New Delhi, Aug 14 (PTI) Union Panchayati Raj Secretary Vivek Bharadwaj on Wednesday said it is up to panchayat representatives to end the “sarpanch pati” system — a practice in which the husband of an elected woman sarpanch wields the actual power.
The panchayati raj ministry will soon plan a special training programme to empower women representatives, he said while addressing an event here that was attended by around 400 Panchayati Raj Institution (PRI) representatives, including women.
They are also among the special guests invited to attend the Independence Day celebrations at the Red Fort here on Thursday.
Referring to the web-series ‘Panchayat’, that highlights the “pradhan pati” practice, Bharadwaj said he was told by some people to watch the show as it portrays the ground reality.
“Some days back, a company’s chairman and managing director came to meet me. I was asked if I had watched the ‘Panchayat’ web series… another person, who heads a consultancy (firm), told me that he took a day off to watch the whole series…,” Bharadwaj said.
“They might have thought I would be happy but I felt very bad. Because the web series shows that a woman is the elected representative but it is her husband who ran the show (in the village),” he said.
Calling upon PRI representatives, he said, “It is your responsibility to end this custom of ‘pradhan pati’. We are with you in this effort.” Bharadwaj said 46 per cent of the 32 lakh panchayati raj representatives are women but wondered how many were able to fulfil their responsibilities themselves.
He also said there is a need for a separate training for women panchayat representatives. The Ministry will look into this, the secretary said.
“We conduct GPDP (Gram Panchayat Development Plan) training but there is no separate training for women and what a woman (representative) needs to be an efficient sarpanch… There is no training on that. It is our shortcoming, we will address this soon,” he said.
“The biggest difference between China and India is that women have very high participation there. If 20-30 per cent women don’t work at all, the society can’t develop,” he said. PTI AO AO ANB ANB
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