Opinion Grassroots Threat
The logical and mandated progression was to move to the second and third tier of the panchayati raj structure but the Omar Abdullah government did not pursue it with adequate zeal.
It may not have a direct cause-and-effect relationship but the killing of a sarpanch in Jammu and Kashmir is being seen by the Centre in the context of the inability of the state government to follow up the panchayat elections last year with the constitution of elected bodies at the block and district levels. The logical and mandated progression was to move to the second and third tier of the panchayati raj structure but the Omar Abdullah government did not pursue it with adequate zeal.
Moving up the ladder of local governance would have required MPs and MLAs to lose some of the power they currently wield in executing projects at the local level. But may be because a large majority of sarpanchs happened to be closer to the opposition PDP than the ruling National Conference,the state government saw the danger of a more prominent opposition presence at the block and district levels too.
Even the sarpanchs who were elected did not get the kind of support that was required to set up the institution of panchayat in villages. The newly-elected sarpanchs were without offices or furniture or a panchayat secretariat. In many cases,the sarpanchs did not even have bank accounts,because of which funds for various centrally-sponsored schemes could not be transferred.
The state government would argue that setting up a fully efficient panchayati raj institution requires much more than the one-and-a-half-years that has passed since the elections last year. Indeed,recently many panchayats were given money to establish secretariats and essential infrastructure. But now a new worry has emerged. The danger of the recent killing being blown out of proportion by its politicisation is imminent. That would fritter away the advantage even further.
The writer is a Senior Assistant Editor based in New Delhi,amitabh.sinha@expressindia.com
Share
