State and Local Administration Questions and Answers

Answer: A

Both (A) and (R) are true and (R) is the correct explanation of (A).

Decentralised planning in India gives district bodies, such as the District Planning Board or, after the 74th Amendment, the District Planning Committee under Article 243ZD, a central part in preparing the district plan. They consolidate the plans of panchayats and municipalities into one plan for the district.

They are given that role precisely because, being close to the ground, they have proper information about local resources and needs, which a state or national planning body lacks. The reason therefore explains the assertion, which rules out the codes saying one of them is false or that the reason does not explain it.

Answer: C

The district became the administrative unit in the period of Warren Hastings.

In 1772, when the East India Company took over the direct collection of revenue in Bengal, Warren Hastings placed a Collector in charge of each district, responsible for revenue and also for civil justice. That made the district the basic unit of British administration, the position it still holds.

Robert Clive's period is known for the Dual Government of Bengal (1765), Lord Cornwallis for the Permanent Settlement and the separation of revenue from judicial work (1793), and Lord Wellesley for the Subsidiary Alliance.

Answer: C

The keyed answer is Cabinet.

In a state the Governor acts on the aid and advice of the Council of Ministers (Article 163), so a proposal on a matter such as granting land to a public institution is dealt with at the level of the ministers and not by the Governor personally. Land grants for public institutions are policy decisions with financial consequences, and state rules of business generally send such proposals to the Cabinet rather than leaving them to one minister or officer.

I could not find the rules of business of a particular state that name this item, so the key is kept as printed and not independently confirmed. The other options are weaker on principle: the Governor is the constitutional head and does not decide such proposals alone, the Chief Minister is one member of the Cabinet and leads it, and the Chief Secretary is the head of the civil service who advises and carries out decisions but does not make them.

Answer: A

The keyed answer is The Rajasthan Panchayat Samiti and Zila Parishad Act, 1959.

Rajasthan was the first state to bring in the Panchayati Raj system, in 1959, and its legislation gave the Collector a place in the district body: he was made an associate member of the Zila Parishad, without a vote or the right to hold office. That close link between the Collector and the district development machinery is consistent with the key, but I could not find a source that states in so many words that this Act designates the Collector as District Development Officer, so the key is kept as printed.

The other options are less plausible. The Tripura Municipal Act, 1994 is a law for towns and not for district development. The Bombay Village Panchayat Act, 1958 governs village panchayats. The Zila Parishad and Panchayat Samiti Act, 1961 is the Maharashtra law, in which the district body is run by an elected president and a Chief Executive Officer, and I found nothing making the Collector the District Development Officer.

Answer: A

The first institution of local self-government was established in 1687.

In 1687 the East India Company's directors ordered a corporation for Madras, with a mayor and aldermen, and the Madras Municipal Corporation came into being under that charter in 1688. It is taken as the first institution of local self-government in India, and the oldest municipal body in the country.

The later dates belong to the period after Lord Ripon's resolution of 1882, which is the landmark of representative local self-government but not its first institution, and 1946 is far too late.

Answer: C

Such an authority is called Local Government.

Local government is government of a limited area within the state, a city, district or village, by a body with authority to decide and carry out measures for that area alone. It is defined precisely by being territorially restricted and subordinate to the state as a whole.

State Government covers the whole of a state. Provincial and regional government are intermediate levels between the centre and the localities, covering a large part of a country rather than a restricted local area.

Answer: C

The keyed answer is (1), (2) and (4), which leaves out (3), enabling people to make effective use of IT.

The e-Panchayat Mission Mode Project under the National e-Governance Plan was designed to automate the internal workflow of panchayats (statement 1), to equip panchayats to use IT in their planning, accounting and monitoring (statement 2), and to make their working more transparent and accountable (statement 4). These match the objectives the Ministry of Panchayati Raj lists for the project, such as automation of internal workflow and greater transparency and accountability.

I could not find 'enabling people to effective use of IT' among the project's stated objectives; the project's focus is on the panchayat and the services it gives citizens. Citizen-centric service delivery is an aim, so a reader could argue for (3) as well, and this is why the key rests on the exact wording of the official list, which I could not check word for word. Options A, B and D all contain (3), which is why they are not the keyed answer.

Answer: B

The function not listed in the Eleventh Schedule is Solid waste management.

The Eleventh Schedule, added by the 73rd Amendment (1992), lists 29 subjects for Panchayats. Small scale industries, including food processing industries, are item 8, cultural activities are item 21, and the public distribution system is item 28.

Solid waste management belongs to the Twelfth Schedule, added by the 74th Amendment for Municipalities, where item 6 reads 'public health, sanitation conservancy and solid waste management'. It is an urban function, which is why it is the odd one out here.

Answer: D

The code is a-3, b-4, c-1, d-2.

• Article 155: appointment of the Governor by the President.
• Article 163: the Council of Ministers to aid and advise the Governor.
• Article 167: the duties of the Chief Minister to communicate decisions and furnish information to the Governor.
• Article 169: abolition or creation of Legislative Councils.

Option C has the Council of Ministers against Article 169 and the Chief Minister against 163, and options A and B misplace the Governor, so only D is right.

Answer: B

The one that is not a challenge before rural local government is law and order.

Police and public order are in the State List, and Panchayati Raj institutions have no police functions, so law and order is the business of the state government, not of the panchayats.

The other three are real problems for rural local bodies. They depend heavily on grants and have weak resources of their own, so financial support is a constant difficulty. Agriculture, agricultural extension and markets are among the subjects in the Eleventh Schedule, so access to marketing outlets for rural produce and the promotion of agricultural research and extension fall within the development tasks they face.