After the modification in Article 370 of the Indian constitution on August 5, 2019. The provisions of the 73rd constitutional amendment covering provisions from Article 243 to 243(O) were made applicable, under which 29 functions were delegated to these Panchayats. In this milieu, since then the LG administration of Jammu and Kashmir is active in delegating the key functions to these institutions. All the three tiers were elected and the marginalized groups including women were given 33 percent reservation at all three levels. First-time block and district development council elections were held. The district development council was elected by the direct participation of the people. Apart from this, huge funds were marked for these institutions to pace the acceleration of local development. Despite all these positive efforts, there is a lot of accountability dilution observed at the ground level. At the ground level even today the Gram Sabha is held comprising few people.
Although currently the advertisement regarding the Gram Sabha is circulated as compared to the past, still there is not much participation of the local people in these Gram sabhas. The argument of the local people on the question of why they did not participate in the Gram sabhas, to answer this question the local people state these Gram sabhas are just the ritual to display to the higher authorities. They further narrated the block authorities have already made the plans with the consultation of a specific group like the Sarpanch and the local contractors of the village and also have distributed these plans on the required papers that among themselves.
During the survey, most of the respondents stated that they were not informed by the Panchayat members about the gram Sabha meetings. This poor accountability leads to mismanagement of the funds at the grassroots level. One more thing that was observed in the study was that if anybody in the village spoke against the sarpanch, such a person would fear that the sarpanch might register the case of harassment against him. In this way, people fear that the Panchayat member might give a false report about the person and falsely associate that person with anti-state activities. Hence, in this way, no one speaks against the sarpanch or the influential group, so it is this violence and conflict that diluted the accountability at the grassroots level institutions at the village level. Even today the impact of the violence is seen clearly; the people are hesitant to participate in the Panchayati Raj Institutions, the reason is the fear and the negative perception about these institutions present among the village masses.
Significant times, the Panchayat members hid their identity from the public because these Panchayat members were seen through the lens of suspicion as the man of the government or informers. Hence, these all negative notions are born because of the conflict. This is the enormous challenge in front of the government as to how to tackle these types of challenges, what I called specific challenges. As the Panchayati Raj institutions are also called community institutions, participation in the institutions is very vital, and when this participation is not there, the scope for these local democratic institutions is very low. Groupism at the Village: During the study, it was found that a special group emerged after the Panchayati Raj in the villages. This group consists of Block officials, Sarpanch, local contractors, and their peers. It is this group that controls the development plans of the villages. The block officials take the views of this group for the village plan formulation and no open Gram Sabha is conducted in the Villages.
Mismanagement of Funds: The funds that are coming for the village development are significantly misused at the ground level. The works that are done in the villages are very much of inferior quality, as within months these works start decaying. It was also reported that the block officials charge a special percentage from the contractors (30 percent of every Lakh). The work under MGNREGA has become contractism; no open Gram Shaba is conducted for the selection of the work of genuine workers. The group that I mentioned above took the job cards of the innocent people and showed work on their names, however; these persons were not doing the work under MGNREGA. The study reported the amount that was charged was around RS 2000 to RS 1500. This amount varies from village to village.
EPILOGUE: To yield the maximum benefits of the government programmes and transparent working of Panchayat Raj at the local level, there is a strong necessity to enforce the Jammu and Kashmir ombudsman Panchayati Raj Act 2014 at the grassroots level. Apart from this, there is also a necessity
to disseminate awareness among the people about the significance and their role in constructing the Panchayat Raj robust at the base level. The erstwhile state administration should take measures to obliterate the pessimistic perceptions present in the minds of local people associated with the Panchayati Raj at the local level. Most ordinary people are not cognizant of the provisions, procedures, and importance of Gram sabha.
Consequently, the specific group (sarpanch, block officials, and local contractors) takes the edge of this poor awareness of the local people and accumulates the advantages from the Panchayati Raj. Besides this, the union territory administration should also empower the local Adalat system to foster justice at the grassroots level. Furthermore, there is a need to engage the youth at the grassroots level through different interactive programmes. This engagement of the youth with the Panchayati Raj institutions would make the Panchayat Raj more effective at the ground level.
One more aspect of the Jammu and Kashmir is the Himalayan region with a fragile ecosystem, so it needs more attention to the environment along with development. Therefore, it needs gravitation in this milieu the Panchayat Raj institutions could play a spinal role to disperse the awareness among the villages about the Himalayan sensitive ecology. Hence, these Panchayats in the Indian Himalayan region should be given additional funds by the centre for the conservation of the environment. For this, a particular budget should be planned by the name of ‘Himalayan Panchayat Environmental Budget’ to tackle the environmental degradation at the local level in the Indian Himalayan region.
It has been seen in Kashmir, that the attitude of the villagers towards the environment is not so constructive. In the last some years, the problem of domestic waste has risen in the villages. The villagers throw it into the water streams and on the road banks. Consequently, it has blocked many small water channels and also became fatal for a number of aquatic living organisms.
Author can be mailed at farooqmajeed19@gmail.com (Views expressed are authors’ own)
