How Participatory is Participatory Irrigation Management (PIM)? A Study of Water User Associations (WUAs) in Andhra Pradesh

It is argued that the reason for the ills of irrigation management is the alienation of farmers from the process of planning and implementation. Often 'lack of political will' is identified as the main reason for the tardy progress in irrigation reforms at the state level. Andhra Pradesh has demonstrated the political will by initiating widespread irrigation reforms through legislation. This paper, based on the situation after six years of WUAs in existence, makes an attempt to provide a comprehensive view on the status and functioning of the Water Users' Associations in the State. It is argued that while substantial amounts of money were spent on the reform process, the money was used mainly for improving the ailing irrigation systems rather than strengthening the formal institutional structures. Though some benefits in terms of increased area under irrigation in canal systems and improved quality of irrigation is evident, the sustainability of these benefits is rather uncertain in the absence of efficient institutional structures. Despite the fact that WUAs are promoted as non-political institutions, 'elite capture' and political involvement dominate their functioning. And the present trend appears to be towards further politicization of these institutions. More importantly, even after six years of their existence devolution of powers to WUAs has not taken place, as most of the important functions like assessment, collection of water charges, sanctioning of works, etc., are still in the hands of the irrigation department. In the absence of devolution of powers the WUAs are aiming for political gains rather than improving the systems. It is argued that political will is a necessary but not a sufficient condition for making the WUAs autonomous and self-sufficient. Restructuring and reforming of the State irrigation departments and the bureaucracy is critical for effective and sustainable irrigation institutions.participatory, Irrigation Management, water, Andhra Pradesh

BANKING SECTOR REFORMS AND EQUITY - A SUB-REGIONAL ANALYSIS IN ANDHRA PRADESH

The changes in government policies are continuous to correct the ill effects of its earlier policies. In this study an attempt is made to examine the equity aspect due to reforms in the banking sector at sub-regional level in the state of Andhra Pradesh covering the period 1985 to 2004. The analysis indicates that the share of rural areas in number of branches, number of accounts, deposits and credit declined during pre and post liberalisation periods. Despite declining shares in most of the parameters especially those of credit and deposits, there is positive growth in both the periods. However, the growth of these parameters is more in urban areas. The distribution of credit among the sectors indicates that the share of agricultural sector in accounts and credit declined during pre and post liberalisation periods. The share of agricultural credit declined in all the regions during pre and post liberalisation periods. This is true with respect to credit and number of credit accounts. In the case of other sectors, the share in accounts and credit increased in both the periods. Though, the share in the agriculture sector declined in all the regions, per account credit increased in all the regions during both the periods. It may be concluded that liberalisation has increased inequalities. But the rate of increase in inequalities is arrested to a certain extent in the recent past. But if one looks at the growth of credit given to different sectors and growth of credit in rural and urban areas, one may not come to this kind of conclusion.Banking Sector Reforms, Equity, Andhra Pradesh

The British Geological Survey's new Geomagnetic Data Web Service

Increasing demand within the geomagnetism community for high quality real-time or near-real-time observatory data means there is a requirement for data producers to have a robust and scalable data processing infrastructure capable of delivering geomagnetic data products over the Internet in a variety of formats. We describe a new software system, developed at BGS, which will allow access to our geomagnetic data products both within our organisation's intranet and over the Internet. We demonstrate how the system is designed to afford easy access to the data by a wide range of software clients and allow rapid development of software utilizing our observatory data

Intramuscular (infiltrating) Lipoma

Intraoral lipomas are benign and relatively rare tumors, although they occur with higher frequencies in other areas, most especially the back, abdomen and shoulders of adults. They have no gender predilection and predominantly affect the buccal mucosa. This paper describes a case of intramuscular (infiltrating) lipoma on the buccal mucosa of a 60-year old male which is relatively rare when compared to simple lipoma of buccal mucosa, and review pertinent literature

Polarization Measurements and the Pairing Gap in the Universal Regime

We analyze recent cold-atom experiments on imbalanced Fermi systems using a minimal model with a BCS-like superfluid phase coexisting with a normal phase. This model is used to extract the T=0 pairing gap in the fully paired superfluid state. The recently measured particle density profiles are in good agreement with the theoretical predictions obtained from the universal parameters from previous Quantum Monte Carlo calculations. We find that the T=0 pairing gap is greater than 0.4 times the Fermi energy $E_F$, with a preferred value of $0.45 \pm 0.05$ $E_F$. The ratio of the pairing gap $\Delta$ to the Fermi Energy $E_F$ is larger here than in any other system of strongly-paired fermions in which individual pairs are unbound.Comment: 4 pages, 3 figures. Revised verison includes cosmetic changes to the text and figures. One reference adde