The term social audit has been
frequently in news. Few Years ago, a Parliamentary Standing Committee on Rural
Development had recommended strengthening of comprehensive Grievance Redressal
Mechanism, Social Audit from grassroots with periodic reviews to be conducted
for timely follow-up. The committee has recently expressed
dissatisfaction over the progress. The Government says that only ten states
viz. Andhra Pradesh, Chhattisgarh, Gujarat, Karnataka, Mizoram, Sikkim,
Telangana, Tamil Nadu, Tripura and Uttar Pradesh have operationalized social
audit units as laid down in Social Audit Rules 2011 and states of
Madhya Pradesh, Odisha, Manipur, Meghalaya, Rajasthan and Jammu and Kashmir are
in the process of doing it. This monograph studies the Social Audit in
detail.
Social auditing is a process by
which an organization / government accounts for its social performance to
its stakeholders and seeks to improve its future social performance. The
concept was pioneered by Charles Medawar in 1972.
A social audit helps to narrow
gaps between vision/goal and reality; and between efficiency and effectiveness.
It allows us to measure, verify, report on and to improve the social
performance of any government effort or organization.
Social Audit is different from
the development audit. The key difference between development audit and
social audit is that a social audit focuses on the neglected issue of
social impacts, while a development audit has a broader focus including
environment and economic issues, such as the efficiency of a project or
programme.
Implications of Social Audit
- Social auditing creates an impact upon
governance. It values the voice of stakeholders, including marginalized/poor
groups whose voices are rarely heard.
- Social auditing is taken up for the purpose
of enhancing local governance, particularly for strengthening
accountability and transparency in local bodies.
- Social Audit makes it sure that in democracy,
the powers of decision makers should be used as far as possible with the
consent and understanding of all concerned.
Objectives of Social Audit
- To assess the physical and
financial gaps between needs and resources available for local development.
- Creating awareness among
beneficiaries and providers of local social and productive services.
- Increasing efficacy and
effectiveness of local development programmes.
- Scrutiny of various policy
decisions, keeping in view stakeholder’s interests and priorities, particularly
of rural poor.
- Estimation of the opportunity
cost for stakeholders of not getting timely access to public services.
Social Audit in India
In India, social audits were
first made statutory in a 2005 Rural Employment Act and government also issued
the Social Audit Rules in 2011 under the MGNREGA Act.
Important Facts about Social Audit:
Social audits are generally
supervised by autonomous bodies consisting of government and nongovernment
representatives.
- The 73rd Amendment of the
Constitution empowered the Gram Sabhas to conduct Social Audits in
addition to other functions.
- Kindly note that CAG not
empowered to conduct Accounting Audit of PRIs in the whole country.
- No central policy or regulation
making accounting audit and social audit mandatory.
- The most appropriate
institutional level for social audit is the Gram Sabha, which has been
given ‘watchdog’ powers and responsibilities by the Panchayati Raj Acts
in most States to supervise and monitor the functioning of panchayat elected
representatives and government functionaries, and examine the annual statement
of accounts and audit reports. These are implied powers indirectly
empowering Gram Sabhas to carry out social audits in addition to
other functions. Members of the Gram Sabha and the village panchayat,
intermediate panchayat and district panchayat through their
representatives, can raise issues of social concern and public interest and
demand an explanation.
The Gram Sabha should
have the mandate to
- Inspect all public documents
related to budget allocations, list of beneficiaries, assistance under each
scheme, muster rolls, bills, vouchers, accounts, etc., for scrutiny
- Examine annual statements of
accounts and audit reports
- Discuss the report on the local
administration of the preceding year
- Review local development for the
year or any new activity programme
- Establish accountability of
functionaries found guilty of violating established norms/rules
- Suggest measures for promoting
transparency in identifying, planning, implementing, monitoring and evaluating
relevant local development programmes
- Ensure opportunity for rural poor
to voice their concerns while participating in social audit meetings.
Created & Posted by Pooja
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