" Arvari Sansad (Parliament) The Voice of Common People"

System of Aravari Sansad

Each 500 Ha of land or 500 people have one representative regardless of land use on the Sansad. The Sansad covers the full river basin and is the supreme authority to make decisions. The people in this level are chosen by the gram sabha (not a PRI institution that is of a village circle) right from the smallest to the largest.

Aravari parliament decisions are executed by the Gram Sabha and supervised by the Aravari Sanchalan Samiti made up of 20-22 people, 4 from each geographical cluster. This sees to the day to day implementation of the decisions of the parliament.

The structure of the Arvari Sansad evolved from talks with villagers in the Aravari and is their true representative. Man is a small part of nature therefore it is necessary to balance nature’s goodness with man’s greed. Therefore there is one representative for land and another for people.

Background:

Arvari is a small river in the District of Rajasthan. The river had been reduced to a monsoons drain for decades, while the region was reeling under chronic drought condition. Rather it dried up for years .The process of rejuvenation of this river was started in the year 1987 by constructing a small water harvesting structure, called Johad (specially in the rural areas of Rajasthan). These Johads are traditional earthen dams built to harvest each single drop of Rainwater falling on the ground. The first Johad came up in the village Bhavta. Later seeing the benefits of these Johads even during toughest drought condition both quantitatively and qualitatively in the livelihood of the villagers and also because it had an great impact on the economic conditions of the individuals in a way improving their standard of living. Many more villagers from different villages came forward to build these structures in their villages reviving the traditional method of harnessing the rainwater. Johad is not only a physical structure made by rural people through traditional knowledge and wisdom but it is also a symbol of peace, love and unity present in the village society. So it has its on social dimension impact on the lives of the rural people.

Benefit of water harvesting structures

The foremost benefit of the water harvesting structures is conservation of rainwater, which helps in Recharging of ground water by harvesting each single drop of rainwater. This not only preserves water for use during the drought but also leads to rise in the water table in the adjoining areas of the structure especially in the wells existing in the fields.
Easier availability of the water in these drought-affected regions result in drastic improvements in the life of the people of these areas. This makes irrigation possible throughout the year and open new avenues of the income for them. This will be an effort towards reducing poverty that emphasizes poor people to become self-reliant.

Over All Impact

Earlier Farmers were not able to cultivate even one single crop a season but now they are able to cultivate a maximum of 2 crops a season. Agricultural production has increased.

Even for getting drinking water females had to travel quite a distance to have access for water. But now due to these water-harvesting structures there much of the time is saved which they utilize in doing other productive works.
Cattle's, Goats and other animals in the villages and wild animals in the Sariska region come to these Johads for drinking water.

Apart from these water table in the wells has also increased and helped in recharging of the Ground water.

Earlier, 80 % men in the working age group use to migrate for employment as laborer but now they all stay in the village itself and do cultivation in their land which earlier use to be uncultivable.

In 1988, many more Johads were built in several villages such as Bhiriavas, Dumoli, Khadata, Khatala, Samatsar, Chosla, Lalpura.This trend continued during the years 1989 to 1991. More Johads were constructed in Villages such as Palasana, Joge-ki-dhani, Hamirpur, Samra, Natala, Kaled, Jagnathpura and many others. And till date altogether more than 350 Johads have been built in the catchment area of the Arvari River. Water in the Johads raised the water table in the entire catchment area of the river Arvari.

From1996 onwards the river began to flow in its full flow and became perennial. The villages also had to contend with the Government. Once the river had been revived and fish were seen in its water. As now there was plenty of water in the Arvari River, there was natural growth of fish, which went on multiplying. Seeing this the government wanted to get hold of fish and gave the contract to big contractor for catching the fish. It is not that the local people wanted control over the fish. Far from it. They are all vegetarians and do not eat fish, but they realized that today it is fish and tomorrow it would be water. This got the people thinking who owned the river ? The Government through the contractor was intruding into community's domain, its right over the use of water. Water as a resource, which was developed by them through their hard efforts and labour, they wanted to have the rights to utilize it.

To discuss all these matters a Jan Sunwai (Public Hearing) was organized on 19th December 1998 near the bank of river Arvari. Dr. Anil Aggarwal, Director, Centre for Science and Environment, New Delhi, Ex Chief Secretary of Rajasthan Mr. Meeta Lal Mehta, Ex Chief Justice of Himachal Pradesh Shri Gulab Chandra Gupta, Vice Chancellor of Rajasthan Mr. T.K.Unnithan, Ex Director of Geological Survey of India Mr.M.L.Jhanwar, Mr.Saeed Rizvi, Joint Secretary, Forest and Environment Ministry, Mr. Ujjwal Pradhan of Ford Foundation, Ms.Sunita Narayan, Centre of Science of Environment and many more officers of Rajasthan Ground Water department , along with hundred representative of various Voluntary Organizations and the Villagers attended this meeting. There was a unanimous decision to form a river parliament to protect the rights of the people who brought the river back. This River parliament will make its own rules & regulation and laws seeing the people's needs and priority. According to them they will work towards the management and conservation of River water. Every body will abide with the Decisions taken by the parliament.

So Arvari Parliament was formally formed on 26th January 1999 to manage the river & its waters judiciously. The Arvari Sansad met for the first time in Hamirpur today on 26th January 1999(Republic Day). It has the representation of 72 villages. This parliament has also framed 11 rules for the use of Arvari water. This parliament meets 4 times a year and if required they could meet in an emergency situation.

It has 142 members nominated by the respective village assemblies. Every village up to 500 hectares in size appoints one members. A Coordination committee comprising members selected by the parliament handles the operations and ensures that the rules are observed.

For making the laws, rules and regulation for the proper management, conservation and utilization of Arvari River, following subjects were taken into considerations:

1. To make rules regarding

• direct water irrigation from Arvari River.
• irrigation from the wells.

2. Crop production free from the Market & Middle men and to consider a system, which fulfills the need of local people.
3. Stop selling of water and to protect the fishes present in the River.
4.Stop selling of Land, not to give lands to outsider and to take decisions regarding these issues.
5. Working towards making the whole River area green and plan to protect the surrounding area from the damage been done through severe Mining.
6. Stop hunting of Animal and illegal cutting of Trees in the Arvari River Area.
7. To search for the various traditional method of water conservation and to revive all these practices seeing the Environmental Need.
8. To find out reasons for over exploitation of water, to stop this and to promote water conservation work.
9.Establish an active system for the management of the River.
10. To establish the role of Jal Sansad (water Parliament) and Village Gram Sabha towards the management of the water sources present in the villages.
The parliament met for the second time on June 5th -7th, 1999,in the village Samra.It was clear that the villagers were determined to carry out all what they had planned. A Liquor company was interested in setting a bear factory in the region as barley is the main crop here and water was nor available in plenty. "The villagers got together to ensure that no industrial concern exploited the river's resources".

In the Third Session held in village Bhaonta-Kolyala on December 28-29,1999,the parliament reviewed implementation of the Rules. The Fourth meeting was held on June 10,2000 in Devka-Devra village. The relationship between the members of the parliament and the village assemblies was discussed.

The Fifth Arvari meeting was held in Jaipur District village Barana Ki Dhani.To do water conservation work for the Drought Proofing due to severe Drought condition existing in the villages of Rajasthan for Last four years.

Next>>Early Struggles