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contribute, and other is where citizens are asserting their voice to claim spaces for
participation.
So, let me first give you a couple of examples of invited spaces for citizen
participation. Unlike many other countries, in India, there a deep divide between the
rural and the urban. Therefore, the nature of participation in rural arena and the nature
of participation in urban arena differ quite a lot.
Let me start with the first example. Yesterday, Dr. Gowda talked about the
amendments to the Indian constitutions, and we amended our constitutions more than
100 times. So let me talk about the most popular, what we called 73rd Constitutional
Amendment Act. I’m sorry for this abbreviation, but C stands for Constitutional
Amendment Act, which became part of the constitution. And that part is called Part
IX. It provided a legitimate space that we called Gram Sabha. Gram is a Hindi word,
and it means village, and Sabha is assembly. So, the constitution provide a space
within the local governance institutions, where all the adult electorate voters, they are
the members of this village assembly or Gram Sabha. And the function of this Gram
Sabha is to hold the elected local government accountable by contributing in the
village development planning process, their implementation and the monitoring of the
implementation of this program. So, a lot of power is vested with the Gram Sabha
where they can decide. They’re supposed to be deciding that what are the priorities
in the village, how those priorities will be made. The local government is supposed to
provide resources and implement those programs. Once those programs are
implemented, then the social accountability practices come in where the Gram Sabha
would demand that how much money has been spent in completing a project, where
that money has been spent. In a way, the elected Gram Panchayat, which is the local
governance institution in India, is supposed to answer to the village. It’s a
tremendous achievement, so to speak. It’s a tremendous example of empowering the
rural populace to ask for accountability and participate in the village planning process.
Let me give you the second example. Again, it has a legal basis. Therefore
I call it an invited space from the State. It’s called Mahatma Gandhi National Rural
Employment Guarantee Act. The scheme is supported by the Act. What does it say?
It says Wage Guarantee Program. And it says that 100 days of wage employment
essential guaranteed by the State for the rural population. This program came in
around 2005 where, in order to address the rural to urban migration. So, the stressful
migration, rural distress, in order to address this scheme came in, where every
individual household can claim 100 days of employment from the State, and State has
to provide that. If State cannot provide that employment, then the State has to
provide compensation, which means that 100 days of wage is guaranteed.
One of the revolutionary probations in this scheme or Act was social audit. And
social audit became quite famous all over the world. But this was, in a way,
guarantee that all the schemes that will be implemented through this wage guarantee
program will be social audited by the Gram Sabha or village assembly. So, it’s a ª£¸²£ª±¡¡²¥¸h¡¢h¢µÈ
tremendous progress in terms of creating new spaces for citizen participation.
