Providing poor sections of society the right to speak is not an act of benevolence but a part of equitable justice system. The book, Disadvantaged People, Opportunities and Participative Governance: The Raigad Experiments (Memoirs of Collector, Raigad) sums up how farmers were taken on board to tap the great potential of sea-side areas as agro-tourist spots
‘Passion does not need explanation.’ — NipunVinayak
Professor Amartya Sen recounts in The Argumentative Indian his experiences during his visit to a village in 2004 when general elections in India were underway. He met a villager, illiterate and poor, telling Professor Sen, “It is not very hard to silence us, but that is not because we cannot speak.” The learned Professor drew a wise conclusion: though the recording and preservation of arguments have an inbuilt bias in the direction of the articulations of the powerful and the well-schooled, members of disadvantaged groups can also provide many of the most interesting accounts of arguments. Modern world has been privy to flow of well-articulated points of view from those strata of society which represents the marginal denizens, unheeded and uncared for. India is no exception. This is story-half-told in as much as it provides a great impetus to move development process towards these disadvantaged groups. What nextIJ What about opportunitiesIJ And by whomIJ Those farmers who don’t speak not because they cannot but because opportunities don’t come their way look forward to someone equipping them with opportunities to mouth their concerns and arguments. Hearing is a great art and those not skilled in this art deprive civilisations of many counter-factual propositions. Once opportunities come, the aftermath holds the same or even greater degree of interest for all interested in consequences of such an impetus. This brings me to a set of experiments conducted by a young man, Nipun Vinayak, an Indian Administrative Service officer of 2001 batch and currently posted as Director, Swachchh Bharat Mission (Gramin), New Delhi, who has succinctly epitomised these experiments in his memoirs titled, Participative Governance in District Administration, published by Authors PRESS, New Delhi.
The book is a reflection on Nipun’s faith in good governance that, he feels, is all about “passion, participation and partnership”. Calling himself “a participative and facilitative development learner”, his career so far has aimed at endeavouring to engage people in various development projects. This book highlights experiments during his tenure as District Collector, Raigad, a small city near Mumbai. These experiments reflect on a need to have a solid safety-valve for the voice of the “disadvantaged group”. On an optimistic tone, Aruna Roy and Nikhil Dey in the Foreword to the book write, “This book is a chronicling of hope, the commodity the Indian people set great store by… In a country where power is skewed, answers lie in combination of common sense and principled action.” This is the best one can say of this book.
The book has two parts: Part I. Maha Mumbai SEZ — Facts, Drama and Impact; and Part II. Development Programmes. The first part has seven chapters; the second four. While the first part highlights sense of association of farmers in Raigad with the process of land acquisition as contrasted with sense of alienation elsewhere, the second part is replete with stand-alone stories. I will try to bring forth two crucial experiments as culled out from the book.
Nipun narrates the chain of resistance offered to Maha Mumbai SEZ (MSEZ) by various groups on generic as well as specific grounds which, inter alia, included “in-principle” opposition to SEZs, acquisition of land of entire villages, flouting of rules by MSEZ Company, etc. There was a virtual impasse. The then Government decided and directed the Collector to give individual hearing to the affected farmers whose lands were proposed to be acquired. Here Nipun’s role as Collector became vital. One of the most remarkable innovations Nipun did in the history of land acquisitions was to address a direct question to farmers, “Do you want to part with your landIJ” This innovative approach was hailed as “referendum”. And Nipun rightly feels what was at stake was not to be dubbed as “heroes” or “villains” but was to have the contentment of having done legally correct thing.
Nipun faced the first issue that was to be resolved: “who to hearIJ” This issue was important as only people whose lands were actually getting acquired for the project need be heard. Toward that end, a mechanism was put in place whereby people would first be identified as “affected farmers” based on their views. The task of identifying persons was given to local talathi (village revenue official), kotwal and other Government functionaries. For various tactical reasons, it was decided that hearing would be conducted at multiple locations so that at any one location the number of people would be less. Second challenge was to obtain a structured and meaningful opinion conveying farmers’ views unambiguously. The format in which public opinion was to be solicited was finalised. Since the opinion was to be solicited in relation to the MSEZ project, only three options existed: (i) people wanted MSEZ project (ii) people did not want MSEZ project, and (iii) people wanted MSEZ project subject to some conditions. The format for recording opinion was, therefore, designed accordingly. It was a one page format, providing for (a) details of the farmers, and (b) his clear opinion on the project. The affected persons had the option to pinpoint reasons for their decision.
What was very important was to reach out to all the people and explain the entire process to them. A public notice was, therefore, issued in the local newspapers and notices were also published in each of the 22 villages, explaining the process in detail. Nipun ensured that all necessary precautions were taken to have a smooth sailing. This exercise of eliciting public opinion had, as Nipun records in his book, ramifications beyond Raigad, like setting a precedence to elicit people’s opinion for a democratic project; setting a new high for transparency in democratic institutions; kick-starting wider debate on issues of land acquisition, especially for companies; redefining/questioning the concept of “public purpose”.
Thus due to these efforts by Nipun, the “pulse” of the people got widely known which became a reason d’etre for a huge celebration event for the affected people. He writes of the aftermath, “I became a ‘villain’ in the eyes of some, but a ‘hero’ in the eyes of many… The law for land acquisition and rehabilitation has finally been amended in 2013, making the prior consent of at least 80 per cent of the affected families compulsory in case of land acquisition for private companies for public purpose. This is a huge change in law, ensuring the say of land owners in whether they want to part with their land for what has been construed as a ‘public purpose’ by the State.” And further, “Till the time institutional structures for direct democracy get strengthened, it will augur well for representational democracy to become more representational.”
Second lesson stems from experiments in the field of “agro-tourism”. “If those who have sweated for generation do not want to till land, would the ones willing just to spend a weekend among nature do it seriouslyIJ” A very fair and genuine question asked by one Shekhar Bhadsavle, a pioneer in agro-tourism, who having studied abroad, decided to come back and work as a “farmer”. Nipun meets him and accepts that he is fortunate to meet the likes of Shekhar, as persons like him are “positives” — always smiling happy, full of enthusiasm; making one wonder if they have no worries or if they ever get tired. The first meeting Nipun had with Shekhar and a few other farmers of the area interested in agro-tourism was held at Saguna Baug, during which, Shekhar shared his wonderful idea, passion and vision.
For Shekhar, with the urbanisation growing things that were part of everyday life are becoming alien. City-bred children hardly know what is agriculture, what is rural. Shekhar envisions a “patronage” relation between a middle class/rich person from Mumbai and a small-medium farmer in Konkan. His argument is that a rich person from Mumbai, who just wants a place among nature, may help a farmer develop his farm into such a retreat, rather than buying land from a farmer and making him landless. According to Shekhar, a farmer today has very trivial issues, which if sorted out sincerely, can bring him prosperity. The city person/patron/friend gets a place where he can go for a brief holiday. He will also be relieved of the responsibility of maintaining a farm himself. He gets an assurance for a place, say one cottage, for him/his family that can be kept apart. Most importantly, he gets the pleasure of having contributed in developing a field, the pleasure of having a friend for life, the pleasure of not having difficulty in explaining to his children what agriculture is. For both, it is a win-win situation. But bringing out such a relationship between the “haves” and “have nots” is not easy. So there occurs a challenge to have it as a policy and propagate it. What did Raigad witnessIJ
Attempt was made to prepare and train the farmers in basics of agro-tourism intensively by involving agriculture department in the entire exercise. The farmers were taken around the Saguna Baug and the concept of agro-tourism explained. Thereafter, applications were invited from the farmers, desirous of starting agro-tourism in their own farms. Twenty farmers were selected for a crash course on agro-tourism, to be conducted by Shekhar under Nipun’s overall supervision. With each trainee, Shekhar discussed the potential in his farm for tourism and advised him to focus more on that so that it becomes his USP. Of course, basic training in “hospitality” was given to all, which induced a high level of confidence in them. They began to work very hard to develop something unique in their farms. Idea was that each such farm would have its own USP. Shekhar personally visited their farms and gave them practical guidance.
Nipun visited Shekhar’s farm every month accompanied with a key district official like Raigad SP and Agriculture Officer to expose other key district officials to this work. As and when the agro-tourism centres of these selected youth got ready, Shekhar began to send guests to them from Saguna Baug office (where there was always a waiting list). He also hand-held
the youth in the initial days helping them improve their processes through constant interaction with them, and also by obtaining regular feedback from the guests visiting those farms. Soon, these centres started working in a full-fledged manner.
In Raigad district, the talukas by the sea side — Murud, Alibag, Pen, Srivardhan — had great potential for agro-tourism. The idea was taken to other talukas as well. In most of these places, many people were already offering services to tourists. Some of them had developed their agriculture well which proved to be an added attraction for tourists. Thus, there were many takers for such trainings and interactions. With the help of agriculture department, meetings with interested farmers were held taluka-wise. How wonderful it was, to meet these farmers full of enthusiasm!
Ultimately what Nipun feels, he conveys in these words, “let me place on record, however, that I acted without any bias. I did only what was directed by the Government or what the law says. The end result was not in our hands. The satisfaction of having done what appeared correct to me is the only satisfaction. And it is immense.” Are these experiments merely stories about providing correct opportunities to poor, downtrodden people or something elseIJ A genuine mind would feel these involve something more. Thinking of opportunities for the poor and disadvantaged. One ought to be capable of thinking before one can embark upon such experiments and Nipun meets this criterion perfectly. His book is a critique by a thinking man, as contrasted to hackneyed ones, driven by true concerns about involvement of neglected persons. He has shown providing poor sections of society the right to speak is not an act of benevolence but a part of equitable justice system. Of late, when the country is witnessing progressive involvement of downtrodden segments of society in overall evolution of a powerful India — an immutable symptom of growing oneness — what persons like Nipun leave behind will continue to be met with élan and éclat, reinforcing faith of people in representative democratic functioning.
(KK Srivastava is Principal Accountant General, Kerala, and an acclaimed poet, reviewer and columnist. The views expressed here are his own)