19 Aug. 1988
19 Aug. 1989

INTRODUCTION :
PIDOW is a venture initiated by three partners - The Government, SDC and MYRADA. The role of MYRADA briefly described is to enable the people to become an effective fourth partner and in most programmes the dominant one.
MYRADA's focus therefore in PIDOW is on :-

• fostering the participation of people and the development of appropriate peoples' institutions so that they can mobilise, regenerate and manage the resources they require and the resources of the watershed in an effective and sustained manner;

• the landless and the marginal & small farmers so that their standard and quality of living rises above the poverty line and remains there; these groups, especially the landless do not find a place in many watershed development programmes which are land based;

• influencing Government departments involved in watershed development to work in an integrated way with a focus on a watershed and to accept peoples' participation as an integral factor in formulating and implementing policies and programmes.

The original project area demarcated in 1983 was spread over 27 villages and 36 Thandas and covered 4 watersheds, Dongergaon, Sonth, Jeevangi and Kamalapur; each watershed covering about 10,000 acres. The partners realised that people could never be able to participate and manage such large watersheds which extended way beyond the area they were familiar with. To continue to operate over these major areas would reduce the project to another broadcast programme similar to an Integrated Rural Development Programme (IRDP) over watersheds which happened to be there. To begin with, a change in focus was required to smaller watersheds. The first major shift in gear came in mid 1986, when as a result of a workshop with the Gulbarga staff it became clear that the programme as it was being implemented over an area covering 4 watersheds did not give any indications that the people were aware that they were involved in a watershed management programme. To enable people to participate effectively, the watershed had to be small enough so that :

• the people could see their watershed;

• it should be an area that they are relating with either through agriculture, grazing, forestry, etc.

• the extent of land assets and resources would not be too large for them to manage without continuing outside assistance, and

• the number of families involved would be small enough to enable them to function together; if the number of families was large (above 30) they would break-up into smaller socially functional and homogeneous groups managing various particular operations like credit, with an apex group supervising the overall functions of a watershed.

After a survey of the 4 watersheds it was decided to choose 3 mini watersheds which were not too large (between 600-800 acres), with 80-100 families in each watershed. The first step regarding the size of the watershed and the number of people who could be effectively involved was described in a working paper which was put together after a workshop in Gulbarga in May 1986; an extract of which is given below :

 Quote :

"The watershed cannot be too large. Its size must depend on the "Capacity" of the people and their institutions to manage the operations required. This "Capacity" - skills and resources - will hopefully increase as a result of PIDOW's intervention. The existing "area definitions" of a watershed as guiding norms are of little help. For example, the PWD (Irrigation Department) describes the watershed in terms of river basins. The area extends over thousands of hectares which comprises the entire catchment area of a major river. Such an area concept cannot serve as the basis of PIDOW's choice of a watershed. It is too large to achieve the major objectives of participation. The practice of Maharaja's and local rulers provides a useful example. They concentrated on minor basins and tanks which were administered by the village or panchayat. This is one reason why the people have developed their own institutions to manage a programme. They should not visit only large Government managed programmes which are high in technology and expertise but have a management pattern too costly and elaborate to be adopted and managed by the people.

 The Watershed cannot be too small either. If it is, then the programme will be largely symbolic in nature. The functional institutions will be too small to achieve economic viability, the social like health and education which require political organisation for proper  management too weak to exert pressure, the area inadequate to provide the major needs of energy, pasture and forestry. How large therefore, should the watershed be? One can be allowed to hazard a guess at this stage at the cost of inviting criticism of being arbitrary. A watershed covering 600 - 800 acres with 80 to 100 farming families would be a possible start for PIDOW."

 Unquote.

The change in focus from a broadcast programme over 4 large watersheds to 3 mini watersheds was not easy. It called for a change in attitudes and in staff deployment. One mini watershed Manager was appointed to be entirely responsible    for the programmes and staff in each of the three mini watersheds. From October 1986 the PIDOW staff concentrated on assisting the people in the 3 mini watershed (a fourth - Harji - was added later), by 1989, work had extended to 12 mini watersheds. From October 1986 to July - August of 1987, however, the major thrust was given to agriculture, soil and water conservation and forestry. The infrastructure was put in place; but we realised that adequate attention was not given to the degree of peoples participation required for effective management. Consequently the staff decided to reflect together on these programmes in the 3 mini watersheds (and the fourth which was added later) to analyse the degree of peoples participation, to identify the obstacles to attaining the degree of participation required and to arrive at guidelines and a strategy for the future programme. This paper will not dwell on the criteria adopted to select the mini- watersheds, which were based on physical data, on the watershed development strategy of starting with watersheds on the upper reaches and working downwards, on the response of the people etc. It focuses only on the dimension of peoples participation and is divided into five parts.

The three mini watersheds selected in 1986 were :

In April 1988 there were 23 groups in these mini watersheds (Watershed Management Associations, Youth Clubs, Women's Groups, Landless Labour Association and Village Development Associations). The relevance and appropriateness of these groups as peoples institutions which are effective and viable for the management of the watershed will be discussed in Part IV.

In these four mini watersheds, MYRADA tried during 15 months from January 1987 :

•  to understand the traditional systems adopted by the people utilising the resources in these MWSs to manage their lives and the resources of the MWSs.  

• to educate, motivate, organise and train the community utilising the resources of a MWS to participate effectively in the integrated development andregeneration of their MWSs.

• to reconcile the demands for utilising lands in the watershed  according to the topography which may clash with the short term needs of the people. (Refer RMS Paper - 5)

• to reconcile the ideology of MYRADA which is focused on the poor which may clash with the objective of the watershed approach where all the farmers (big and small) directly benefit, especially in the land development measures but also in land use; (Refer RMS Paper 5)

 The staff decided to reflect on their experiences in community organization - of successes and failures. This decision led to a two day workshop at Gulbarga on the 23rd and 24th February 1988 facilitated by the Executive Director of MYRADA: participating were MYRADA Team at Gulbarga, the SDC Regional Representative,the field level staff drawn from the area and staff from angalore.

The workshop was informal and unstructured: but over the period of two days four sets of key questions were identified to guide the discussions. The first two sets of questions were addressed to strengthen and clarify the understanding of the concept of participation - the crucial "P" in the "PIDOW" Project - and of what is required of MYRADA's staff to elicit such participation. The results of the reflection are given in parts I and II, of this paper. The remaining two sets of questions helped us identify the structural features of people's institutions for fostering effective participation of the people particularly in the development of MWSs. The results of our reflections are given in Parts III and IV.

No particular attention was given at this stage to evolve a strategy whereby all the Government Departments involved could work in an integrated way and also relate effectively with the peoples institution in planning and implementing a watershed programme. Up to this time plans were being made with each Department separately; peoples participation in planning only extended to expressing their choice of saplings and implementing some of the soil and water conservation programmes. The Credit Management Groups initiated by MYRADA, however, had begun to operate; a separate report on their working is available. People had also participated in establishing and maintaining forestry and fodder plots, but this was mainly in collaboration with MYRADA staff.

Certain questions however, were being asked by MYRADA staff:

1. How far can people's participation go in the PIDOW model where Government had a significant role to play in planning and implementing major programmes.

2. Can the degree of participation which MYRADA expects to be achieved within PIDOW. For example MYRADA has come to realise that while people must be involved in planning their watershed, in this stage the initiative will not be theirs. MYRADA feels that it should go further. For example when soil conservation measures are planned, the Department should be in a position to call for tenders and to revise and question the estimates besides actually supervising the work. No contractors should be permitted. Any profits made should go to build up the common fund of the Watershed Committee. This fund could partly be used for maintaining the structures constructed. The people should also have the liberty to site these structures as well as to put up alternate appropriate and often traditional structures.

3. Further when farmers are motivated to build bunds on their fields and do so on their own, why should they not be compensated? Instead MYRADA finds that the Department comes in and constructs new bunds often with bulldozers because it has a target to achieve.

The queries raise several issues which will be discussed in another paper.