Role of NGOs in India’s Development
The state has a primal and significant role to play in a democratic set up in devising and enforcing the development programmes based on social and economic perspective. Unfortunately, in the present-day society, the poor are facing much more complex problems. In a country like India, this particularly holds true as a large chunk of the society is still vulnerable facing discrimination at every level.
Non-Government Organisations (NGOs), the groups or institutions or organisations that act independent without any administrative hold, work on the foundation of principles of equality, selflessness and human development. Currently, approximately 25,000 NGOs are operating with a pan-India presence.
Social service holds significance since ancient times in India. Even Mahatma Gandhi, after India getting independence, is alleged to have expressed his desire to transform the Indian National Congress into a public service organisation. His proposal was declined, but later many of his ardent followers emulating on his principles setup several voluntary organisations across the country to carry out constructive works. However, in the early 1970s, the process of identification, verification and registration of these organisations came into operation and led to emergence of NGOs in India. Following their formal inception, the government took great interest in promoting them in different ways.
The Sixth Five Year Plan of India was launched with the famous slogan ‘GARIBI HATAO’ where the government acknowledged the significance the NGOs hold in the development of India. Later, the government came out with the seventh FYP, where it put the onus on NGOs to develop ‘self-reliance communities’ for promoting development of rural sector. The government brought out the eighth FYP with the objective of promoting the network of NGOs across the nation. The ninth FYP visualised the main role of NGOs in the promotion of PPPS in the country. The tenth FYP came out with a vision over the significance of NGOS to raise awareness among the peasants about various modern farm techniques and government initiatives being adopted for their benefits and the development of the agricultural sector. In addition, government has come up with various assistance programmes and financial aids to promote the development of NGOs.
NGOs with the backing of government have speeded up its development activities by working on specific issues like poverty alleviation, social inequalities, children rights, child labour, caste stigma, women rights, rural development, water and sanitation, environmental issues, etc. The last two decades have witnessed the proactive role played by NGOs in the development of social sector including education, health, etc. An important role the NGOs have played particularly in rural sectors is in causing the school dropouts return to their school, thus, upholding the Right to education. Moreover, the initiatives taken by NGOs for the development of health sector such as programmes on the eradication of leprosy, TB and malaria and improving water and sanitation facilities have been of great success.
The most significant contribution of NGOs is witnessed in successfully persuading the government to come up with several development-oriented policies and laws that include the following: Right to Information, Integrated Child Development Scheme (ICDS), Integrated Child Protection Scheme (ICPS), MNREGA, Juvenile justice, Nirmal gram initiative, Rashtriya Swasthya Bima Yojna (RSBY) and various policies on women development, forest and environment development, anti-trafficking and people with disability, etc.
NGOs in reality have been very active in safeguarding the interests of the poor and impoverished and hold significance for protecting the democratic values of the country. However, several NGOs operating in India have come under the scanner for suspicious functioning because of lack of accountability and credibility loss. Recently, the Intelligence Bureau (IB) came up with a report on few NGOs, which in the pretext of protests against the developmental activities taken by the government, are causing great harm to the interest of the nation. The report mentioned that the nations bore a loss of 2–3 per cent of GDP due to consistent protests made against the government’s initiatives by ‘foreign-funded NGOs’. The report has raised discussions and debates putting a question mark over the accountability of NGOs. The NGOs has the right to protest over the rights of the people but they should come up with alternate options without hampering the developmental initiatives taken by the government. Merely hampering and disrupting developmental activities in the name of protests would be detrimental to the growth of the nation. Hence, it becomes all the more essential for NGOs to ascertain effective policy research and suggest alternative solutions to the government, working as a think tank, since the basis for their set up was to help the government with the most effective options in pursuit of national interest.
It is well-known fact that several NGOs funded by the foreign agencies for their activities played a major role in raising protests against government initiative to set up coal and thermal power plants and Kudankulam Nuclear Project in the respective states leading to power shortages in the region. After the release of IB report, few voices were raised from various quarters to stop the flow of foreign funds to those NGOs. However, in a country as vast as India with little income source and high difficulties in raising funds for the sustenance of NGOs. It would not be prudent to stop flow of foreign funds. The better alternative to blocking the funds would be to ensure more transparency in their classification based on their fund sources. An effective approach would be to beef up the scrutiny procedures through the Foreign Contribution (Regulation) Act, 2010. Moreover, NGOs must be instructed to ascertain transparency in their governance framework and the functioning of their board.
In brief, the NGOs functioning with added accountability, coming up with alternative developmental approaches, in tone with the government and market can work wonders in boosting further the development process in India.