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| Back To Village: A Fading Development Model | | |
Dr. Satwant Singh Rissam
The ‘back to village’ programme started last year was first of its kind initiative to reach the people at the grass root level across all panchayats of J&K. The goals were to strengthen panchayats, collect opinion on prevailing government schemes from rural population and to assess economic potential and unforeseen needs of the villages in J&K. People developed high hopes as soon as this programme was announced. Somewhere the idea people developed of ‘back to village’ was that the long pending demands & several languishing projects of their area would now get the desired attention. Certainly it was a quite new thing for J&K residents and thus in June 2019, people participated in large numbers in this programme. There was much fanfare during 1st phase and many demands were put forward before visiting officials by people in the both regions of J&K. The 1st phase of the programme ended with high hopes and expectations of “equitable development”. Time passed by but nothing moved on ground regarding the grievances collected in the 1st phase. With such a response, people got disappointed and thought of this program as government’s ‘half hearted approach’ towards rural people.
While people were yet talking of non-fulfillment of promises under 1st phase, 2nd phase of ‘back to village’ was announced with a promise to lay emphasis on unfulfilled works of 1st phase. With a larger push and under the media attention 2nd phase was rolled out in Nov 2019. But in 2nd phase resentment among panchayats and people came out openly with some panchayats even boycotting the entire phase. Surprisingly, during 2nd phase all highlighted matters of 1st phase were being ignored and sidelined by the visiting officials with a plea that they didn’t visit the same area during 1st phase. And before the end of 2nd phase, the entire hype added slowly turned into disappointment. 2nd phase was a traditional risk taken by government administration to go to public without any societal changes. Both phases failed to provide anticipated results and resentment grew high in public against the government. The concept of taking governance to doorstep of public through this programme couldn’t take shape.
Now almost after a year and amid ongoing pandemic, on October 2, 2020 the 3rd phase of ‘back to village’ programme began. The government is pushing one after another phase with a claim to have brought change on ground but the government’s tall claims got exposed when in some areas of Pulwama district in Kashmir no one appeared before the visiting officials and these officials were forced to visit houses to meet the people. Moreover, reporting of same grievances twice or thrice reflects the mockery of entire system. The government appears to have not done any homework before going back to people in 3rd phase. Why even after two phases, the same things are being repeated by the public? This also shows that either the government has failed to take feedback from concerned quarters or the bureaucracy in J&K wants to continue by wasting money on such programmes.
The real intention of government was to give an ear to the grievances. But having given ear to it, government now has turned blind eye to the problems of public. With majority of issues remaining unaddressed and confined to official files only, this programme is slowly becoming a ‘fading development model’. The ‘back to village’ programme could have become a revolutionary step had government worked on identified problems in time bound manner. Basically, the tools adopted to cater to people’s problem appeared disciplined but were very less goal oriented. Infact things would only change once accountability of the officers is fixed. Mahatma Gandhi said that the future of India lies in its villages. And if government in J&K demonstrates ability to hold itself accountable then trust among the people and government would strengthen in this new J&K. |
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