Why Doesn't India Have True Democracy at the District Level?

 The never-ending story of district collectors caught with wealth, hundreds of times more than their known sources of income, has been an ugly reality since the early days of British colonial oppression. It can be safely argued that this creature – the district collector, would have evolved nonetheless, had it been any other colonial power ruling the roost in India instead of the British.

The brazen pomp and grandeur along with the autocratic power and prestige that is usually associated with the job of a district collector in the perception of the average Indian, is illusory and misplaced on the one hand and utterly disgraceful, on the other. It’s a strange paradox – most people are awestruck by the power and ‘prestige’ of a civil service officer serving as a district collector and at the same time, is critical of the damage this officer of the government is doing to the nation. 

There have been good district collectors and some that have laid down their lives in the line of duty and a grateful and saddened nation have always saluted these bravehearts. However, the bulk of the district collectors that collide with criminals to loot public wealth have no business to cite the examples of these honest officers and ride piggyback on their sacrifice. Rather, we should ponder over why these honest officers had to pay such a high price for steadfastly doing their job. 

It’s not difficult to see why good officers have found it impossible to survive in the district collectorate. The entire structure of the district collectorate is a mockery of democracy and is institutionally and morally untenable. The district collector lords over the district as the executive authority with overriding powers to control the district level legislatures – the Zilla Parishad and the Nagar Palikas. Naturally, the collectorate has become the hub of the worst forms of vested interests. 

The district collector is a government appointed officer with no connection to the district he lords over, much like the collector during the British Raj. He is not accountable to the people of the district but they, including their elected representatives in the Zilla Parishads and Nagar Palikas, are accountable to him. Strangely, the voluntary sector constitutional ‘specialists’ who talk about power to the people, don’t bother about this sore thumb sticking out of Indian democracy. 

The question today, isn’t about a few good collectors getting sacrificed at the altar of corruption or whether the ‘rustics’ at the Zilla Parishads are fit to run their districts. It is about the basic question – can you have such an autocratic entity as a district collector with all the wrong attributes and infamy, right at the heart of the world’s largest democracy? Let’s even overlook the never-ending stories of collectors amassing astronomical wealth for the time being and focus on the basic question – why on earth have collectors to wreck our districts? Why shouldn’t the people of the districts have the right to govern themselves like it is done at the union and states?