Two full decades after their inception, the zilla panchayats in Goa are trapped in a bewildering contradiction. While they have become politically electrifying arenas during election seasons, these district-level bodies wield almost no real power in day-to-day governance. Established in the year 2000 as a crucial second tier of the panchayati raj system, they have consistently lost the battle for the devolution of funds, functions, and authority from the state government.
The Deliberate Creation of "Toothless Tigers"
Soter D'Souza, a veteran grassroots advocate for panchayati raj, offers a blunt assessment. He labels the zilla panchayats as "almost toothless tigers." According to D'Souza, this power vacuum is not an accidental failure of the system but a calculated strategy. It allows the state government to retain centralized control, effectively bypassing the local self-governance framework that panchayati raj institutions were meant to embody.
The original vision for these bodies was far more ambitious and integrated. D'Souza explains that zilla panchayats were intended to become the nodal agency connecting gram panchayats, potential taluka panchayats, and various state government departments. In this ideal model, even interventions by MLAs, MPs, and government agencies would be routed through the zilla panchayat, rather than dealing directly with village-level bodies.
"All these line departments would have been in the zilla panchayat," D'Souza states, painting a picture of a streamlined system. Technical expertise from bodies like the Town and Country Planning (TCP) department and the Goa Coastal Zone Regulation Management Authority (GCZMA) would be housed at the district level. This setup was designed to provide single-window clearances for village projects, ensuring efficiency and accountability.
Fragmented System Fuels Chaos and Dependency
The absence of this integrated model has led to administrative chaos and created fertile ground for corruption. D'Souza points to the tragic Arpora incident as a direct consequence. "There are 10 different departments giving licences, each department operating in isolation. Now nobody is taking accountability and passing the buck," he laments.
This fragmentation has forced both gram panchayats and zilla panchayats into a state of subservience. They now depend heavily on MLAs and MPs for funds and project approvals—a dependency the entire panchayati raj structure was specifically created to eliminate. A senior bureaucrat, speaking anonymously, confirms this failure: "The current system defeats the very idea of self-government bodies. While the role of panchayats has been reduced to only issuing NOCs for projects, the zilla panchayats are left to go abegging."
How Party Politics Undermines the "People's Republic"
The introduction of party-based elections to zilla panchayats has fundamentally altered their character and raised serious questions about their future. This move is seen as a direct contradiction to the core philosophy of local self-governance.
"A candidate who gets elected is under the dictate of the political party. So it's a conflict between what the people want and what the party wants," D'Souza argues. The crisis deepens after elections, where the allegiance of the elected representative lies primarily with the party. This allows the party to dictate terms, often overriding decisions made by gram panchayats or gram sabhas, thereby undermining the very concept of a people's republic.
Researchers of the panchayati raj system argue that its basic philosophy does not permit the open participation of political parties, as it is treated as a 'people's republic.' They warn that the open entry of parties will prove disastrous for these grassroots democracies.
However, for the political parties themselves, zilla panchayat elections now serve a completely different purpose. They are less about strengthening local governance and more about testing political waters ahead of the assembly elections. Ironically, the very powerlessness of these institutions has made them convenient launchpads for political careers, with ZP membership viewed by many as a gateway to the state legislative assembly.
As Goa's zilla panchayats mark over twenty years of existence, the gap between their empowering vision and their current reality as politically charged yet powerless entities continues to widen, casting a long shadow over the future of decentralized governance in the state.
