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Q. Bring out the key challenges faced in conducting social audits in India. Also, comment on the merits of institutionalizing them in the governance ecosystem.

Approach:

• Briefly explain social audit.
• Discuss the issues and challenges in conducting social audit in India.
• Discuss the need for institutionalizing Social Audit in the governance ecosystem.
• Conclude by giving some suggestions to strengthen social audits in India.

Answer:

Social Audit is the critical stock taking of any program or scheme by the community with active involvement of the primary stakeholders. It includes an audit of the quality of works being executed at different levels along with the details of disbursements made and utilization of human and material resources.

Issues/challenges faced in conducting social audits in India include:

• Apathy of implementing agencies:

The implementing agencies request for frequent postponement of social audit, fail to provide documents on time, do not send independent observers for the Gram Sabha etc. Further, there is poor response and lack of action on the audit findings by the implementing agencies.

• Lack of capacity building:

There is lack of technical and managerial capacity such as bookkeeping, accounting practices etc. among those who conduct social audits.

• Lack of stringent penalty:

Flouting of social audit principles and norms does not attract any penalty or legal proceeding, which makes social audit a toothless exercise.

• Lack of incentive to participate and poor follow-up:

There is a lack of awareness and interest among the Gram Sabha members regarding social audit. Further, social audit reports are not made available to the Gram Sabhas in local languages. In addition, weak local self- governing institutions has resulted in poor follow-up of social audits.

The need for institutionalizing social audit in the governance ecosystem arises due to the following:

• Reduces corruption:

Social audit uncovers irregularities and malpractices in the public sector and maintains oversight on government functioning, thus reducing leakages, corruption and wastage of public resources.

• Increases accountability and transparency:

It ensures accountability and transparency in the answerability of the government for working of local government bodies. It also strengthen participation of people in the performance and deliverables.

• Participative and democratic:

Social implementation of programs, as the beneficiaries themselves are auditors. Further, it provides a collective platform for people to express their common needs thereby resulting in social cohesion and makes people more forthcoming regarding social development activities.

• Monitoring and feedback:

It monitors the performance of an organization and provides feedback on the work done. It also reduces the trust gap between the citizens and the local governments.

Social audit is based on the principle that democratic local governance should be carried out, as far as possible, with the consent and understanding of all concerned, states should frame and implement social audit legislations, as was done by Meghalaya and Andhra Pradesh. Also, the CAG could partner with local citizens and social audit institutions to train them, build capacities and issue advisories on framing of guidelines, developing criteria, methodology and reporting for auditing.