Rayhan Ahmed Topader :
In the developing world, the existence of an effective local government system remains crucial, although the traditional discourse on local government seems to have recently diminished due to the emergence of new actors or partners in governance such as private enterprises and non-government organizations. It has been repeatedly emphasized that a decentralized local government system is crucial for facilitating policy implementation, making need-based policy decisions, distributing goods and services, reducing the state’s administrative burden, educating citizens in democratic practices and rights, developing political leadership, and addressing internal socio-cultural diversity. Given this multi-purpose significance of local government, it is not surprising that in the developing world, ‘practically every country has experimented with some form of decentralization or local government reform with varying aims and outcomes. Among the South Asian countries only Nepal could escape the misery of colonisation. In 2015, Nepal became a federal republic. Under its new constitution, the republic is constituted with three levels of government, federal, provincial and local. The federation is divided into provinces and local is divided into districts and local levels that include metropolises, sub metropolises and gaunpalikas. The Constitution of Nepal 2015 gives various powers to these local levels.
This enables them to formulate laws to implement these powers. Besides these single powers, there are other concurrent powers that can be implemented by all three level of state,i.e.federation, province, and local levels, based on the principles of coordination, cooperation, and coexistence. These local institutions provide basic services to the people in various areas such as agriculture, works and transportation, education and sports, irrigation, physical development and health services etc. After the recently concluded parliamentary election, Pakistan is contemplating to restructure its existing local government system.
The currently existing system was installed as per ‘Devolution Plan 2000. This new local government system was introduced in Pakistan on 14th August 2001 after the promulgation of Local Government Ordinance 2001 by all the four provinces. The new system comprises of a district government or a city district government and zila council in a district, tehsil municipal administration and tehsil council in a tehsil and union administration and union council in a union. Accordingly Village Neighbour hood councils provide an interface with the lowest tier of the local government with the community. The system devolved some sectors/functions to the districts, including health and education; and municipal services, including water to the tehsils. Local government is the third and lowest level of government in Sri Lanka after the central government and provincial councils.
The local government bodies are collectively known as local authorities. They are responsible for providing a variety of local public services. Local authorities are divided into three different groups: municipal councils, urban councils and divisional councils. All local authorities are elected using the open list proportional representation system.
Develop mental initiatives now emphasise the inclusion and wider participation of people particularly the marginalised sections in the decision-making process. For this purpose, decentralisation is considered to be the best means of ensuring inclusive participation. It is perceived that decentralisation can accelerate the pace and spread the benefits of growth and the poorest and marginalised groups are likely to receive a larger and fairer share of the government services.
For decentralisation, local government institutions are considered to be one of the most effective vehicles for providing benefits to the local levels as these bodies tend to ensure political equality, responsiveness and accountability. As such, the importance of decentralisation has been realised more or less by all.
Here it may be mentioned that the history of decentralisation and the existence of local government institutions is quite old in South Asia. At the same time, other than Nepal, all other countries of South Asia were under the same colonial power, the Great Britain. The Constitution of Bangladesh, in articles 11,59 and 60, has laid down a framework concerning local government institutions.
According to article 59, the government is required to establish local government institutions (LGIs) at all levels of administration below the centre. Currently, Bangladesh has union level local bodies as the lowest tier.
The second tier upazila (sub district) has been reinstated.The zila parishad (district council) has also been constituted after a long interval.Thus, at present, there are two distinct types of local government institutions in Bangladesh: one for rural areas and the other for urban areas.
The local government in rural areas represents a hierarchical system consisting of three tiers: union parishad, upazilla parishad, and zilla parishad, while the urban local government consists of pourashavas and city corporations Here it needs to mention that there are several ethnic groups in Bangladesh with a total population of more than 1 million.They are mostly concentrated in three hill districts.
Over the years, the ethnic population has experienced a strong sense of social, political and economic exclusion, lack of recognition, fear and insecurity, loss of cultural identity, and social oppression.To bring them into the national mainstream, a separate system of local government was established. The Act 19 of 1989 has established three local government councils in three districts of Chattogram Hill Tracts.The act has transferred several government departments to the local governments. All local government institutions in Bangladesh have varied functions depending on their jurisdiction and nature.
Laws require local authorities to carry out regulatory and administrative functions, promote public health and provide physical structures.
A revision in the local government legislation introduced a reserved quota of council seats for women, and after the 2018 local elections, 29.1% of councillors were females. Grants are provided from national government through provincial councils, and local authorities are responsible for the collection of taxes which are delegated and user fees as well as property rates. Local government institutions are in existence for quite long in all the South Asian countries with their difference in the forms of government and historical past.
These institutions went through reorganisa tions for many times to suit the needs of the time as well as, in some cases, of regimes. These have been functional since their introduction almost without interruption.However, despite variations to the degrees or extent of decentralisation there exist some common challenges of these local government institutions of these countries.
These include limited institutional capacity; overlapping of roles and functions of different levels; perpetual dependence of central government grants and finance because of weak local resource base, weak system of accountability, and inadequate human resources to discharge the ever increasing functions and responsibilities.
At the same time, decentralisation implementation plans with specific time frame for implementation should also be developed.However, for finances, these institutions overwhelmingly depend on the grants of the central government.
India’s 73rd and 74th constitutional amendments made provisions for devolution and mandated that states to hold regular elections and transfer funds and functions to the local government units urban and rural.
The local government in rural areas is organised under the panchayat system of governance involving panchayati raj institutions. The panchayat is a three-tier system that includes gram panchayat at the village level, panchayat samiti at the block level and zilla parishad at the district level.The panchayat system exists in all states except Nagaland, Meghalaya and Mizoram.It also exists in all union territories except Delhi. The panchayat system is provided for all states having a population of more than 2 million.
Functions of the panchayat include planning and implementation of schemes for economic development and social justice relating to various subjects in the indicative list. Based on the 74th Constitutional Amendment Act, there are three types of urban local governments, like, Municipal Corporation, municipality, and city council. The functions and powers of them vary from state to state.
