ANNOUNCEMENTS
Potential for economic growth has shifted priority of stakeholders towards urban areas. The 74th Constitutional Amendment (CAA) to the Constitution of India (COI) in the year 1992, envisaged reforms in governance, institutional, administrative and finances for urban local governance. The implementation of aimed objectives will be achieved with efficient Capacity Building (CB) of stakeholders in Urban Local Bodies (ULB). Capacity Building in case of ULBs has emphasised in administrative training for solving challenges faced in urban development and management. This study aimed to analyse the importance of CB for Municipal Councillor in ULBs for efficient urban management and performing their constitutional rights by analysing on ground realities. For the analysis, municipal councillors of DMC has been interviewed to analyse the awareness among them towards their constitutional rights as being a councillor, gaps as well as challenges faced by them to understand it and to suggest framework for CB for them by analysing available framework for CB in ULBs for councillors. Structured interviews were conducted with thirty six councillor of East, South and North Delhi Municipal Corporation. Thirty six councillor out of two seventy councillors in DMC were selected on the basis of stratified random sampling. By stakeholder mapping, stakeholders responsible for CB were also interviewed to understand the available framework in ULB for CB of councillors. Semi- structured interview were conducted in National Institute of Urban Affairs (NIUA), Department of Urban Development Government of National Capital Territory (GNCT) and one of the training entity responsible for CB in Delhi ULBs, Indian Institute of Public Administration (IIPA) as well as Regional Centre for Urban and Environmental Studies (RCUES) Lucknow for understanding challenges faced by training entities in CB. It was then analysed that the present framework for CB available for municipal councillor lacks in on ground realities of challenges faced by municipal councillors like awareness about Municipal Corporation Act, the 74th CAA, working of corporation, administrative hierarchy in corporation, financial responsibility, and not aligned with training needs for municipal councillors. This study had done training need assessment to suggest CB framework by understanding working of councillors, their past experiences in urban governance, their present awareness and challenges in performing their constitutional rights and also suggested specific suggestions in present framework or CB program.
Key words: Urban Governance, Capacity Building, Municipal Councillor, Delhi Municipal Corporation, Training Institutes
