Punjab’s struggle with devolution

Since colonial times, provincial local governments have been the foundation and doorstep of the delivery of social and municipal services. In Punjab, despite being burdened with a broad scope of responsibilities, local government has gradually become the weakest tier of governance over the past few decades.

The list of expectations from local governments is quite long: from managing the transfer of funds to community-based organisations, exercising control over land use and zoning, managing assets, including leasing and renting out properties, to providing municipal services and infrastructure development.

Successive provincial legislation in Punjab, comprising PLGO 2001, PLGA 2013, PLGA 2019 and PLGA 2022, have postulated for assigning incremental responsibilities to local governments without considering their financial, technical and administrative capacity and capability.

The ecosystem governing the capacity development of local government seems to have taken a heavy tilt towards the provincial government instead of adopting a balanced approach. The neglect of local government capacity, spanning decades, not only led to diminishing capacity in the face of governance challenges but also provided the provincial government with justifiable reasons to create parallel structures – all in the name of lack of capacity and need for effective governance.

The case may be built on the historic devolution under the PLGO 2001, which was gradually rolled back in the name of c