ENVIS Centre on Panchayati Raj and Environment

The Ministry of Environment and Forests, Govt. of India has established an Environmental Information Centre (ENVIS Centre) on Panchayati Raj and Environment at Indian Environmental Society. The immense need was felt by the Ministry of Environment and Forests (MoEF), Govt. of India to collect and disseminate information on Panchayati Raj Institutions (PRIs) and Environment and also to promote the participation of PRIs in environmental conservation.

The Programme: Background and Objectives

The basic concepts of Panchayati Raj are that the villagers should think, decide, and act for their own socio-economic interests. Thus, it is related to village self-governance, where the people in the form of an organization will think, decide, and act for their collective interests. For integrated rural development, decentralization of power and resources to Panchayati Raj Institutions (PRIs) is an essential element. The Panchayats can play effective role through drawing local people’s participation in sustainable harvesting and management of local resources. Agriculture, land improvement, forestry, tree planting, animal husbandry, village and cottage industries, drinking water, poverty alleviation programmes, health, sanitation, family welfare etc. are necessarily the concerns of the village panchayats.

It has been realized that if financial and technical assistance is provided to PRIs, they can certainly take positive initiatives in solving local environmental problems. Thus there is an immense need for collection, documentation, and sharing of information to promote environmental consciousness among rural masses for providing information to decision-makers, policy planners, scientists etc. To facilitate this, the Ministry of Environment and Forests (MoEF), Govt of India has established ENVIS Center on Panchayati Raj and Environment at Indian Environmental Society with the following objectives:

• To develop comprehensive databases on various panchayat bodies in a phased manner in all the States / Union Territories of the country.
• To disseminate information on the locale specific issues prevailing in the Panchayats of several districts of the States, for preparation of developmental plans of panchayat.
• To establish Electronic Linkages with all information sources working in the field of Panchayati Raj.
• To develop a comprehensive Resource Base in the form of books, reports, journals, databases etc. and to respond to the queries received from several panchayat bodies.
• To publish Newsletter for dissemination of necessary information and to appraise the panchayat bodies about existence of this Centre on “Panchayati Raj and Environment”.

ENVIS Centre on Panchayati Raj and Environment has been bestowed with the responsibility of documenting environmental issues to promote environmental consciousness among the rural masses. Major functions of the centre include collection, compilation, and dissemination of information related to environment and rural development through newsletter and other resource material; institutional capacity building through organization of training programme and awareness camps.

Progress during the Year

The centre has been continuously collecting information preferably from secondary sources related to rural environmental problems and from various concerned agencies like CAPART, Ministry of Rural Development, NWDB, State departments of Environment, planning Commission, Department of Statistics, and Voluntary Organizations working on rural issues.
A network through development of linkages with all the NGOs, Rural Development Authorities, Panchayati Raj Institutions etc. working for the environmental issues in Panchayats is made in order to determine the profile of information, requirements of Panchayati bodies especially on environmental issues. The centre has also established linkages with various ENVIS nodes throughout the country for exchange of information on a periodic basis.

The Society has compiled electronically all the relevant data on the Panchayats of the thematic areas. This is available online at www.iespanchayat.net.in.

Around 200 new mailing addresses have been added to update our network. The Information Network is now being uploaded on the Website.

The Centre has published four Newsletters “Panchayat” both in English and in Hindi language for wide dissemination of Environment on the following theme:

1. Medicinal Plants – Their Usage and Values
2. Energy and Environment
3. Chemical Fertilizers and Environmental Management

Panchayat is published quarterly and is the only publication of its kind focussing exclusively on PRIs and Environment. This is distributed widely among diverse target groups (educational institution, govt. departments, NGOs, etc.). The newsletter is also sent to a large number of gram panchayats, villages.

These newsletters are also available online at www.iespanchayat.org. The website also provide information about the legislation, structure of PRIs, panchayat profile of each state, environmental programme, success stories and relevant news items.

An Electronic Newsletter is also being sent every fortnightly, which comprises of latest happenings in the thematic area and abstracts from all type of media source. It is sent to concerned people through e-mails E-groups and is uploaded on the website.

The Society has also published one book on “Panchayati Raj and Environment” in Hindi. In the Book, the Society has compiled the related information on Panchayati Raj and Environment in the simple language. The Society has also developed a booklet of 100 question answers related to Panchayati Raj and Environment titled “Panchayati Raj Evam Paryavaran – Prashanottri”. The Society has also collected the success stories on Women and Panchayati Raj and compiled them in a booklet entitled “Panchayati Raj and Women”.

The Centre has received large number of inquires from several user groups about the activities and functioning of the Centre. IES has always tried its level best to give at the earliest and fully satisfying replies to the queries received. It has been observed that over the years the number of queries is increasing. This indicates that more and more interaction is being developed between user group and the Society. The Centre has received large number of queries on different environmental issues like environmental awareness, pollutionn and waste, environment and development etc.

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