Empower & Educate Local Officials
For Good Governance At VDCs

By Mukti Rijal

QUESTIONS are raised time and again about the use of the government grant to village development committees. Some tend to argue that the resources are not properly used, if not misused. They call for thorough reexamination of grants giving to local bodies and make necessary amends should it be established that VDCs are indulged in resource abuse and misappropriation. Others hold lenient view and place emphasis on trial and error contending that flaws and discrepancies could be corrected in due course of time.

Exaggerated Story

The local government officials do air strong rebuttal to the charge. Some DDC presidents are heard saying that the line agencies spend tens of million rupees at the district for larger projects but without any real and lasting outputs and results. No fingers are pointed at them and line agencies are allowed to go scot-free whereas exaggerated stories are cooked about the misuse of resources at the local bodies.

It can be said that the local governments in many cases are cash strapped and have no resources at their disposal to indulge in gross and fragnant misuse. Some VDCs and DDCs have started generating resources but the volume and size is not big enough to allow the officials to steep in the morass of corruption.

However, no matter the size and magnitude of resources there are some cases of improper use and mis-utilisation. A few of them can only be imputed to the intents bordering on corruption whereas many of the cases are the results of lack of knowledge, skills and support administrative and technical manpower. Some cases of improper use of resources can also be ascribed to political resources.

A large majority of local government office bearers are not seemingly aware of the provisions in law that require the observance of the tenets of good governance. This writer had an opportunity, not very long back, to interest with VDC office bearers of the Palung and the Daman VDCs in Makwanpur district. Not all of them have read and understood the provisions of the Local Self-Governance Act specific to the village development committees.

A large number of Village council members including the women and members from disadvantaged commu-nities coopted in the VDCs have not even seen not to talk of reading the law.

This shows the poor state of the official commitment to implement the law in the sense that it was incumbent upon the government to, at least, reach the law out to those who must know about it for implementation. This responsibility should have been borne by the government at the expense of state exchequer. Relying on donor agencies or some non-governmental urgency to assume the line functions of this nature does not serve any good purpose.

We can take cue from South Africa where the Multiracial government headed by Nelson Mandela made it possible to distribute a copy of the country’s new constitution to all the citizen as a first attempt of educating the citizens on the new constitution enacted following the abolition of apartheid. We in Nepal can easily do to make the local self-governance act and the rules available to all local government institutions at one, if not to all the elected members. But the ground reality appears that the rules are yet to reach down to the distant villages. There is enthusiasm and interest at the local level but lack of education and training and other supportive measures have been at the root of poor performance or underper-formance.

The local self-governance Act has several provisions that seek to strengthen the values of good governance. Section 19 of the Local Self-Governance Act requires that the local government officials should declare their assets, both moveable and immovable within thirty days of being sworn in the office. In some cases this may not be practical and necessary at the village level, as people know each other intimately including the property holding of the elected people. This can be started from the level of DDC and slowly implemented at the VDC level.

The Local Self-Governance Act provides for stronger scheme of rule of law. The VDCs can formulate bylaws and bring them into effect after the Village Council approves them. An element of separation of power is also introduced at the village level with law making and deliberative functions entrusted to village council and the executive tasks and mandates given to the executives body.

The concept of Public Accounts Committee enshrined in the Local Self-Governance Act is important in the context of financial integrity and good governance at the local level. The Committee needs to be formed at the VDC level and it is heartening to note that the Public Accounts Committee has been in place in many VDCs where the elected office bearers are aware of the provision. In the Parsa DDCs, as told to this authors there was stiff contest for the positions of the committee. This is in line with the Public Accounts Committee at the national parliament. Should the committee become effective and functional at the VDC and DDC level, many alleged irregularities and arrears could be brought to disclosure for rectification and settlement.

True Spirit

Development and empowerment go hand in hand with good governance. We have several problems constraining the strict application of the tenets of good governance at the central level. Despite some minor problems the districts and villages can be easily brought on the rail of good governance if we acted to implement the Local Self-Governance Act in true and honest spirit.

Satar Culture

By Netra Subedi

SATARS are people living in Jhapa and Morang district of Nepal and it is believed that they are the descendants Santhals of Bihar in India. The total number of Satars in Nepal was around twenty-thousand in the census 1961. This number is decreasing nowadays.

It is estimated that there are around seven thousand Satars in Nepal. This fluctuation can be attributed to their habit of moving back and forth across the Nepal-India border. They mostly make only a temporary living in the middle of forest clearings. Physically they look similar to Tharus, but unlike the Tharus, they are not interested in farming. They are much more interested in maintaining their spears and hunting weapons including bows and arrows. They frequently organise hunting expeditions for the village people. Being good hunters, they kill and eat various animals like, deer, jackal and even snakes.

The Satar women folk are quite skilled in making brooms, bamboo baskets and straw mats. Similarly, they depend very little on factory made clothes because they make their own rough clothing. Women wear a skirt with a scarf over their breast whereas men wear a loin-cloth around there waist. Women decorate themselves with brass and silver jewellery.

Village council is very important to maintain law and order in the Satar community. Majhi is the headman of council, appointed with the unanimous consent of the village. These disciplined people obey the decision of the village council without question. But infortunately, they are very often exploited by other clever people. Some of their exogamous clan units are Hemram, Saren, Basars and Hasda.

Since marriage is monogamous and patrilocal and descent is patrilineal they tend to follow the universal norm of marriage.

Dor Bahadur Bista, in his famous book entitled "People of Nepal" writes, "Anyone breaking marriage rules and committing other offences is excommunicated or made to pay a fine of one hundred rupees and a feast of one hundred meals of boiled rice." Even then junior levirate—marrying an elder brothers’ widow—is a common practice. Arranging the marriage while candidate are around twenty years old common practice. However the young people involve in premarital sexual activities. In case of pregnancy in such activities, the male concerned is bound either to marry the girl or to pay compensation against the child delivery expenses. In most of the cases young people themselves arrange their marriage. The young people can get enough time to know each other even in the case of arranged marriage. Some times, they marry by force also. Either of the party can be forced to marry. If a boy can put vermilion powder in the parting of the girls hair, the girl is believed to be wedded to the boy. Similarly, if a girl enters and stays in the house of a boy of her choice, the boy is compelled to marry her in case he cannot persuade her to go back.

They Celebrate several festivals, which have associative relationship with different seasons. ‘Vaha’ and Sohraya’ are the most important ones. They worship the deities of the forest asking permission for hunting and picking wild fruits on the occasion of Vaha that falls in February. They worship their ancestors on the occasion of Sohraya, which is observed in November. Their most important gods are Morang Thakur, Moreko and Baru. They cremate the dead bodies on the riverbanks. They strictly observe birth and death pollution and have a priest from their own clan group.

These people are noted for their merry making. Generally women sing and men play flute and drums. Such performances in the moonlit nights are very popular among the youth.

In spite of the fact that the Satars have a unique culture and norm of life, their standard of life is more or less similar to the Rautyes of western Nepal. They are extremely backward in the field of education and socio-economic condition. Rich and clever people can influence them easily particularly in the time of election. The governmental and non-governmental organisations including the researchers, need to be attentivein uplifting the standard of living of the Satars of Nepal.