Concerns in Urban Local Governments

What is the issue?

• It is quarter century since the creation of municipalities under 74th Constitutional Amendment Act.
• It is imperative at this juncture to assess the progress of municipal governance in India.

What are the concerns?

• Limitations - Sates have fallen short of implementing the provisions of the 74th Amendment.
• There are concerns in underlying constitutional design of urban local governments (ULGs).
• Local governments are financially constrained.
• They do not have the administrative capacity to carry out its functions.
• ULGs are increasingly disempowered and depoliticised as an institution.

• Power - The elected representatives at the city-level are rendered powerless.
• In most municipal corporations, the mayor is largely the ceremonial head.
• The executive powers are vested with the State government-appointed commissioner.
• This disjuncture in municipal governance has been exploited by State governments.
• Parastatal agencies - Various parastatal agencies are created by the State government.
• These further deny municipal corporations their political role.
• E.g. urban development authorities (building infrastructure), public corporations (water, electricity, transportation services, etc)
• Even urban planning and land-use regulation is with State government-controlled development authorities.
• These agencies function with certain autonomy.
• Moreover they are accountable only to the State government, and not the local government.
• Parastatal agencies and unelected commissioners are pre-74th Amendment legacies that have not been undone.
• Depoliticisation - There is increasing depoliticisation of local government in recent years.
• These seek to ring fence projects from local government.
• E.g. Central government programmes such as the Smart Cities Mission.
• This programme mandates the creation of special purpose vehicles (SPVs) for Smart Cities.
• SPVs will have operational independence.
• They will have autonomy in decision making and implementation.
• State government can further delegate the decision-making powers available to the ULBs to the Chief Executive Officer of the SPV.
• Disempowerment - Even for performing functions that are within its purview, local government requires State government permissions.
• These include functions like levying local taxes or undertaking civic projects above a certain budget.
• Municipalities are not yet autonomous units to be truly called as the “third tier” of government in India’s federal system.
• The creation of parallel institutions further disempowers the elected local government.
• It shows how higher levels of government distrust local politics.
• Functions - Functions in 12th Schedule which a State government is expected to devolve to the local government should be relooked.
• It does not include essential civic issues such as urban transportation, housing or urban commons.
• Civic activism - This has often been focussed on the creation of two bodies mandated by the 74th Amendment.
• They are the ward committees and metropolitan planning committees.
• However, there is an over-reliance on such semi-representative bodies.
• This does not augur well for creating a genuinely democratic city government.
• Civil society’s emphasis on nominating its members into ward committees can further depoliticise local governments.
• It could make them captive to the interests of certain elite resident welfare associations.
• Exceptions - The 74th Amendment contains an industrial township exception.
• A municipality need not be constituted in areas which are declared as industrial townships.
• These provisions have been employed by State governments to keep local governments weak.
• Distribution - The 73rd Amendment provides for three levels of panchayats at village, taluk, and district levels.
• Unlike this, power in urban areas is concentrated in a single municipal body.
• It could be the municipal corporation, municipal council or town panchayat.

What is the way forward?

• Local governments must be increasingly acknowledged as inherently political spaces.
• The present model of urban governance vesting power in a singular municipality should be relooked.
• Urban governance reforms should focus on political empowerment of local government that promotes local democratic accountability.

Source: The Hindu