Govt fails to constitute Finance Commission for 3-tiers of PRIs
Act amended by MHA yet to be fully implemented
Mohinder Verma
JAMMU, Jan 1: Even one year after their establishment, the District Development Councils in the Union Territory of Jammu and Kashmir don’t have Planning and several Standing Committees, which otherwise have crucial role to play in handling many important aspects. Moreover, the Government has failed to constitute Finance Commission for the three-tiers of the Panchayati Raj Institutions and due to this the Act amended by the Ministry of Home Affairs last year has yet not been fully implemented.
Official sources told EXCELSIOR that in order to ensure further devolution of powers to the grass root democratic institutions, the Union Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA) carried out several amendments in the Jammu and Kashmir Panchayati Raj Act, 1989 by way of Union Territory of Jammu and Kashmir Reorganization (Adaptation of State Laws) Fourth Order, 2020.
Through the amendments the Ministry of Home Affairs paved the way for establishment of District Development Councils and District Planning Committees. However, even one year after the constitution of District Development Councils, the Planning Committee has not been framed for any of the Council for the reasons best known to the Government particularly the Department of Rural Development and Panchayati Raj, which is the main agency for implementation of the Act, sources said.
“The inordinate delay in establishment of District Planning Committees is notwithstanding the fact that these committees are supposed to consider and guide the formulation of development programmes for the district and indicate priorities for various schemes and consider issues relating to the speedy development and economic upliftment of the district”, sources informed, adding “in the amended Act it has been mentioned that District Planning Committee will function as a working group for formulation of periodic and annual plans for the district and formulate and finalize the plan and non-plan budget for the district”.
Moreover, there is no Standing Committee for Finance, Standing Committee for Development, Standing Committee for Public Works, Standing Committee for Health and Education and Standing Committee for Welfare, the provision for which was also kept in the Act amended by the Ministry of Home Affairs.
As per the provision, each Committee should be consisted of such number of members including its Chairperson as decided by the District Development Council so that all other elected members except the Chairperson and Vice-Chairperson shall be elected as a member in any of the Standing Committee and the number of members elected to each Standing Committee shall, as far as possible, be equal.
Stating that due to non-serious approach at various level the amended Act has not been implemented in totality till date, sources said that the mandate of the Standing Committee for Finance is to deal with the subjects like finance, accounts, audit, budget, general administration while as Standing Committee for Development is supposed to deal with the development planning, socio-economic planning, agriculture, soil conservation, animal husbandry, minor irrigation, fisheries and small scale industry etc.
“Similarly, the Standing Committee for Public Works is supposed to deal with public works, housing, spatial planning and environment while as the mandate of the Standing Committee for Health and Education is to deal with public health and education and the Standing Committee for Welfare is required to deal with social welfare, development of women and children and development of Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes”, sources said.
“It is not understandable as to how formulation of committees having such huge responsibilities can be ignored by the Government”, sources said, adding “it is the duty of the Government to initiate steps for having such committees in each District Development Council”.
Moreover, the Government has yet not initiated any exercise to constitute Finance Commission for three-tiers of the Panchayati Raj Institutions (PRIs) including the District Development Councils (DDCs), Block Development Councils (BDCs) and Panchayats, which otherwise has an important role to play as far as funding for boosting developmental works in the rural areas is concerned.
“As there is massive flow of grants to the DDCs, BDCs and Panchayats with the implementation of 73rd Amendment of the Constitution of India there is dire need to have Finance Commission so that the grants to Panchayati Raj Institutions are routed through the proper channel”, sources said, adding “the Finance Commission will play crucial role in checking diversion of funds meant for all the three-tiers of the Panchayati Raj Institutions”.
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