Governance of Van Panchayats

Abstract

Over the last three decades, India has witnessed significant changes both in perspective and newline process with regard to the use and management of common forest resources. The newline management of common forest resources ranges from exclusive control of the state over newline resources; to management by the market; to control and management by the community, with newline a fair share of debatable conflicts in terms of efficiency, governance, and types and nature of newline institution. In other words, the changing role of the state and nature of association with the newline community has resulted in a shift in the philosophy of forest resources management from newline mere revenue generation to addressing the question of sustainability and livelihood. The newline objective of these policy changes, as claimed by the State, was to increase the participation of newline the local inhabitants in the decision making and distribution of benefits of the common forest newline resources. This has been projected as a radical departure from highly centralised to newline decentralised system as far as the resource management is concerned. newline Though these changes in the perspective and the process of forest resource management newline occurred in 1990s at global and national level, community participation had already been newline institutionalised in this region as early as 1931 through the establishment of Forest Councils newline known as Van Panchayats (VPs hereafter) in the erstwhile Uttar Pradesh (presently newline Uttarakhand). However, like the other governing institutions, there was continued newline marginalisation of women in these forest councils as well. This is because the traditional newline institutions, VPs in this case, for the management of resources have been dominated by the newline patriarchal norms and beliefs resulting in alienation of women from the system of newline management of common forest resources. newline The State has created space for women in the governance of the community forest by newline reserving 50% of the seats for women in VPs under Uttaranchal Panchayati Forest Rules, newline 2001. By legalising inclusion of women in the governance structure, state has created a space newline for their participation in the resource use and distribution system. Thus, this dissertation will newline explore critically the extent to which current governance system addressed the concerns of newline women with reference to access and management of common forest resources; and newline whether or not the current governance system has empowered them in the decision-making newline and distribution of resources. newline Key Words: forest resources, forest council, reservation, gender newline