قوانین ناحیه مقررات ساحلی در پانچایاتس ساحلی (روستاها) از کرالا، هند روبرو اثرات اجتماعی و اقتصادی از برنامه های مشارکتی به تازگی معرفی شده مردم برای خودگردانی محلی و توسعه پایدار

Coastal Regulation Zone (CRZ) notification was issued by the Ministry of Environment and Forest of Government of India in February 1991 as a part of the Environmental Protection Act of 1986 to protect the coast from eroding and to preserve its natural resources. The initial notification did not distinguish the variability and diversity of various coastal states before enforcing it on the various states and Union Territories. Impact assessments were not carried out to assess its impact on socio-economic life of the coastal population. For the very same reason, it was unnoticed or rather ignored till 1994 when the Supreme Court of India made a land mark judgment on the fate of the coastal aquaculture which by then had established as an economically successful industry in many South Indian States. Coastal aquaculture in its modern form was a prohibited activity within CRZ. Lately, only various stakeholders of the coast realized the real impact of the CRZ rules on their property rights and business. To overcome the initial drawbacks several amendments were made in the regulation to suit regional needs. In 1995, another great transformation took place in the State of Kerala as a part of the re-organization of the local self government institutions into a decentralized three tier system called “Panchayathi Raj System”. In 1997, the state government also decided to transfer the power with the required budget outlay to the grass root level panchayats (villages) and municipalities to plan and implement the various projects in their localities with the full participation of the local people by constituting Grama Sabhas (Peoples’ Forum). It is called the “Peoples’ Planning Campaign”(Peoples’ Participatory Programme—PPP for Local Level Self-Governance). The management of all the resources including the local natural resources was largely decentralized to the level of local communities and villages. Integrated, sustainable coastal zone management has become the concern of the local population. The paper assesses the socio-economic impact of the centrally enforced CRZ and the state sponsored PPP on the coastal community in Kerala and suggests measures to improve the system and living standards of the coastal people within the framework of CRZ.

Awareness on sustainable development of the coastal belts for humanity is on the increase [1] and [2]. Like in several coastal countries, many coastal zones of India too have fragile ecosystems and these continue to degrade due to human interference. Kerala state, a narrow strip of land with a mean width of only 67 km is bordered by the Arabian Sea on the west and the Western Ghats on the east (Fig. 1). The total length of coastline is 560 km. Kerala has some 6250 sq km of brackish water area including marshes, backwaters, mangroves, inter and sub-tidal zones. This is a good feeding and nursery ground for a variety of commercially important fish, prawns, crabs and several marine organisms. These waters are also used extensively for inland transportation and were once blessed with mangroves. The state has a population of 31 million as per the latest census (2001). As most people live in the coastal area, population pressure is even higher and economic and subsistence activity infringe on the environmental quality of the region.1.1. Coastal zone management The Government of India, in 1991, issued a major notification under the Environment Protection Act, 1986, framing rules for regulation of various coastal zone activities. These rules are called the Coastal Regulation Zone (CRZ) rules. Under these Rules, the entire coastal stretch from the lowest low tide to highest high tide line and the coastal land within 500 m from the high tide line on the landward side is termed as CRZ. The latter is classified into four categories depending on the sensitivity of the zones. Prohibited and regulated activities have been listed for each zone. The following activities are declared as prohibited within the CRZ, namely: New industries other than the permitted like IT; disposal of hazardous substances; new fish processing units; new effluent/waste treatment plants; disposal of untreated waste and effluents; dumping of city or town waste or ash from thermal plants; land reclamation; mining of sands, rocks or corals (except rare minerals not available outside CRZ areas; harvesting or extraction of ground water other than manual wells for domestic purpose or traditional activities construction other than permitted ones, etc. The Ministry of Environment and Forests and the Government of State and Union Territory and such other authorities at the State or Union Territory levels shall be responsible for monitoring and enforcement of the provisions of this notification within their respective jurisdictions. 1.2. Kerala coastal zone management plan In response to the Government of India CRZ Notification and Supreme Court judgement, the Government of Kerala prepared the Coastal Zone Management Plan. Because of the special features and circumstances of this state, like the limited land availability and high population density it was decided through an amendment that the distance from the HTL along the creeks, rivers and backwaters shall be kept as 100 m or the width of the creek, river or backwater whichever is less for the purpose of regulation. All the mudflats, the marshy surroundings and the mangrove ecosystem have been classified as CRZ-I. A buffer zone of 50 m distance belt around them will be maintained even if the width of the creek, backwater and river is less than 50 m. Reclamation is not permitted, nor shall there be any construction on lands reclaimed after February 1991. Dredging is allowed, but the land formed as a result of dumping of the dredged materials should not be used for development activities. Dredged materials are not allowed to be dumped in the CRZ areas. Only rare minerals not available outside the CRZ areas are allowed to be mined. No reclamation of kayals (backwaters) will be permitted within the CRZ areas. No coastal roads or railways are permitted in CRZ-I. (Letter No. J-1711/23/92-IA-III, Dated 27th September 1996, issued by the Government of India & draft notification S.O. 51 (E) dated 11-1-2002) With this regulation in force the State Government and the Local bodies are liable to follow the guidelines while granting sanction for any developmental activities in their territory. Also, the State Governments and Union Territories have to implement and monitor the whole process. A State level committee has been constituted in each and every state to monitor the various processes and to attend to the grievances. The Local Self-Governments (villages, municipalities or cities) are the actual bodies to practice the various regulations when sanctioning any development activities including the construction of dwelling houses, factories or any resort. The local people who were already living in the CRZ have to abide by the new regulations whenever they are planning modifications to their buildings or conduct reconstruction. The investors in the unoccupied or vacant private lands in the CRZ are the real losers as they may not be able to use these lands for any future projects of their choice. Thus Local Self-Governments in the coastal belt have to plan all the development projects within the framework of CRZ. 1.3. Peoples’ participatory programme (PPP) for self-governance of local governments In deep contrast to the top-down instituted CRZ regulations are the “Panchayathi Raj Nagarapalika” Legislation and the subsequent administrative reforms that lead to decentralisation of powers and empowerment of local bodies or local Governments. This was mooted by the Planning Board of Kerala State in 1995 [3]. PPP first started in the year 1997–98, which was one of experimentation followed by a year of rectification of weaknesses and defects. Based on the Panchayathi Raj Nagarapalika Legislations, the powers for local administrations and governance were transferred to a three-tier administrative set up. The base unit of development is the grama panchayat. Few grama panchayats in an area constitute a block panchayat and few block panchayats in turn constitutes a district panchayat. Now there are 991 grama panchayats, 152 block panchayats and 14 District panchayat in Kerala State. This three-tier panchayathi raj system came into existence in Kerala on 2nd October 1995. Besides these rural local bodies, there are 52 municipal councils and 5 municipal corporations in the state. The average population in grama panchayat and municipality were 25,199 and 48,785 (1991 census) respectively. The organisational structure of the Panchayathi Raj Nagarapalika system of Kerala is given in Fig. 2.Before the introduction of Panchayathi Raj System, the role of the panchayats (grass root level villages) was confined to traditional civic functions like sanitation and health care [4]. Local Governments in the coastal zones like the panchayaths and municipalities/cities are the real guardians of the coastal zones as they are the authority to sanction the various construction activities and issue licences for industrial activities in the region as stated earlier. More details on the working mechanisms in these regions are provided by Madhusoodanan and Balchand [5] and Ajith Joseph and Balchand [6]. Richard and Barbara [7], Thomas and Richard [8] have given the evolution and the outline of the decentralisation process taken place in Kerala. The details of the various steps involved in the introduction of PPP in the governance of Local Self Government Institutions and the system of its administration are given by Ramachandran et al. [9]. Fig. 3 gives the structure of various interlinked and mutually interactive activities in the coastal villages, which have direct impact on both CRZ and PPP in Kerala. On the other hand, the CRZ and PPP have certain positive and negative impacts on the various activities going on in these regions. The symbol (+) represents that the CRZ or PPP has positive influence on the activity like development or traditional shrimp farming or waste disposal. Similarly the symbol (−) represents that CRZ or PPP having negative influence or non-supportive nature on the various activities like the ones shown in the figure. In certain cases, the CRZ/PPP is supportive (+) for activities like the development of port or defence activities in the restricted area whereas it prevents or discourages certain other activities like mining or construction of buildings in the same area. In such cases (±) symbols are used in the figure. This paper analyses the socio-economic impact of the ‘bottom up’ PPP for Local Self-Governance in the framework of the ‘top to bottom enforced’ CRZ rules on the coastal people in Kerala.

Kerala state has a literacy rate of 90%, which is also the highest in the country [23]. This achievement in the educational sector was achieved through a series of planned programmes over the past 3 decades as described by McKibben [24]. This is comparable to several of the developed countries. The initial CRZ notification of 1991 and the subsequent verdicts of the various courts in India upholding the provisions of the CRZ had a noticeable positive impact to reduce coastal zone destruction on one hand and at the same time had a significant negative impact on the socio-economic life of the coastal people. The property rights and economic development in the coastal zones were severely hampered with several unrealistic and unachievable restrictions when applied with a common yardstick through out the country. According to Libcap and Steven (1989), just not only currently held property rights stand affected, but also the credibility on application effect efficiency and economic growth. This may also stimulate rapid exploitation and discourage their continued preservation [25]. Johanny Ali feels that greater the perceived risk of loosing existing property rights, the less likely the holders of these rights will be to forego current consumption to accumulate property, thus slowing investment that contributes importantly to economic growth [26]. Obviously, government plays an important role in the credibility of the persistence of property rights [27]. The resultant conflicts and slow down of the economic activity in the coastal zone could have been avoided to a greater extend if a Strategic Environmental Assessment (SEA) and EIA were carried out at the beginning. The assessment should have the complete integration of environmental, social and economic issues framed in a holistic manner. The analysis of this kind in India should involve systematic analysis of social, political and economic interactions with natural resources and natural resource systems in different ecological and cultural segments. Several countries have recognised the importance of SEA and EIA for long-term sustainability [28], [29], [30], [31], [32], [33] and [34]. At present, the approach of the Ministry of Environment and Forest who is responsible for the notifications seems to adjust to the diversity and variation by issuing required amendments to the various clauses to suit regional environment. Here also before issue of each amendment, proper SEA has to be carried out to avoid imbalance in the region rather than yielding to political pressure. The PPP introduced in Kerala is a unique experimentation for decentralisation and local level governance. This has inculcated greater socio-economic and socio-political strength at grass root level in villages. The success of PPP in Kerala was due to the creation of a social network of all the stakeholders from the Chief Minister down to ground level politicians, from chief secretary to local village level clerks, from professors in the universities to school teachers, from scientists to the local public laymen. This was made possible due to the then prevailing political environment in the state where the state level administration and majority of the local level administration were in the hands of a single coalition set up. They could gear up the whole machinery of the state to motivate and train the volunteers at various levels to put into practice the theory of peoples participation in Local Level Governance. 30,00,000 people participated in the planning and development of various development projects. 12,000 task force members and experts made this possible with the training of about 1,00,000 facilitators through out the state. With the initial setback in adjusting to the new environment, the system picked up gear subsequently to a peoples’ mass movement. The system mainly worked in a highly informal environment where several open-ended groups connected the network with linkages to other groups to perform the set tasks in a congenial atmosphere. This system worked in somewhat like the model described by Rob and Laurence [35]. With local level planning and active participation from people, priorities stood changed. This stimulated the traditional and small-scale industries, which were the backbone of rural areas. FAO also has recognised that the economic development in the developing world is possible only through promoting primary and small-scale sectors. However, with the change in the political scenario lately, this network seems to be loosening up and broken at several places. In order to sustain this unique and successful system beyond political barriers, the stewardship of the central connectors and other linking pins should be given to leaders with non-political affiliations having good command in the society.