Multistakeholder Involvement in Environmental Management
19
Roof water harvesting is also being stressed to
augment water availability. Some state
governments and city authorities are making it
mandatory for new houses to instal roof water
harvesting structures.
The achievements in the area of watershed
development have been considerable, but they
have also thrown up several challenges for
governments, NGOs and people. The biggest
challenge is to sustain the effort. For this it is
crucial to maintain the water-harvesting
structures that have been built in tens of
thousands. The Watershed Guidelines (2001)
clearly mention the need for an exit protocol. It
is suggested that the structures should be
managed by the Watershed Associations or
Committees under the supervision of
Gram
Panchayats.
In Madhya Pradesh, ownership of these
structures has been shifted to the Gram Sabha
(village assemblies) which will manage and
maintain the structures. In Gujarat, the
government is planning to set up an institution
funded by the government to maintain these
structures, which are currently managed by the
involved communities.
Over the years, government policies have
progressively moved towards participatory
watershed development at a local scale. This
has enabled community groups, NGOs and
government departments to work
synergistically to tackle problems of water
scarcity effectively all over the country. The
government is also concerned about the quality
of
rivers and is initiating participatory
mechanisms to manage this. A National River
Conservation Authority has been set up under
the Chairmanship of the Prime Minister.
Tasks Ahead
Our Clean Water
Shanti Maluda accompanied by fellow members of her all-
women Village Water and Sanitation Committee (VWSC), and
an engineer from a support organization travelled all the way
to Delhi, a distance of 350 km from her native village, to
choose the right quality of pipes needed for the water system
being installed in their village. Shanti is the Chairperson of the
VWSC of Kamtoli village in the hill state of Uttaranchal.
People exercising their choices and controlling the quality and
standard of their services is the hallmark of the Swajal (swa
means our and clean, while jal means water) project
being implemented in Uttar Pradesh and Uttaranchal states of
India. What makes this possible is an innovative
decentralized approach being followed in the project.
The Swajal project was envisaged in 1994 through the Project
Management Unit, an autonomous government society, and
the World Bank for developing a community-based, demand-
driven, rural water supply and sanitation programme. The
new institutional model designed to facilitate this functioning
is based upon partnership among three organizations, the
Village Water and Sanitation Committees, NGOs (serving as
support and capacity-building units) and the Project
Management Unit (PMU). The scope of the Swajal project
includes water supply and sanitation, community
empowerment activities, including health and environmental
awareness, and preparation of rural water and sanitation
sector development plans for the entire state.
The major stakeholders are the villagers or the beneficiaries.
A VWSC is formed in each village as a formal body with a
legal status as a sub-committee of the Gram Panchayat
(Village Council). The committee made up of seven to twelve
democratically elected members has at least 30 per cent
representation from women and 20 per cent form socially and
economically backward sections. In a unique precedent,
under the Swajal project, all construction-related funds are
transferred by the PMU to a community-managed bank
account. These accounts are jointly operated with a support
organization, usually an NGO. Once the funds are available,
the VWSC moves ahead with the project planning,
implementation, operation and maintenance at the community
level.
The PMU has developed guidelines and formats for the action
plans to address the local water and sanitation issues of the
village. The villagers use these to draw upon their own plans
based on their own situation, experiences and ideas. These
plans are carried out by the community with the assistance of
the support organization. Thus the programme runs as a
collaborative effort between the villagers, the supporting NGO
and the Project Management Unit.
By June 2001, more than 1000 villages were in various
stages of implementation of Swajal. About 250 villages are in
the operation and maintenance stage, 350 in the construction
and 600 in the planning stage. The VWSCs are regularly
collecting the water tariffs and managing their own systems.
The overall success of the programme has created a new
model which has the community or the users at the centre of
the programme.