Public Administration

74th Constitutional Amendment Act has revitalized the

local government in urban areas

Introduction:-

The 74th Constitutional Amendment Act of 1992 established the Municipalities

or Urban Local Governments system as a constitutional entity.

In India, the phrase “Urban Local Government” refers to the process through
which the electorate governs an urban region. An urban local government can
only regulate activities inside a given urban region that the state government
has designated.

Decentralization of powers and authorities to Urban Local Bodies (ULB) at

various levels was mandated by the 74th Amendment Act. Additionally, this
amendment attempted to establish an institutional structure that would permit
entry through autonomous local governments in the nation’s cities.

In order for urban governments to successfully serve as local government

units, the legislation intends to revitalise and enhance them.

Part IXA, which went into effect on June 1, 1993, contains the provisions in
this amendment. As a result, it provided the local self-government entities in
metropolitan areas with a constitutional basis

Additionally, it granted the ULBs the authority to carry out the 18 tasks stated
in the Indian Constitution’s 12th Schedule.

A fundamental basis for the decentralisation of rights and authorities to

Municipal organisations at various levels is provided by the 74th Amendment
act of 1992. However, it is the States’ job to give it a concrete form.
 Objectives

 Municipalities now have constitutional status thanks to the statute. They

now fall under the protection of the Constitution’s justiciable provisions as
a result.
 In other words, state governments must implement the new municipal
system in compliance with the act’s requirements within the terms of their
constitutions.
 In order for municipal governments to properly serve as local government
units, the legislation aims to improve and reinvigorate them.
 The main objective of the 74th Amendment was to strengthen the local
governments.
 The Amendment facilitate setting up of institutional mechanism to ensure
decentralization
 Demarcating role of Urban Local Body and specify their function.
 Specifying areas deemed as urban to include new urbanizing areas.
 Ensure representation of Publically deprived class and women
 Ensuring Urban Local bodies are not superseded

Major provisions of the Act

 It was passed by Parliament in December 1992 and came into force on 1

June 1993 adding Part IX A (Articles 243-P to 243-ZG) and the 12th
schedule in the Constitution.
 The 74th amendment provided a uniform law for all the municipalities in
the nation.

Article Article 243-Q mentions the Constitution of Municipalities i.e. Nagar Panchayat,
243 Q Municipal Council, and Municipal Corporation.

Article 243R mentions the Composition of Municipalities, it states that all of its
Article
members are directly elected by the people of the Municipal area which is
243 R
divided into territorial constituencies known as wards.
 Article
Article 243 T deals with the reservation of seats in every Municipality.
243 T

Article
Article 243 U mentions the duration of Municipalities.
243 U

Article Article 243 V mentions the grounds for disqualification of members of the
243 V Municipality.

Grassroot democracy is a people/community driven contribution in elections,

governance and decision making. Grassroot democracy can be seen as a
propensity towards designing political processes where as much decision making
authority as practical is shifted to the lowest level of organization.

Local government was further defined by Lawal (2000) as that tier of government
closest to the people, "which is vested with certain powers to exercise control
over the affairs of people in its domain". Local government is a system of public
administration at a local level, charged with the responsibility of bringing the
people at the grassroots closer to the government. Grassroots organisations can
have numerous structures; depending on the type of organisation and what the
members want.

If democracy means people's participation in running their affairs, then it is

nowhere more direct, clear and significant than at the local level, where the
contact between the people and their representatives, between the rulers and the
ruled is more constant, vigilant and manageable.Decentralization is a main
mechanism through which democracy becomes truly representative and
responsive.

The egalitarian ideals of decentralization, development, and increased,

continuous and active popular participation in the process of nation-building can
be secured only through the working of an efficient system of local government.

The rising population and urbanization in various cities of India were in need of a
local governing body that can work for providing necessary community services
like health care, educational institution, housing, transport etc. by collecting
property tax and fixed grant from the State Government. There are seats
reserved for Scheduled Castes, Scheduled Tribes, backward classes and
women. Grassroots democracy is the political processes which are driven by
groups of ordinary citizens, as opposed to larger organizations. The government
decided to promote their creation as effective units of local self- government with
the aim of nurturing democratic participation by involving villagers in the
development of their communities to reduce the costs of administration. 74th
Constitution Amendments prescribes regular elections every five years and
election.To guarantee free, fair, and timely elections, there is a facility for
establishing state election commission.

Implementation:

In order to provide time to allow changes to be made in the then existing laws which were inconsistent
with the provisions of the Constitution (74th Amendment) Act, a transition period of one year was
provided for. Immediately after the Constitution (74th Amendment) Act came into force on 1st June,
1993, the Ministry of Urban Development took necessary steps to ensure that the provisions of the
State Municipal Laws are brought in conformity with the provisions of the above Act. As a result of
various steps taken up by the Ministry of Urban Development through correspondence and also
organising meetings of the State level Secretaries, the State Governments brought in place the
conformity legislations by target date i.e. 31st May, 1994. 9. The amended State municipal laws provide
for detailed provisions for constitution and composition of municipalities, reservation of seats for SC/ST
and women, fixed term of 5 years and re-election of municipalities within a period of 6 months in case of
dissolution, functions and financial powers of municipalities, setting up of State Finance Commission etc.

Critical Evaluation:-

 At the point when we take the provisions of the Part IXA of our constitution, we
can say with certainty that the 74th amendment act 1992 is perhaps the most
significant and fundamental amendment so far concerning urban developments.
The Act attempted to make local bodies efficient and transparent.
 The 74th amendment to the Constitution was intended to empower Urban Local
government with decision-making abilities, revenue generation, and financial
autonomy.
 As far as financial autonomy or independence, Urban Local governments have
unquestionably shown improvement over their rural counterparts, nonetheless,
no Indian city can in any case coordinate with any of the metros in developed
nations even following 25 years of underlying change.
  The implementation of the 74th CAA by the State Governments across the
country has not been done enough to implement it with few exceptions like
Kerala and West Bengal.

Challenges:

Urban local bodies enjoy limited autonomy to perform the functions assigned to them.
Further, many states have not transferred most of the subjects to the local bodies, which
makes the entire exercise of electing so many representatives somewhat symbolic. They
are also criticized on the ground that the formation of local bodies has not changed the
way decisions are taken at the central and the state level. Thus there has been little
effective decentralization

 Article 243Q added a proviso which states that a municipality may not be constituted in
those urban areas which are specified as industrial townships. This provision sidetracks
the most important purpose of the 74th amendment, viz. creating constitutionally
mandated municipal bodies of self-governance for all urban areas.
 Of the 18 tasks that are listed under the 12th Schedule, only a few have been entrusted
to the municipalities.
 Though the 74th Amendment contains a stipulation for ward committees, they exists
only in a few states.
 Article 243ZE mandates a Committee for Metropolitan Planning. However it has been
set up only in Kolkata and Mumbai.

Conclusion

The constitutional 74th Amendment Act have made a hold attempt to ensure their continuity,
stability, representativeness and autonomy to function as valuable systems of self governance.
The 74th Amendment to the Constitution marks a watershed moment in India's
evolution of local government.Municipalities and municipal corporations in urban
India have been granted constitutional status for the first time.The Nagar Palika
Central Legislation, also known as the 74th CAA, has dispersed hundreds of
small local governments across India.The 74th CAA not only constitutionalized
the status of urban local government, but it also improved its life, structure,
working, and financial conditions.

Due to this amendment, a uniform pattern has emerged all over the country except any tribal
areas which exist only in the north-eastem region, unless the Parliament by law extends the same
to the tribal areas.The discretion of the state Governments has been drastically curtailed in the
sense that they have now constitutional obligations to set up the Municipalities as per article
243Q. The criteria to set up the municipalities have been fixed and now it is more rational and
scientific. With this act, the district planning has been given the Constitutional Status. Due to this
the planning process itself has changed.