Keep Your Promises Campaign to hold Government Accountable A Story from India

Electioneering campaigns are fascinating combative theatres at which national and local political party players go over the top to lay out hydra-headed superlative promises to schmooze the electorate. But political promises are seduction with minimal cerebral character. So therefore governments tend to win elections on extraordinary back-stories of super-size promises. After elections, the electorate is left with the task of demanding for a payment of awesome promissory notes – accountability to deliver on promises.

As we deepen our democracy, we could learn lessons from others so we don’t waste precious time reinventing the wheel of ideas. So this week, this column publishes edited excerpts of a case study from India, touted to be the largest democracy in the world. An Oxford publication, it was written by Avinash Kumar and published at http://www.comminit.com/en/node/286214/348.

This case study explores Wada Na Todo Abhiyan (WNTA, also known as the Keep Your Promises Campaign), an ongoing effort to mobilise people in India to pressure the government to deliver on key promises, and to demonstrate the demand of people across India for social justice and a better future for all the nation's children.

By late 2008, WNTA had a federal structure reaching 23 states, with 3,000 networks and a core membership of 105 organisations. From the beginning, it was envisaged that in addition to creating a national advocacy agenda, emphasis would also be placed on decentralised state-level campaigns to ensure that local priorities were included.

Amongst its many programmes is the Nine Is Mine campaign for the allocation of 9% of gross domestic product (GDP) to health and education as promised in the United Progressive Alliance's election manifesto when it came into power in 2004. WNTA's core strategies include:

1). Mass Mobilisation: Repeatedly, WNTA organises events with a large and active public presence and extensive media coverage. For instance, the September 2005 People's Summit Against Poverty involved more than 12,000 people and resulted in a People's Charter calling for immediate action to meet the Millennium Development Goals’ commitments and end poverty.

On global Stand Up Against Poverty Day WNTA partners across 15 states organised a diverse set of actions involving 1,236,979 people from communities and local decision-making bodies, including students and government representatives.

WNTA's children's alliance mixes children from slums and wealthy cities, creating a cross-class alliance for social justice. These children play active roles in campaigning for health and education spending. After the campaign got schools across the country involved through grassroots mobilisation, a concert and a children's rally were organized.

When thousands of children – from the poorest slums and the most elite Delhi schools –attended the concert and rally, dancing together and marching side-by-side, the media rushed to cover this unusual social phenomenon. The day after the TV coverage, the Prime Minister's office invited the children to come and meet him.

When they met him, he accepted the 100,001st postcard petition and assured the children, on the record, that he would boost funding for schools and health centres. In the following year’s budget, he did just that, raising health spending by a quarter and education spending by a third in a budget in which defence spending went up by just nine percent.

2). Policy Audits and Citizens Reports: In order to press for the full implementation of the National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme (NREGS), WNTA organised a March for the Right to Employment in 6 states. These marches were accompanied by People's Tribunals, where local officials were told about the inefficiencies and gaps in the implementation of the scheme.

Following this, a National Tribunal was held at the India Social Forum where over 50 representatives from 14 states spoke. The outcomes and verdicts of these processes were taken to different parliamentarians. The government showed its acknowledgment of the importance of the campaign by integrating the audits in its monitoring mechanisms and increasing the reach of the NREGS to 595 districts from the initial 200.

WNTA used the idea of Citizens' Report Cards to put constant pressure on the government and to hold them to account. In its first year, WNTA released a report focusing on the MDGs, particularly in relation to education, health and employment. A survey involving the local community was conducted in 1,514 villages. It was followed by a mid-term MDGs checklist and a status Report Card which was presented to the Prime Minister. Extensive media coverage ensued.

WNTA's annual review of the CMP checks on the major promises made by the government through a rigorous process wherein a Report Card is developed and the resulting report presented and passed through various state networks to get their feedback and assent before it is finally released. An elephant bearing a sign reading "CMP Promised" standing next to a goat with sign "CMP Delivered" (illustrating the difference in scale) became a popular image widely used by the media.

3). Budget Tracking and Advocacy: The Centre for Budget and Governance Accountability, a member of the WNTA alliance, organises a national consultation each November (when the government's budget-making process for the following year begins). What results is a People's Charter of Demands, which looks at various aspects of the social sector like agriculture, education and health from the perspective of marginalised groups. This is forwarded to various ministries of the government.

Experts weigh in, followed by a public discussion where government, policymakers, civil society groups and media representatives come together to evaluate the implications of the Charter for economically poor people. Results? The campaign is promoting the right to be heard in an innovative way, where policy analysis from the top has led to grassroots mobilisation from the ground.

A key theme running throughout WNTA's work is direct engagement with marginalised groups such as women, indigenous peoples, children and people with disabilities. WNTA's approach involves harnessing the work these groups were already doing, thereby adding to their strength and capacity by including them in its quest to secure their economic rights.

WNTA also addresses gender in its own structures. In 2006, the WNTA steering group was expanded to ensure women made up 50% of members.

Following are key lessons learned:
1). Build alliances and overcome isolation without giving up one's identity, perspective and sensibility.

2). For any large network to be successful in ensuring poor people's right to be heard, the priorities have first to be drawn from local, regional and national contexts and then draw on international frameworks.

3). The national framework has to take into account the perspectives and voices of groups that are marginalised in social and economic terms, as well as groups of differing gender and age in order to seek their support and build their capacity. The lobbying strength of the middle class should also be sought.

4). It is important not to organise separate or new fronts but to explore opportunities to bring isolated or disparate movements together on common ground, making them a unified and much stronger voice that cannot be ignored by the government.

5). The strong points of all constituents must be harnessed for the interest of the whole. Such strengths include grassroots groups providing input from the ground; policy groups providing macro analysis in a language that is informed by grassroots realities; media-based groups providing support for media advocacy.

6). It is possible to create excitement and enthusiasm for issues such as health and education. The key is to articulate these vital issues in a language people understand and want to respond to.