Decentralisation Initiatives and Local Governance in Kerala

Kerala is a state (or province) in the south-west of India, which is known to have decentralised its local governance in ways far more advanced than most Indian states. It has drawn a lot of attention due to this and is considered a worth emulating model. The essential features of decentralisation in Kerala is as follows :-

Since the formation of Kerala State

The Government of Kerala thought of democratic decentralisation immediately after the State was formed in 1956. The Administrative Reforms Committee appointed by the Government made detailed recommendations in 1958. The report is an excellent prescription for decentralisation in any state under a federal set up. Some of the concepts like list system for election has never been discussed so far in spite of Kerala state had so many unique advantages to go ahead with decentralising its governance and democratic processes.

Kerala is a fertile land for decentralisation

The State of Kerala, with its peculiar geographical features,provides a conducive environment for devolution of powers down to the lower tier governments and the people at the grassroots.
Kerala is a tiny strip of land lying in the southwest corner of India, with a costal lenth of 560 KM and the maximum width of 120 KM.. The area of the State is 38863 sq km, having just 1.18 percent of the nations area, of about the size of Switzerland. The population of the State having 3.25 crore is ----- percent of all India and is comparable to that of Canada. Kerala is one of the most densely populated regions in the world.
Many people consider Kerala as the land of coconuts. The narrow stretch of green land is covered with coconuts all along its beaches, village roads, on the edge of its rice fields, in the house compounds and the foothills of its mountains. Coconut tress can yield nutritious coconut meet, a controversial cooking oil, sap to provide the mildly alcoholic drink toddy, husk for the coir fibre, leaves for thatching the roof and oil to burn the religious lamps. Kerala is the land of spices- cardamom, ginger, tamarind, and pepper, as well as rubber, tea, coffee, teakwood, cashew nuts and many other garden and forest products too.

Almost all people in Kerala speak their mother tongue Malayalam. Kerala's trade with ancient Babylonia may date back to 3000 BC. The spices trade brought progressive influence to the Kerala society and that would be a prominent reason for its modernity and affluence. In Kerala, the traditional Hindus live alongside Muslim and Christian without any conspicuous discomfort. Today 57 percent of Kerala follows Hindusm with 23 percent following Muslim faith and 19 percent following Christianity. A small Jewish population lives in the city of Cochin.

History
For several centuries Kerala was ruled by monarchs who controlled different areas conquering and re-conquering each others domains. In May 1498 a Portuguese navigator Vasco da Gama arrived in Kerala to usher in the period of European colonial rule. In 1605 the Dutch came, followed by British and then French traders. In 1792 the English effectively took power in the area that is now Kerala.

The British governed Kerala as three separate units. In the south, Travancore was ruled indirectly through it established monarch. The central region Cochin was similarly administrated. The Travancore and Cochin princely rulers were beholden to the British but had some leeway to make their own policies. Northern Kerala - the Malabar - came under direct British rule as part of the Madras Presidency. With Indian independence in 1947, Kerala's three major areas had developed a common linguistic and cultural heritage leading to the creation of a Malayalam speaking single State.

Kerala Politics
In 1957, voters of newly formed Kerala elected a communist majority to the State Legislative Assembly which was dismissed by India Government two years later. Since then, the right and left coalition parties led by Indian National Congress and Communist Party of India (Marxist) ruled the State in each alternate turn, except once in 1976. In 1976, the ruling right wing coalition was voted to power again.

Kerala's Achievements
Kerala is very poor with a very low per capita income eventhough you can affluence everywhere. Despite its poverty, Kerala shows high development indicators and stands out very high among low-income countries in adult literacy, life expectancy, infant mortality and birth rate. Kerala achievements area not confined to the expansion of education and health care alone, but the quality of life benefits are fairly distributed among men and women, urban and rural areas and low and high castes.

In agriculture, Kerala ranks first among all Indian States in the rupee value of output per unit of land area. The state is first in India on measures of basic services in its village within a unit area of five kilometers. It stands out above other Indian States in providing basic services.

The Advantages Kerala had
Most of the area of the State receive large amount of rain fall, alongwith having acess to surface water and ground water in plenty. The rain is available for half the year. There are fourty four rivers running east west ,cutting across the Kerala society into smaller communities with strong bonds, with limited access for the people to have access with other side of the river till the bridges were established a few years ago.Lakes, ponds, estuaries, wells etc as sources of surface water are well distributed across the state. So water availability has not been a major problem. The inherent soil quality, better soil management, natural vegetation, diverse crop system , high biomass production, hogh species diversity etc made Kerala a fertile area for production. The settlements are evenly dispersed across the land without any demarcation between urban and rural.areas. Cities, towns and villages are not highly differentiated from each other. Villages are not cluster of houses but a continuum of houses scattered all over the landscape. This dispersion has happened due to the lushness, availability of fertile land around each house site and the ease of getting water.

Because of the dense and fairly even distribution of population, it has become easier to provide cost effective health and accessible education services in Kerala throughout the entire area. The dispersal of settlements also helped to reduce infectious / parasitic diseases and development of excellent road network across the entire area.
Kerala's long history of international contact and trade which dates back to as early as 3000 BC, probably became the basis for development of a progressive outlook in Kerala among its rulers and people. The British colonialism drained local economy for the benefit of British invaders. But the people had good exposure to progressive ideas outside and that might have helped in early land reforms, educational expansion, and the easing out of caste indignities.

British investors took their interest in the cool. well watered Kerala mountains situating close to ocean transport lanes and established their estates for plantations containing cash crops. This has resulted in the emergence of a working class with interest opposing to that of the British investors leading to radical reforms in Kerala development.

Ensuring Food for all
Kerala is a food deficit state as much of the best land in it is used for cash crops. It had to import food from outside. The food items imported are distributed through private markets and a network of public distribution system. The state conducts programs such as school and nursery lunches, special feeding centres, and fair price shops to make the state hunger free. School feeding originated in 1940, and expanded later, is still ongoing with whole funding from State Government and remains as a way of feeding the poor. In addition, many Kerala women and their infants can get one free meal each day at local village nurseries.

Public distribution of food through fair price shops is another mechanism for ensuring adequate nutrition to the poor. Each ration shop serves the 360 households, within an area of two Kilometers. The fair price shops provide some palm oil, kerosene, wheat and sugar also.

Public Health and Sanitation
Kerala had made major accomplishments in health and sanitation. The public health of Kerala is not the product of health programs alone but resulted from combined effects of various factors such as good environment, neat habitat, availability of food, sanitation, awareness of people etc.

Realising that poor housing can be a major source of disease, Kerala had made efforts to provide houses to the poor through its programes. Improving sanitation was another governmental programs to enhance public health. Provision of safe drinking water is probably the most significant in curbing infections diseases. In spite of heavy rainfall from June to December, Kerala experiences prolonged drought from January to the end of May.

Preventive immunization and vaccination are Kerala's most impressive public health programms. Low infant mortality is the result of those health programms. Along with public heath measures, Kerala provides the most extensive set of medical treatment facilities compared to any other Indian state. Services are available throughout and across the state to both urban and rural areas. Rural hospital beds are closer to people than in the rest of India. Compared to other states, the health facilities are far more accessible.

Dramatic decline in birthrate is another impressive achievement. Redistribution of wealth and provision of basic health care are the main reasons for this achievement.

Education
Kerala is well ahead of the rest of India in providing education across urban-rural, male-female, and high caste-low caste barriers. In addition, Kerala conducts an active adult education program for those who bypass education earlier.

Education programms in the State started with establishment of missionary school. The rulers of the princely states later established schools in order to prevent Christian conversion as a fall out of missionaries establishing schools. Later, caste based social organisation and local governments started establishing schools. Social reform movement, village library movement spread of newspapers etc contributed much for the educational development in the State. Education helped people in getting employment, enhancing independent thinking etc. But it changed the taste of many people who longed to have western type of home, food, dress fashion, luxuries and profession.

Land Reform
Land reform is considered to be a successful achievement. The abolition of tenancy resulted in massive re-distribution of land rights. In Kerala, there were a class of land loads at the top, below them another class of tenants and yet another class of third-level inferior tenants who were the actual cultivators. The unique component of Kerala's land reform was the abolition of the second kind of tenancy. Land reforms imposed ceiling on land holding and the excess of land holdings were distributed to tenants.

By land reforms, 1.5 million former tenants became small land owners. Many had lost their giant estates and had transformed as school teachers or administrators. Land reforms had improved the lives of vast majority of people in Kerala's country side and form the basis for many progressive movements including people planning.

Caste Systems in Kerala
Kerala had the most rigid and elaborate caste structure. Kerala was " a madhouse of caste". Lower castes were put to many constraints and discrimination. Spontaneous protests such as clothing agitation, struggle for use of public roads etc. Caste improvement associations, temple entry movement and the workers movements helped to weaken the caste system. Public educational institutions, mass transport system and progressive movements in Kerala contributed to the abolishion of caste system.

Women
Kerala women are far ahead of their all India counter parts. They have higher literacy and fewer children. They marry later and live longer. Female children survive more than do males. Kerala is the only state in which there are more females than men. Over half of the students enrolled in colleges in Kerala are women. It was the first Indian State to have a women cabinet minister. In sports, Kerala women stand out among all the Indian states. Kerala women have to face many traditional problems also.

The decline in agriculture resulted in decline of income to the States's poorest women depended on agriculture. Kerala women face several forms of violence- such as rape, dowry deaths, sexual harassment etc. Women are not supported to travel alone. In Kerala, bus seats are segregated sexually. Kerala women can rely on many social structures and organisations that offer potential for overcoming their problems.

Kerala Provides the Right Envronment
In short, Kerala by all means provides an excellent environment for human development, economic development and a political environment for development of democracy. The features make it a right place for decentralisation and development of grassroots democracy, if there someone to push ahead the concept.

Still decentralisation was in a slow pace

Despite enactment of laws, nothing significant in decentralised development was done for over three decades. As in the case of the rest of India with the formation of a large number of State-level Boards, Corporations and authorities for almost all areas, even the existing village and urban local bodies atrophied over the years since many of their functions were taken over by such para-statals.

There was a short-lived attempt to form District Councils in 1990, following a comprehensive Report on Decentralisation.

Since 1992

However, with the passage of the 73rd and 74th amendments to the Constitution of India in 1992, Kerala carried out pioneering reforms and embarked a path of Comprehensive decentralization since 1995.

Kerala has 999 Village Panchayats, 152 Block Panchayats and 14 District Panchayats; in the urban areas it has 53 Municipalities and Five Corporations.

Milestones in Kerala's decentralization initiatives

These can be briefly listed as below:

* April/May 1994: Enactment of the Kerala Panchayat Raj Act and the Kerala Municipality Act.
* October 1995: Transfer of powers and functions to local governments; along with institutions, offices and functionaries.
* February 1996: Introduction of a Special Budget Document for local government allocations,
* August 1996: Launching of People's Plan Campaign for decentralized planning and announcement of earmarking of about 35% plan resources to local governments.
* March 1999: Restructuring of the Kerala Panchayat Raj Act and the Kerala Municipality Act.
* March 2000: Amendments to 35 Acts having relevance to local government functioning.
* July 2000: Transfer of district level offices and staff to District Panchayat,
* January 2002: Decision to redeploy surplus staff especially engineers to local governments.
* January 2002: Decision to fix share of untied plan grants as one-third of the total plan size of the State.
* 2003: Redeployment of surplus clerical staff to local governments completed. Redeployment of engineering staff is under way.

Legislative framework: salient features

The Kerala Panchayat Raj Act 1994 which was itself a path-breaking law, was thoroughly restructured in 1999 and several innovative features laying strong legal foundation for evolving genuine institutions of Local Self Government were built in.

* Grama Sabba: Kerala has created a fourth tier in the form of Grama Sabhas (or village council meetings) equated with the electoral constituency of a Village Panchayat All the electors of the Ward are members of the Grama Sabha. It is an attempt to create a new set up for direct democracy - involving the people of the ward.

The Grama Sabhas have been given clear rights and responsibilities with absolute powers for identification of beneficiaries, strong advisory powers for prioritizing developmental needs and wide powers of social audit.

* Functions of local governments: The 11th Schedule of the Indian Constitution lists out developmental areas where local governments should have a role in planning for economic development and social justice and in the implementation of such plans.

Unlike many other States, Kerala defined the functional areas of the different tiers of PRIs as precisely as possible. In areas related to infrastructure and management of public institutions, the functional differentiation is sharp and clear, but in productive sectors it is difficult to clearly earmark functions separately for each tier.

Only through experience can the natural functional area in such sectors get marked. There is a clear recognition that there is a role-range for local governments as Agent, Adviser, Manager, Partner and Actor - with the objective being to reduce the agency role and expand the autonomous - actor role. The Kerala Act classifies functions as mandatory functions, general functions and sector-wise functions. in its schedules.

* Committee System: All Village and Block Panchayats have three Standing Committees and the District Panchayat five Standing Committees. The Standing Committees are constituted in such a way that every Member of the Panchayat gets a chance to function in one Standing Committee or the other. Each Standing Committee is assigned certain subjects and these Committees are expected to go into the subject areas both at the planning and implementation stage in great detail.

For the purpose of co-ordination, a Steering Committee is constituted consisting of the President and Vice President of the Panchayat and the Chairpersons of Standing Committees. In addition, there are Functional Committees for different subjects which can include experts and practitioners and the Panchayats are free to constitute Sub Committees to assist the Standing Committee or Functional Committee. There is also provision for constitution of Joint Committees with neighbouring Local Governments.

* Control by Government: The amended Kerala Panchayat Raj Act drastically reduces the powers of direct governmental control over Panchayat Raj Institutions. While Government can issue general guidelines regarding national and State policies it cannot meddle in day to day affairs or individual decisions. The Government can cancel resolutions of the Panchayat only through a process and in consultation with the Ombudsman or Appellate Tribunal according to the subject matter of the resolution. Similarly a Panchayat can be dissolved directly by government, only if it fails to pass the budget or if majority of its members have resigned. In all other cases a due process has to be followed and the Ombudsman has to be consulted before dissolution takes place. This is a unique feature which does not exist even in Center-State relations.
e) Setting up of independent institutions
In order to reduce governmental control and in order to foster the growth of self government as envisaged in the Constitution, the Act provides for creation of independent institutions to deal with various aspects of local government functioning. They are listed below:

* The State Election Commission: The Election Commission has been given powers which go beyond those required for the conduct of elections. It is empowered to delimit Wards which were formerly done through the executive and it has been given powers to disqualify defectors.

* The Finance Commission: This has been given the mandate as required by the Constitution. The first SFC was constituted in 1994 and the second SFC in 1999.

* Ombudsman for Local Governments: This is a high power institution which has been given vast powers to check malfeasance in local governments in the discharge of developmental functions.

* Appellate Tribunals: These are to be constituted at the Regional/District level to take care of appeals by citizens against decisions of the local government taken in the exercise of their regulatory role like issue of licence, grant of permit etc.
* State Development Council: This is headed by the Chief Minister and
consists of the entire Cabinet, Leader of opposition, Vice-Chairman of the
State Planning Board, the Chief Secretary, all the District Panchayat
Presidents who are also Chairperson of District Planning Committee and representatives of other tiers of local governments. This institution is expected to take the lead in policy formulation and in sorting out operation issues.
* Supremacy of the elected body: The President of the Panchayat Raj Institutions has been declared as the executive authority. The senior most officials of various departments brought under the control of the Panchayat Raj Institutions have been declared as ex-officio Secretaries for that subject. The Panchayats have full administrative control including powers of disciplinary action over its own staff as well as staff transferred to it. In order to ensure a healthy relationship between officials and elected Members, the Act prescribes a code of conduct, which lays down certain directive principles of polite behaviour, respect for elected authorities and protection of the freedom of the civil servant to render advice freely and fearlessly.
All these features are there in the Kerala Municipality Act as well.
* The State made a path breaking decision to amend 34 Acts dealing with subjects which are in the functional domain of local governments. This decision was taken to make it clear that local governments are not just the creatures of the Panchayati Raj and Municipality Acts; but they are entitled to legal space in all legislations having something to do with their functions, thus becoming the third tier of governments below the Central and State Governments.

==Extent of Decentralization--

The extent of decentralization and its nature can be gauged from the following facts:
* In the Health sector all institutions other than medical colleges and big
regional speciality hospitals have been placed under the control of the local
governments.
* In the Education sector, in rural areas the high schools and upper primary
schools have been transferred to the District Panchayats and the primary schools have been transferred to Village Panchayats; in urban areas, all schools have been transferred to the urban local governments.
* The entire responsibility of poverty alleviation has gone to the local
governments; all the centrally sponsored anti-poverty programmes are planned
and implemented through them.
* As regards Social welfare, barring statutory functions relating to juvenile
justice, the entire functions have gone to local governments. The ICDS is fully
implemented by Village Panchayats and Urban Local Bodies. Care of the
disabled, to a substantial degree has become a local government responsibility.
* In the Agriculture and allied sectors, the following have become the de
facto and de jure local government functions.

a) Agricultural extension including farmer oriented support for increasing
production and productivity.
b) Watershed management and minor irrigation.
c) Dairy development.
d) Animal Husbandry including veterinary care.
e) Inland fisheries.

* Barring highways and major district roads, connectivity has become local
government responsibility.
* The whole of sanitation and most of rural water supply have moved over to
local governments.
* Promotion of tiny, cottage and small industries is mostly with the local
governments.
* All the welfare pensions are administered by the local governments.
Thus most of the responsibilities relating to human and social development have been passed down to local governments. Welfare and poverty reduction are now largely dependent on local governments who also have considerable area of responsibility in the primary sector. Local infrastructure creation is also largely in the domain of Panchayats and Nagarapalikas.
Critical institutions of public service like hospitals, schools, anganwadis, veterinary institutions, Krishi Bhawans, hostels for Scheduled Castes and Care institutions for different disadvantaged groups have been transferred to local governments on as is where is condition. The responsibility of local governments which are typical of a non-plan nature in respect of these institutions include
1) routine and heavy maintenance of infrastructure
2) upkeep and maintenance of equipment
3) replenishment of consumables
4) administrative charges relating to telephone, water, electricity, fuel etc.
5) noon-day meal cost in schools.

Though funds for meeting these responsibilities are to be transferred by government to local governments, in practice, due to the fiscal stress during the last few years, the amount has stagnated as may be seen from the Annexure - TV.

This amount is far less than what is required leading to a major operation and maintenance deficit which has its adverse implications for public service delivery to the poor.

Transfer of Resources

The salient features of how Kerala has handled these problems and a highly unionized and powerful staff structure are summarized below:

* The principle of work and worker going together was enunciated. This enabled the government to transfer institutions and offices along with staff to
the local governments. Also, it was followed up by determining surplus staff both professional and ministerial in development departments at the State, regional and district levels and transferring them to local governments. This redeployment process is currently under way whereby about 1200 clerical staff will go to local governments with each of the 991 Village Panchayats getting one clerk. Similarly about 200 large Village Panchayats would get one Assistant Engineer and for the remaining Village Panchayats two of them will share an Assistant Engineer; all 152 Block Panchayats will get an Assistant Executive Engineer.
* The cadre of the staff transferred is not disturbed. This prevents promotion chances being affected and facilitates movement of staff from one local government to another or from local government to government. In a sense the analogy of All India Service Officers serving both Central and State Government is relevant.
* The local governments have full managerial and part disciplinary control over the staff. They can assign any work to the staff transferred to them related to their area. They can review their performance and give the required directions. They are empowered to impose minor penalties on all staff transferred to them and, in the case of non-gazetted officers, resort to suspension whenever warranted.
* A kind of dual control is inevitable. Since the State Government carries out some of its functions through the field level staff who have been transferred to the local governments State control over the staff becomes necessary. Also, as the cadre is managed by State, such control is automatic.
* The salaries of the staff transferred continue to be paid for by Government. This prevents unnecessary burdening of local governments with the costs and efforts of salary disbursement and account keeping.
* Even the own staff of local governments i.e., Village Panchayats and Municipal bodies who are paid for by the local government themselves are recruited through the Public Service Commission and constitute a local government cadre.
vii) Based on work-study, staff pattern has been fixed for different types of local governments. Only government can create new posts in local governments.
* A decision has been taken to have a published transfer norm which would ensure that all local governments including remote and backward ones get the staff on a rational basis. This would also prevent government from exercising partisanship in favour of local governments perceived to be on the government side or discrimination against other local governments.
* To protect the legitimate professional interest of staff a code of conduct has been legislated. The detailed rules are under formulation. This would help officials in discharging their functions without fear or favour.
* In the case of professional staff where ego conflicts tend to be more, government has been trying out a two-pronged approach - one of interfering whenever there is a complaint and sorting it out through negotiations and the other of trying to organize joint training courses for elected heads and the professional staff to foster mutual understanding and trust.

Stages in Decentralized Planning

The Campaign made during the Ninth Plan, has succeeded in providing a concrete methodology for participatory planning for local level development. The salient features of this methodology are described below, stage by stage.

* Needs identification: Through a meeting of Grama Sabha/Ward Sabha, i.e., the ward or the electoral constituency of a Village Panchayat or Municipality Member, the felt needs of the community are identified. There is a period of environment creation to mobilize maximum participation in the Grama Sabha/Ward Sabha. Statistics reveal that about 10-12% of the rural population has participated. The meetings are held in a semi-structured manner with plenary sessions and sub group sessions dealing with specific developmental issues. The decisions are minuted and forwarded to the Local Governments. Each meeting is chaired by the
elected member and has an official as its co-ordinator

* Situation analysis: Based on the demands emanating from the first special Grama Sabha/Ward Sabha and based on developmental data, both primary and secondary, exhaustive Development Reports have been prepared and printed in the case of every Local Governments in the State, These reports describe the status in each sector of development with reference to available data, analyse the problems and point out the directions for further development. This is an one-time exercise for a Plan period and the Reports have been revised before the Tenth Five Year Plan.

* Strategy setting: Based on the Grama Sabha/Ward Sabha feed back and the Development Report, a one day seminar is held at the Local Government level in which participation of experts, elected members, representatives nominated by the Sabhas, practitioners from among the public is ensured. The development seminars suggest the broad priorities and general strategies of developmental projects to be taken up for a particular year.

* Projectisation: The ideas thrown up by the above three stages are translated in the form of projects by Working Groups at the Local Government level. For each Local Government there are about eight Working Groups dealing with different sectors of development. Each Working Group is headed by an elected member and is convened by the concerned government official. The Vice Chairman of the Working Group is normally a non-government expert in the sector. The projects are prepared in the suggested format outlining the objectives, describing the benefits, explaining the funding and detailing the mode of execution and phasing of the project.

* Plan finalisation: From among the projects, based on the allocation communicated, the concerned Local Government finalizes its plan for the year and this plan is submitted to the District Planning Committees (DPCs) through the Technical Advisory Committees. The Panchayat is free to take up any project, irrespective of its cost, subject of course to the resources actually available and within the sectoral limits,

* Plan vetting: The Technical Advisory Committees at the Block or the District level consisting of official and non-official experts vet the projects for their technical viability and conformity with the mandatory government guidelines on planning and costing and forward them to the DPC. They cannot change priorities or projects; they can only ask for rectification.

* Plan approval: The DPC gives the formal approval to the plans after which the Local Government can start implementation. It is to be noted that the DPC also cannot change the priority of a Local Government. It can only ensure that government guidelines are followed. Administrative approval for implementation is given project-wise by the Local Government. Every Local Government has unlimited powers of Administrative sanctions subject only to the limits of its financial resources.

Setting up of accountability systems

Since substantial responsibilities have been passed on to local governments Accountability Systems acquire special importance. In harmony with local government functioning and participatory budgeting, in addition to traditional systems of checks and balances, new forms of downward accountability to the people has also been structured in. The key accountability systems are given below:

(i) Committee System of decision making All decisions of local governments are to be taken by itself through consensus or by voting. Power is not concentrated in individuals.
(ii) Right to Information
All documents of local governments except very few ones like health records of patients, contract documents before finalisation etc., have been declared as public documents by law. Any citizen has the right to peruse them or ask for photocopies. In a literate and politically conscious society this is a powerful Provision against corruption.
(iii) Participatory Budgeting
The evolution of a budget particularly for
development works is through the comprehensive stage by stage planning process which allows space for citizen interaction and intervention, expert involvement and final budgeting before approval by elected bodies. This provides adequate protection against arbitrary decision making.
(iv) Due process in selection of beneficiaries This is ensured through the
following steps.

(a) Clear enunciation of eligibility criteria and prioritisation criteria at the time of scheme formulation.
(b) Assigning weightages to each prioritisation criterion.
(c) Calling of application in writing.
(d) Enquiry process into applications with awarding of marks to each criterion.
(e) Reading out of marks in Grama Sabha/Ward Sabha.
(f) Opportunity to each applicant to see all records including application forms of others.

* Technical Sanction The process of giving Technical Sanction has been taken out of the departmental technical hierarchy. Technical Committees have been constituted at the Block/Municipal/Corporation/District levels consisting of engineering experts drawn from governmental, academic and non¬governmental sources. This gives some protection against inflation of estimates and dilution of technical standards.

* Audit Systems The traditional audit system through Local Fund Audit Department has been strengthened with the technical support of the Accountant General. A special Concurrent Audit System has been designed, manned by surplus staff from the Panchayat and Urban Affairs Departments headed by an Officer of the Indian Audit and Accounts Service. This system called Performance Audit acts as an online corrective mechanism helping local governments to put their systems in proper place. Performance- Audit is conducted twice a year in all the local governments. Since the minimum grant-in-aid to a Grama Panchayat is Rs.35 lakhs, the Accountant General also
carries out grant-in-aid audit including Village Panchayats. A Technical Audit Team has been put in place at the State level consisting of senior Engineers mostly from outside Government who are selected for their integrity. This Team looks into complaints regarding execution of public works.

* Social Audit A semi structured social audit is conducted in Grama Sabhas and Ward Sabhas where the accounts of Village Panchayats, Municipalities and Corporations have to be presented and querries replied to.

* Awareness Building. IEC campaigns have been conducted through the media of Press and TV explaining the right of the citizens vis-à-vis local governments. Special meetings of NGOs are held to tell them every thing about citizen entitlements vis-à-vis local governments.

* File of the Property Statements. All elected Members have to file their property Statements immediately on election.

New Reforms under implementation

(i) Appellate Tribunals. Judicial Tribunals are to be set up at the regional level to hear appeals against decisions by local governments in exercise of their regulatory powers. The Acts have been amended for this purpose and negotiations were on with the High Court regarding allotment of judicial personnel.
(ii) Social Audit. A draft Social Audit Policy has been approved by the Government and an initiative to take up action research programme to build up good models of Social Audit has been cleared and Rs. 5.70 crore has been allotted in the current year's Annual Plan for this purpose.
(iii) Citizen's Charters. This has been legislated for and in order to operationalize them Rs. 3.25 crores has been provided in the current year's Plan. Once the Citizens Charters are brought out accountability for provision of Services would improve.
(iv) Monitoring by independent institutions. Monitoring of local government programmes by independent institutions has been decided upon. Rs. One crore has been set apart in current year's Plan for this purpose. Institutions have been identified and the working out of the methodology for concurrent monitoring is on through six pilot projects..

A quick assessment of Performance

Decentralization has had several positive spin-offs. They are summarized below:

* The formula based devolution of funds has ensured that funds flowed to every nook and corner of the State including the outlying and backward areas, facilitating public investment.

* The cornerstone of Kerala's decentralization has been people's participation. The processes have been designed to facilitate intervention by the interested citizen at all stages of the development process right from generation of developmental ideas through project planning, project implementation, up to monitoring.

* Decentralization has resulted in better targeting especially in the case of individual benefits by insisting on a due process in the selection of beneficiaries. The quality of identification has certainly improved.

* Decentralization has opened up opportunities for wide ranging reforms. Already right to information, prescription of dire process in giving of benefits, outsourcing of technical services, community management of assets and simplification of procedures have taken place. More reforms in the form of independent regulatory institutions, improved management systems both financial and administrative, enhanced accountability mechanisms etc., are in the offing.

* In development matters local governments have significant achievements. The important ones are:

i) As is evident from the performance, local governments have done well in provision of minimum needs infrastructure both to households as well as to communities. This is particularly true of housing, sanitation, water supply, infrastructure of hospitals and schools and connectivity.
ii) The introduction of the mandatory Women Component Plan has been a path breaker. Local governments have gradually matured in their planning for gender sensitive schemes. Earmarking of 10% of the plan outlay for women has helped considerably the disadvantaged groups among women like widows, and has improved the provision of services, which are of direct benefit to women. The local governments have to be further guided to improve the quality of planning to engender it fully.
iii) Local government plans have shown a strong anti-poverty bias. More funds have flown to families below poverty line through local governments than would normally have been the case.
iv) Local governments have evolved good models in water supply, improvement of quality of education, improving agriculture productivity, etc. They have generally shown a preference for affordable technologies and appropriate solutions. There have been some positive steps in areas like integrated natural resource management.
v) Many local governments have been able to raise public contributions for water supply schemes, repair of buildings, provision of facilities like latrines in schools and dispensaries, supply of computers to schools etc.
There are also certain problems and weaknesses, which are enumerated below:
1) The outliers like Scheduled Tribes are still to gain from decentralization. In a
scenario where one section of the poor lives off another section,
decentralization seems to have certain inbuilt limitations.

* The poorest among the poor need social safety nets particularly for food and health emergencies. This cannot be provided by local governments by themselves.

* The management of services particularly health and education have not improved except for some infrastructure and equipment provisions. These services have direct implications for local development, poverty reduction and employment.

* The flow of bank credit into local schemes has been rather limited resulting more from bankers' reluctance to deal with local governments than from inadequacies of project formulation. This has resulted in higher subsidies.

* In a State like Kerala where the number of educated poor is very high there is an inherent limitation in local government action against it. Linkage with job markets through skill up gradation or identification of self-employment opportunities or small-scale production activities with assured markets are all services, which have to be provided from higher levels.

* There is a tendency to spread resources thinly with funds being given to every electoral constituency whenever a development scheme is taken up. Distribution of assets and inputs, not necessarily productive, has been common.

* Vertical integration of local level programmes has proved difficult to achieve.

* Participatory aspect of planning is often limited to airing of needs and sharing of benefits. There is little healthy discussion by all sections of the population based on data and norms, generating a prioritized list of developmental needs.

* The introduction of local planning and development unfortunately coincided with years of acute financial difficulties of the State government. Due to constant ways and means difficulties, the actual release of funds and implementation of local schemes were not matched leaving to delayed or partial implementation or even abandonment.

* Similarly, redeployment of staff for plan implementation could start only a few years after the programme was started. It is still incomplete. This has also adversely affected local plan implementation.

* Despite Government's over-all approach and pro-local government policy, reluctance to change persists in many individuals and departments.

* The resolution of problems between the local governments (as regards their assigned statutory functions) and para statals like the Electricity Board and Water Authority continues to be knotty (as there can be no redeployment from them).

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