced their dissent against this ordinance. It is also pertinent to note that a political party is using executive power to change an electoral law by explicitly bypassing the state assembly and thus opposition political parties, all of whom are opposed to the ordinance. The legality of the ordinance is thus under question not just because of the substantive changes made by it, but also in its nature and timing.

Equally, the ordinance goes against the very tenet of the 73rd Constitutional amendment, which provided for local self-governance in rural areas. The Constitutional amendment, passed by the Parliament and ratified by state legislatures, did not moot any sort of educational qualification to be eligible to contest elections and instead provided reservation for marginalised social groups such as Dalits and women to ensure their participation in the political process. By setting arbitrary standards, which will exclude majority of the people from these very communities, the BJP government of Rajasthan is using executive decision of a state government to subvert the Constitution and the collective will of the Indian citizenry as represented by the Parliament and state legislatures.

The ordinance also suffers from severe logical fallacies, which render it completely arbitrary. The government argues that sarpanches play an executive role and are embroiled in thousands of cases of corruption. However of the 6000 odd panchayat samiti and zila parishad elected representatives, only a few hundred (samiti pradhans and zila pramukhs) have any sort of executive role. It is thus unclear why educational qualifications should be imposed on the others. Even otherwise, this argument is rife with anti-poor elitist illogic in its conflation of the unschooled with corrupt. It is also not clear how the government arrived at the 8th and 10th pass qualification and what separates the candidate who has passed 8th grade from the one who has passed 10th grade. The former is somehow qualified only for panchayat administration; the latter for both block and district level administration. If the argument is that public representatives must have some minimum level of educational qualifications, then it is blatant hypocrisy on the part of the BJP that its own MLAs and MPs do not meet the standards set by the ordinance.

There is merit in the argument that a public official should be able to understand the documents she/he is handling. However this understanding is related to literacy (the ability to read and write with understanding) and not some arbitrarily defined standards of educational attainment. Even if one were to accept the argument for literacy, the government should necessarily have put this into effect from the next panchayat elections since mere literacy in rural Rajasthan is abysmally low: 61 per cent overall and 45 per cent for women (census 2011). The notice period would have given interested persons an opportunity to enroll and educate themselves. If in addition, the government had also invested in massive adult literacy outreach to ensure that the poor and marginalised actually had the opportunity to study, it would have truly seemed development oriented. Everyone - civil society and opposition political parties - would have supported such a measure. Instead the government has chosen to disenfranchise at least 80 per cent of the rural populace who have not had the opportunity to study due to class, gender, caste and region based marginalisation in what can only be seen as double punishment.

Finally, in attempting to foist the original idea on to the Congress Party, the BJP government is trying to make a sin out of what is a virtue of democratic governance. The fact that the Congress government mooted a similar policy during its tenure is of little significance. Any government will deliberate on scores of policies as part of the political process and governance but the very fact that it did not move forward with this idea speaks for itself. The erstwhile Congress government may indeed have deliberated on something similar but to draw equivalence is erroneous because the details and manner of execution could have differed in many ways leading to wholly different outcomes. A consultative process wherein the government is open to changing its stand or wholly dropping its initiative altogether based on reasoned debate and dissent is a fundamental tenet of democratic governance. The fact remains that the Congress-led government dropped this initiative given the lakhs of people who would have been disenfranchised from their democratic right of political participation - and the onus of this decision lies solely with the current BJP government.

Two former CECs and several former judges of the Supreme Court and Rajasthan High Court (and other High Courts) have already written an open letter to the Rajasthan chief minister calling the ordinance unconstitutional, unjust and undemocratic and urging her to withdraw the ordinance. The Supreme Court will take up writs challenging the ordinance today (January 5). The fate of rural Rajasthan and the very normative framework of democracy will turn on its decision.

• Closing down of 17000 schools

The Vasundhara Raje government in Rajasthan recently closed 17,000 government schools across the state (August 2014). Technically the schools have not been “closed” but “merged” into nearby “Adarsh” schools in what is called school rationalisation; however the manner in which this exercise has been done has pushed many students into private schools they can ill-afford or worse drop out of school altogether.

School rationalisation is an idea with merit. Across the country, there are primary schools with fewer teachers than the number of classes in the school. There are also instances of schools with very low student enrolment due to the Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan/Right to Education norms of at least one primary school within a 1km radius. At the same time, there are schools with excess teachers due to political pressures which have nothing to do with education. Therefore, if schools along with associated teachers and students were mapped out and then “rationalised” in a decentralised exercise involving teachers and students/parents - using student-teacher ratio, distance, connectivity, school infrastructure etc as criteria - it could lead to much better utilisation of resources and improved education for students. However, the Rajasthan experience shows how a good idea can be thwarted by sheer administrative callousness – with tragic outcomes for children already on the margins of our society.

I visited schools in two blocks of Jaipur district to understand the impact on the ground. The expectation was that Jaipur being the state capital would be one of the best implemented districts as compared to other poorer districts on the border. I also spoke with teachers, students, parents and some administrative officers off the record.  In both blocks – Sanganer and Amber - of the schools that I visited at random, the story that emerged was disheartening. The transfer ratio of students from merged school to “Adarsh” school was uniformly low – immediately indicting the whole exercise. On paper, 100 per cent of the students have been automatically enrolled in the “Adarsh” school, but based on conversations with the teachers, I found that very few are actually coming to school.

The example of “Kankwali ki Dhani” Adarsh primary school in Amer block in which two primary schools - Jagannathpura Bid and Jagannath Pura - were merged is revealing. Not a single student from either of the two schools attended the Adarsh school – simply because it was too far. Some students from these two schools instead enrolled into Government school in the adjacent village, Luniawas – because that school was much nearer. Others – mostly smaller kids dropped out. I looked at the attendance record of the ten Class 4 and 5 students who did go to Luniawas: a paltry ten days on average in almost two months. Parents of both closed schools protested and the merger was nullified. All students in both schools returned immediately to resume studying but lost a full two months of coursework in the meanwhile.

Similarly, in Sanganer block, Aamli ki dhani school was merged into the Badwani primary school. Of the 18 students enrolled, only nine transferred. To come to this Adarsh school, the students would have to cut through a field, permission for which was refused by the owner or take a detour too long and busy for the younger students. Plus some OBC kids from the closed school did not want to study in the new Adarsh school because of the caste composition of its students. The more affluent ones enrolled in private schools; others dropped out. School after school that I visited revealed the same problem – of schools having been merged without consideration of actual distances, traffic involved. No school had infrastructure adequate to accommodate all students and classes were being conducted in make-shift surroundings.

These examples reveal the absurdity of the exercise when done remotely without field visits or consultations. For instance, had either the parents or the teachers been consulted, they would have informed that despite being another village, the school in Luniawas was closer than the Adarsh school in the same village. Another farcical outcome of this insulated exercise was evident in Sanganer block, where I found two schools (Kharda ki Dhani and Nimdi ki Dhani) which escaped closure in this exercise. Only the schools have no students but five teachers! When I visited these schools during school hours, both schools were closed with a notice in one school informing that one teacher was absent while the other had to suddenly leave for important work.

However the most tragic situation was when I visited the school in “Banjaro ki Dhani” in Amber.  The name itself alerts one to the desperate circumstances of the children there (Banjaras are categorized as a “Special Backward Class”) yet this school too has been closed in this exercise. As I neared the hamlet, the first sight was of four small children carting plastic bottles – children who had one time gone to school but had dropped out. As I spoke with these little children asking them about their school, another kid on a bicycle came to boast that he went to a private school and “yeh log to kooda chugte hai” (sort trash). Their little faces shrinking even more, the children walked away despite my entreaties to buy them candy from the nearby store. This school had 34 children (24 regular) enrolled from Banjara, Bhil and Bawaria community; only three students went to the Adarsh school. Almost all others dropped out. I lined up some of the children who were around that time – all of whom were out of school now – in front of the school now closed. A snapshot of little children who have been literally shut out of school, denied education and prospect of a better life. When I went to speak with their teachers in the new school, one teacher was adamant that even if the school were to be reopened, she’d have nothing to do with it because of the apparent lack of support offered by the community.

The closure of government schools has definitely helped increase enrolment in private schools. However anecdotal evidence suggests that many children enroll in private schools at first but then drop out on being unable to pay the fees later. At the same time, Raje’s government is clearing amendments to the Right to Education Act, bulk of which are geared towards easing norms which have threatened private schools with closure under the Act. Without getting into the merit of these amendments, it is reasonable to ask based on these twin developments if the Rajasthan government is trying to privatise education? Even if that is the intent, can any government treat its youngest most vulnerable citizens with such callousness, forcing them out of their schools in the middle of the school year. Vasundhara Raje has been running a public outreach program called “Sarkaar Aapke Dwaar” (Government at your Door) but for an exercise of this magnitude and import, it found it unimportant to consult the stakeholders– students, teachers or parents. Consequently schools were closed arbitrarily and no supportive measures (such as transportation services) put in place to ensure 100 per cent transfer of students into the new Adarsh schools. It is incumbent upon the Rajasthan government to clarify how many students of these “merged” schools actually transferred to the Adarsh school based on their attendance over the last three months and efforts made by the Government to minimise dropouts.  It is also not enough to simply rollback these school closures as the government has done wherever enough political pressure has been applied. Many students, especially from vulnerable communities, who have dropped out will not return to school. A truly decentralised exercise needs to be undertaken in each block in conjunction with the headmasters and parents, vulnerable areas mapped, and a plan devised to ensure that all children go back to school.