Archives: Briefs Reports

In this report, the researchers have examined the Faecal Sludge and Septage Management Framework in the State of Uttarakhand. The report aims at mapping the potential and limitations of the extant legal and policy framework governing FSSM in Uttarakhand and at the Central Level, and to analyze the challenges in the actual implementation of FSSM in Uttarakhand. The study was conducted in two stages. The first stage involved a mapping of legal, institutional and policy framework in FSSM in Uttarakhand at large, and of the selected cities/towns of Doiwala, Pithoragarh and Rudrapur in particular. The second stage involved field visits to the selected towns to examine the implementation of the extant regulations. The fieldwork was done through in-depth semi-structured and unstructured interviews with various stakeholders including different agencies and residents in the particular urban area. The researchers found that in relation to septage collection, multiple stakeholders and payments and regulatory structures exist in Uttarakhand which provides its own unique challenges. Another of the researchers’ findings relate to the limited suitability of STPs in Uttarakhand, the importance of strong environmental controls, and the plight of sanitation workers in the State. The researchers’ solutions to resolve these issues relate to the utilization of existing sanitation programmes such as SBM-U and reforms in regulations at local, state and central levels.

The overall vision of Project Nirmal is the demonstration of appropriate, low-cost, decentralized, inclusive and sustainable sanitation service delivery solutions for two small towns (Angul and Dhenkanal) in Odisha leading to improved sanitation access for all households and integration of FSM in the sanitation value chain, through enabling institutional and financial arrangements and increased private sector participation.

The project is being implemented by Practical Action and Centre for Policy Research with support from Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation; Arghyam; Housing and Urban Development, Government of Odisha; and Municipalities of Angul and Dhenkanal.

The Centre for Policy Research (CPR) jointly with the Freshwater Action Network, South Asia (FANSA) have collaborated to bring out this research report. It highlights the need for policy focus on smaller city sanitation and discusses why faecal waste management requires immediate attention in the region. The report also discusses the essential steps to scaling FSM improvements in the region. It presents an analysis of how the countries in the region are supporting faecal waste management and data on the operational and upcoming faecal sludge projects in the region.

Suggested Citation: Dasgupta, S., Murali, R., George, N., & Kapur, D. (2016). Faecal Waste Management in Smaller Cities Across South Asia: Getting Right the Policy and Practice. New Delhi: Centre for Policy Research.

India should have spent at least ₹38,571 crore in 2019-20, across Union government ministries and State government departments to fully finance a set of core direct nutrition interventions (DNIs), at scale.

In this study, you will find information on nutrition costing. It carries forward critical studies that costed for nutrition interventions.

In India, there is great concern over the retail tariffs being charged for electricity, but ironically little attention is paid to the components of overall costs. Power generation makes up 70-80% of the cost of supplying electricity, and power procurement practices have a significant effect on that cost. Yet almost no attention is paid to how discoms procure power. The recent swings between shortages and surpluses of generating capacity point to serious shortcomings in power procurement practices of discoms. The challenge of effective power procurement will be even greater in the future. Discoms will need to deal with increasing amounts of renewable energy in the resource mix. Smart homes, self-generation and the presence of electric vehicles will add to the challenges and magnify the uncertainty.

Clearly there is an urgent need to improve the power procurement practices in the country to address these challenges. Effective power procurement practices can also facilitate greater energy access through a decrease in the cost per kWh of providing electricity, which will allow access to electricity for a greater number of people for the same amount of money.

This study analyses the current practice of resource planning and power procurement in three states: Delhi, Punjab and Uttar Pradesh. Building on the analysis and drawing from a review of international experience, the study has developed recommendations for improving power procurement practices. The study makes a case for shifting the discourse beyond power procurement to resource planning which covers a broader range of activities. Resource Planning is the process used by discoms to meet the forecasted peak demand and total energy requirements of all their customers. Resource plans with a typical planning horizon of 10-20 years, also focus on cost-effectiveness, minimization of risk, and compliance with environmental and policy goals.

This report chapter explores nuances in the working of distributed ledgers, their capabilities as a decentralized architectural solution to store and access land records, and the hurdles – policy and practical – in the journey towards such realization.

Analytical studies on rural local government finance are few and far between in India. The paucity of reliable data and the lack of transparency in Panchayat finances and associated difficulties in accessing data are important reasons for this. These data gaps are well known and successive Finance Commissions have highlighted this problem with little effect. This PAISA Gram Panchayat (GP) study: ‘Do Gram Panchayats Get Their Money?’ is a small step towards filling this analytical gap. This study analyzes GP level finances in Birbhum district of West Bengal by asking the following questions

Do GP’s get their money?
If so, do GP’s get all their money? i.e. their entire entitlement?
When do GP’s receive their funds? i.e. do funds arrive on time?
Do GP’s spend their money?
If so, what do GP’s spend their money on? And does this expenditure reflect local needs and priorities?
This PAISA study investigates these questions in the context of untied funds– funds that do not impose any specific rules regarding their utilization on the spending agency. Untied funds typically constitute less than 10% of a GP’s resource pool, but are significant because they have the potential to enable GPs to prioritize activities that reflect local needs and preferences.

The study tracks the fund flow process and expenditures incurred through 3 untied funds in a sample of 20 GPs in Birbhum district over a 5 year period from 2005-06 to 2009-10. In addition, it tracksthe receipt of SRD funds at the GP level. As a point of comparison, the study also tracks receipts and expenditures of tied funds – funds which are to be utilised strictly as per the rules or guidelines framed by the Central or State government, and thus, provides no flexibility to GPs.

Do schools get their money? Between October and November 2010, PAISA went to 13,021 government run elementary schools across India to ask the following questions: Did you get your money? When did you get your money? Did you spend the money, if so what was the output of that expenditure? This PAISA survey was conducted as part of the annual ASER survey that tracks learning outcomes. ASER is implemented entirely by citizen volunteers and civil society organizations making PAISA the first and only citizen led effort to track development funds. PAISA is conducted annually. This report “Do Schools get their money?” offers snapshots of findings from the 2010 survey.

Between October and November 2012, PAISA went to 14,591 government run elementary schools across India to ask the following questions: Did you get your money? When did you get your money? Did you spend the money? And if so, what was the output of that expenditure?

The PAISA survey is conducted as part of the annual ASER survey that tracks learning outcomes and is implemented entirely by citizen volunteers and civil society organizations. This makes it the first and only citizen led effort to track development funds.

“Do Schools Get Their Money? (PAISA 2012)” offers a snapshot of findings from the 2012 survey.

According to the National Crime Records Bureau (NCRB, India) at least 284,694 Indian farmers have taken their lives since 1995. This occurred at an annual average rate of 14,462 in the five years from 1995 to 2000, and 17,699 in the 12 years between 2000 and 2012. That is, since 2001 around 49 farmers have taken their own lives each day, on average – more than one every half hour.1 Farmers’ suicides are one of the biggest scandals of modern times, perhaps even of modernity itself and its idea of development. Development and law have an intimate connection. Fuelled by ideas about innovation, progress in science and technology, and economic growth, particular development strategies are stabilised by and institutionalised in the law. Law is an exercise in line drawing. It creates domains of legality, propriety, property, rights, subject positions, delineating realms and people that are inside them as well as those that are outside. Farmers who commit suicide would seem to be unambiguously outside – excluded from the framings of law. But this is not so. The farmers who have ended their lives after facing extreme, un-negotiable forms of marginalisation are those that fall within the protective purview of law – The Protection of Plant Varieties and Farmers Rights Act (PPVFRA), 2001. Hence this paper’s title “the curious case of farmers’ rights in India”. In 2001, India had become one of the first countries to legislate on farmers’ rights, passing the Protection of Plant Varieties and Farmers’ Rights Act. It was the world’s first explicit legislation on farmers’ rights, inaugurating what many saw as a new chapter in the discourse of rights and a template for such legislations worldwide. One of the stated intents of this Act was to protect the small farmer, his rights and threatened livelihood in the face of the growing global integration of agriculture after 1995, when India became a party to the Agreement on Trade-Related Aspects of International Property Rights (the TRIPS agreement).