THE CONCEPT OF THE CONSULTATION
On 19 January 2008, CYSD (Centre for Youth and Social Development) and
VANI (Voluntary Action Network India), an apex body of Indian NGOs,
organized a State level consultation on the National Voluntary Sector
Policy – 2007 at Hotel Crown.
The consultation in Orissa was part of the state level deliberations
on the National Voluntary Policy, the first of its kind in the history
of India, being organized by VANI all over the country. This Policy
that was formally approved by the Union Cabinet on 17 May 2007 has
been drafted by the Planning Commission with the help of experts and
NGOs, and VANI and CYSD have been closely associated with the framing
of this policy.  Coming as it does at the beginning of the 11th Five
Year Plan (2007-12), which promises to encourage partnerships between
Civil Society Organizations (CSOs) and the government, the national
policy is an attempt to help the Voluntary Sector contribute to the
social, cultural and economic advancement of the people of India by
encouraging, enabling and empowering an independent, creative and
effective voluntary sector.
The main objectives of the policy include: a) Creating an enabling
environment for Voluntary Organizations (VOs) that not only stimulates
their effectiveness but also protects their identity and safeguards
their autonomy; b) Enabling VOs to legitimately mobilize the necessary
financial resources from India and abroad; c) Identifying systems by
which the Government may work together with the Voluntary Sector; and
d) Encouraging VOs to adopt transparent and accountable systems of
governance and management.
Recognizing that the real challenge before the government and the
voluntary sector is the actual implementation of the policy, and to
ensure that the policy is not a mere "tiger without teeth", this state
level consultation had been organized to provide a roadmap for
operationalising its key features. The consultation also recognized
the important role that the voluntary sector has to play in
implementation of this policy. It was an attempt at dissemination and
discussion of the Policy in Orissa so that the Policy is shared and
debated by members of the voluntary sector and an interface is
organized with the state government to ask them for their response to
the Policy and explore the way forward for a state level policy for
the voluntary sector.
INAUGURAL SESSION:
The Inaugural Session began with Shri Paresh Tewary, Chief Executive
Officer, VANI welcoming all the participants. Mr Tewary introduced the
participants to VANI by talking about how it started, what it is all
about, and what it does. He informed the participants that VANI was
founded in 1988 to be a platform for national level advocacy,
coordination and action to support and promote voluntarism. VANI has
been working as a catalyst between central and state governments and
their machineries on the one hand and Indian NGOs on the other. Mr
Tewary described VANI as a premier network of voluntary organizations
in India with over 25,000 NGOs spread across 25 states of Orissa. Mr
Tewary explained that sharing knowledge on policies and programmes of
the Government and donor organizations to its members is central to
VANI's advocacy work.
Mr Tewary lauded the democratic spirit with which the consultation was
organized because 'participation' was the defining characteristic of
and key to democracy. He described the National Policy as a milestone
because it acknowledged the role and significance of the voluntary
sector.
He hoped that the Consultation would help achieve three goals -
1) Formation of a group that would help the state government in the
formulation of a state policy on the voluntary sector.
2) Increased interactions between networks of voluntary sector in
Orissa and VANI.
3) A warm feeling of solidarity among Voluntary Organizations as they
work towards a common cause of development in the country.
Shri Jagadananda, Member Secretary, CYSD and Former Chairperson,
Voluntary Action Network India (VANI) in his "Introductory Address"
explained the rationale behind holding the Consultation to the
participants. He introduced the National Policy on the Voluntary
Sector as well and outlined its salient features. He discussed some of
the substantive issues and some of the issues and challenges that the
Voluntary Sector faced today.
Shri Jagadananda began by indicating the significance attached to the
policy by the Government of India by describing the policy as a
landmark document in the history of voluntary sector in India. He
mentioned some of the steps taken and the effort it entailed to make
the National Policy as helpful as possible to the Voluntary Sector. He
said that the process took 2-3 years and that a joint machinery had
been set up in the Planning Commission with representatives of the
Voluntary Sector and senior bureaucrats of the rank of Secretaries led
by the Cabinet Secretary himself at the helm. Task forces were
constituted and there were many meetings in which substantive issues
were taken up and debated. A sincere attempt was made to address the
problems of the Voluntary Sector because the National Policy
recognizes the important role the Voluntary Sector has to play in
various areas. It clearly acknowledges, "The voluntary sector has
contributed significantly to finding innovative solutions to problems
such as poverty and deprivation, through awareness campaigns, social
mobilization, service delivery, training, research and advocacy."
Mr. Jagadananda highlighted some of the key features of the Policy
that aimed to give a greater role to the Voluntary Sector in the
development of the country. The foremost among them was the aim to
make the Voluntary Sector a Partner in Development. He pointed out
that till now, the collaboration with the State was in the nature of
project funding and project partnership. The major change, the
National Policy suggests is a strategic collaboration, there the
Voluntary Sector is involved not merely to execute State programs but
in a much more substantial way, from the very conceptual stage itself.
The national policy was, therefore, the beginning of a process to
evolve a new working relationship between the Government and the
Voluntary Sector, without affecting the autonomy and integrity of the
Voluntary Organizations.

The National Policy also emphasized the need for making the Voluntary
Sector strong and vibrant to enable it to make to contribute more
effectively to the advancement of the people of the country, Mr.
Jagadananda said. A key element in this was in making the Voluntary
Organizations more accountable and transparent. He lauded the
Voluntary Sector for its contribution in making the processes of
Social Audit more prevalent and for working to bring the RTI into
being, but wondered how many from within the sector were allowing the
same tools like social audit to be used with their organizations.

Mr. Jagadananda explained that as the State sought to empower and
enable the Voluntary Sector through the Policy, and as the power and
influence of the Voluntary Sector increased, the Civil Society
Organizations come increasingly under the scanner as they are in the
spotlight. Their demand for greater accountability of other
institutions makes them vulnerable to the same demands. He pointed out
that this demand has been increasing as some small section within the
sector have been found guilty of abuse of trust and privilege as well.

As the Voluntary Sector rose to face the challenges and issues, Mr.
Jagadananda also spelt out some of the 'continuing dilemmas', which
according to him were bothering the Sector.
1)      The diversity of contexts in which the Sector operated was a
problem because then no one solution would work. The challenge before
the Sector, therefore, was to find innovative and effective solutions
in each area.
2)      There was a great diversity in the nature of the organizations as
well. There were networks, coalitions, campaigns, grassroots
organizations etc. So, could a single framework to understand the
Sector be effective?
3)      There was the problem of competing claims and balancing unequal
stakeholders such as the donors, the government and the people. Under
the pressure of meeting the accountability needs of the donors and the
government, the accountability needs of the people often get relegated
to the background, Mr. Jagadananda opined.

Mr. Jagadananda urged the Voluntary Sector to rise to the challenges
and set precedents in accountability and to keep innovating by
cultivating a culture of organizational learning. Since the intention
of the National Policy was quite clear in trying to enable and empower
the Voluntary Sector, he asked the participants from the Voluntary
Sector to give a critique of the National Policy. Their feedback was
important so that efforts could be made to take the Policy forward and
would help work towards a State Policy on the lines of the National
Policy. He assured them that the important issues and questions
emerging from the Consultation would be communicated to the
Policymakers in the Government.

In his inaugural address, Shri Ajit Tripathy (IAS), Chief Secretary,
Government of Orissa said that the Government had high expectations
from the Voluntary Sector while acknowledging that the NGO sector had
suffered because of unfriendly attitude in the government, the
economic mafia and terrorists as well. He pointed out that even PRIs
were not friendly to NGOs and saw them as competitors.

Mr. Tripathy said that the Voluntary Sector and the Government should
not be suspicious of each other and work as competitors. Rather, they
should work together. He repeatedly urged the Voluntary Sector to
forget their old sense of isolationism and rivalry and become partners
in the development process in the state. The Government and NGOs
should work together to prevent problems rather than to look forward
to expose each other. Arguing that prevention was any day better than
cure, he urged the Voluntary Organizations to help the Government in
preventing important government projects from failing.

Mr. Tripathy appealed to the Voluntary Organizations to use their
information networks to help the Government. They could help in many
fields but primarily in 1) ensuring communal harmony and preventing
communal disturbances, 2) in prevention of corruption that was
demoralizing the people, and 3) in informing the government about gaps
in policies and their implementation.

He was full of praise for SHGs and the momentum it had generated. He
said that with greater support of NGOs, the number of SHGs could be
doubled so that the revenue generated through them could also be
doubled. Admitting that government advertisements often have limited
response, Mr. Tripathy suggested that with the help of Voluntary
Organizations, there could be a much better response to government
policies with more people benefiting from them.

He informed the participants about strengthening village level
institutions such as the Pani Panchayats and Joint Forest Management
Systems as important and potential areas for the VOs and the
Government to work together. He urged the VOs to suggest better ways
of working together.

TECHNICAL SESSION- I
Government and Voluntary Sector Engagement: Issues and Challenges
Chair: Mr. A V Swamy, Director, VISWAS
Dr. Bhagban prakash, civil society expert, in his talk covered the
entire gamut of issues and challenges that came into an engagement
between the Government and the Voluntary Sector. He began by
expressing his pleasure on seeing the National Policy which has
captured the various facets of the sector.

Dr. Prakash began his presentation by charting a brief history of
engagement between the government and the voluntary sector in India.
He said that in the pre-independence period, there was little talk
about the Voluntary Organizations as a Sector and problems they faced
in general. It is to the credit of the Voluntary Sector that the
agenda of the Planning Commission and the Voluntary Sector is the same
today. But there was a difference in the relationship between the
State and the Voluntary Sector for the perception of the Voluntary
Sector was of romanticization in the pre-independence period. The
dream turned to disillusionment in the 1970s and the love-hate
relationship has continued ever after, he said.

In response to the three instruments of engagement outlined in the
National Policy, Dr. Prakash pointed out that,
1) Although the Policy talks of formal Consultation at the Centre,
State and District levels, the Government was yet to spell out the
role of the Voluntary Sector in PRIs at the State and District levels.
2) He questioned the notion of the "strategic collaboration" that the
National Policy envisages between the Government and the Voluntary
Sector. This "strategic collaboration" should mean that the Voluntary
Sector is seen not as an implementing partner alone but as partner in
all planning and formulation of development strategies. A mechanism
had to be created to put that concept into practice. Since, there were
many multi-sectoral issues like health, environment and poverty he
alerted the participants that unless there was really a strategic
collaboration between the government and the voluntary sector, the
engagement between them was going to fail.
3)      And with respect to the third instrument of engagement, i.e.
project funding, he pointed out that there was no standardization of
schemes. The norms are arbitrarily framed and vary from Ministry to
Ministry and department to department.

Dr. Prakash then went on to delineate some of the major issues that
the Voluntary Sector faced today.
1. He said that the VOs had a limitation in their impact as they
maintained a critical distance from mainstream political institutions.
Activities of VOs such as mobilization, campaigning etc are political
but they mostly remain away from mainstream politics. Given the scale
of the state and number of VOs, the impact is limited. The impact of
VOs without GO-VO collaboration can be limited. They could only create
small models of development, generate ideas and give them to the
Government.
2. The VOs have not been able to leverage their mass base to influence
public policy
3. Ambiguities continue about devolution of funds, and functions and
functionaries in PRIs- The role of VOs is not yet defined.
4. Divergence in perception of engagement- The Government expects VOs
to work on service delivery but VOs are moving into advocacy.
5. Although the 11th plan outlay for 5 years is 35, 44,718 crores,
there is no amount earmarked for the Voluntary Sector.
6. Networking and alliance building among NGOs is poor. The ball was
in the court of the Voluntary Sector to strengthen themselves with
stronger networking among all the 5000 NGOs working in Orissa.
7. To give credit to the Government, there have been many policy
initiatives in the last two years seeking participation of VOs. The
NREG, NRHM, Bharat Nirman etc. are some of them. The 11th plan also
recommends CSO participation in implementation and evaluation of the
planning process.

After delineating some of the issues that need to be addressed to make
the engagement between the VOs and the Government more productive, Dr.
Prakash suggested that there should be a civil society chamber at the
national level and state level on the lines of the attempted second
chamber for civil society in the UNGA. This would enable real
engagement and strategic collaboration.

Mr. G. V. V. Sharma, Commissioner-cum-Secretary, State Revenue and
Disaster Management Department, said that he was attending the
Consultation not as a member of the Government but as one interested
to learn. He briefly responded to some of the issues that had emerged
in the presentations.
1)      He said that if VOs are maintaining critical distance from
political institutions, it is either out of compulsion or choice. As
far as the Government is concerned there is no compulsion. In many
places, VOs have joined political institutions like PRIs. So, VOs
exercise that choice in their interest of doing better work.
2)      He also clarified that a policy need not be passed by Parliament.
Therefore, the National Policy in its present form could also be
effective without having to go to Parliament.
3)      He lamented the fact that though both the Government and Civil
Society are working for the redressal of some of the basic problems
affecting the country like malnutrition, poverty etc. most of the work
done by civil society and the Government is done in a
non-participatory manner.
4)      He said that though there is excellent synergy between the GO and
VOs during natural calamities such as the super cyclone, there was no
synergy during non-emergency situations.
5)      The real challenge was how the GO and VOs could work together at
the village and panchayat levels, to play an empowering role for the
people.
6)      Regarding the question of criticism of NGOs, Mr. Sharma pointed out
that with more than 23,000 NGOs registered as societies, the
Government was not equipped to respond to criticisms about specific
NGOs. No civil servant is empowered to take action against any NGO on
the basis of criticism other than for mis-utilization of funds.

Mr Dipak Mohanty, Director, OTELP took off from where Mr. Sharma left
by talking about the issues, challenges and how to try and implement
synergy at the community level. He said that he could see only 2
challenges in GO-VO partnership.
1.      Psychological challenge at the level of human attitude. If this is
taken care of, challenge at the operational level is taken care of. He
pointed out that the Government has a secure, prescribed set of
administrative structure behind it. If the security is challenged, the
Government becomes vulnerable. The benefit of VOs and their work also
has to be visible to communities.
2.      The other challenge was of mutual trust and respect between GO and
VO.  He said, both the Government and the Voluntary Sector should be
open to perspectives from the other side and consider them. Both had
to work together as wheels of the same vehicle.

Mr. Mohanty talked about some of the lessons learnt from OTELP and
said that there should be joint responsibility, joint accountability
and transparency. The subordinate-superior relationship should not
come in the way of working together. If the two aforementioned
challenges are met, there could be a productive collaboration between
the Government and VOs.

OPEN HOUSE DISCUSSION

The Technical Session was followed by an Open Discussion in which many
participants raised questions and offered their opinions. Some of the
points that came up are:
1. Partnership: A Mirage-
a)      The Chair of the Session, Mr. A V Swamy, Director, VISWAS, surmised
that everyone seemed to be convinced it was a policy only to involve
VOs but not to partner them. Their intention was to get VOs to
implement Government schemes and not to involve VOs in the formulation
of scheme. He said the Government saw VOs as facilitators for
community mobilization and not as community representatives.
b)      Mr. Satya of Seva Jagat, Kalahandi said there were few people in
the Government who really treated NGOs with respect and listened to
them. He pointed out that any NGOs working on Rights were removed from
the consultative process also. In the case of NREGA, Mr Satya told the
participants that when they informed state functionaries about gaps in
implementation, the latter did not listen and abused them instead.
c)      Smt. Kasturi Mahapatra, Director, Open Learning Systems, questioned
the intention of the Government to partner VOs when VOs were not
consulted on budget allocation etc.
d)      Mr. Manoj Pradhan wondered how there could be partnership when they
had to work in a very hostile environment.

2. Regulation-
a)      The role of the VOs, Mr. A V Swamy emphasized was that of
innovators. Most of the Government policies were started by VOs, which
were later adopted by the Government. He added that because they were
innovators, they could not be regulated. Activists were not to be
regulated; they are to be followed.
b)      Mr. Ramakant Satpathy said that regulation should be limited
because if there is more regulation, then voluntarism would lose its
spirit. He pointed out that there were already existing mechanisms for
regulation.

3. Soul Searching-
a)      Many participants felt that the NGOs had to be more transparent and
accountable so that they earn the respect of all.
b)      Mr Satya of Seva Jagat said the NGOs should disclose all their documents.
c)      Mr. Prafulla