*CHAPTER II* *GRAM SABHA- Constitution of Panchayats*
* * * * *5. Meeting of Gram Sabha (1) T*here shall be four ordinary meetings of the Gram Sabha to be held on any Sunday of January, April, July and October of every year, to be convened by the Sarpanch *Suggested amendments* *5. Meeting of Gram Sabha* (1) Regular Gram sabha meetings shall take place on a fixed day at fixed time at a fixed place every month. The day, place and time shall be decided by the Gram sabha. It could be changed in any subsequent meeting, but wide publicity should be given to the changed date, place and time, before it is implemented. The day, time and place of next meeting shall be announced at the end of previous meeting by way of reminder. (2) A meeting of the Gram Sabha shall be presided over by a person, other than Sarpanch or Deputy-Sarpanch, so elected in the said Gram Sabha meeting by those present, only for the purpose of chairing and conducting the said Gram Sabha meeting. Provided that the people may elect the same or some other person to conduct the next Gram Sabha meeting. (3) The Sarpanch and Deputy-sarpanch shall attend all gram sabha meetings unless any one of them is medically ill disposed or has some very pressing family engagement. In any case, he/she shall not keep absent for three consecutive meetings, in which case he shall make himself liable for recall. (4) Minutes in each Gram sabha shall be taken by Panchayat Secretary. Minutes will be read out after each meeting. If anyone has any objections to the minutes, the same shall be modified immediately after discussions by the Gram sabha and finalized, only after which signatures of those present in the meeting shall be taken on the same register below minutes of meeting. The Gram Sabha may choose someone else other than the secretary to record the minutes. (5) If 5% of the registered voters or 50 registered voters, whoever make up the higher number, requisition in writing, the Panchayat secretary shall call an emergency meeting of Gram sabha to discuss issues mentioned in the requisition letter within 7 days of receiving the requisition letter. Provided that if the Panchayat secretary fails to call such a meeting, it shall be the duty of the Sarpanch or Deputy sarpanch to call for such a meeting. If the Sarpanch and Deputy sarpanch also fail to call the meeting, the signatories to the requisition letter may themselves call a meeting by circulating the notice house to house. In such an eventuality, both Sarpanch and Deputy-sarpanch would stand disqualified and would be deemed to have vacated the office and Panchayat secretary shall be liable for punishment by the members in the Gram sabha meeting. (6) Agenda of every Gram sabha meeting shall be decided in the following manner: a. Minutes of previous meeting and action taken upon those items shall form the first item of agenda. b. If any member wishes to bring any item on agenda, he/she can give it in writing or just orally tell the Panchayat Secretary. All the requests received a week before the meeting shall be included in that meeting and rest would be included in next meeting. c. The agenda shall be adequately publicized at least a week before the meeting. d. Before the start of every meeting, the priority of agenda items i.e. which item will be taken up first for discussion, will be decided through consensus or where there is no consensus, through voting on each item by raise of hands, with the item receiving maximum votes to be discussed first. e. At least one hour shall be set aside to discuss individual grievances, where people could raise their individual grievances against any government agency or against anyone. Gram sabha shall take all appropriate steps to get these grievances resolved at the earliest. (7) Gram sabha shall decide the various means that shall be used to circulate and adequately advertise notices, agenda and minutes of meetings. (8) Resolutions- (a) Ordinary resolution: Any resolution shall be passed through consensus. Every attempt shall be made to have consensus on an issue, even if there is a need to discuss that subject in more than one meeting. However, if consensus is not possible, the matter shall be decided through simple majority. Quorum for any Gram sabha meeting shall be 5% of registered voters, out of which 20% shall be women. If quorum is absent in any meeting, the meeting shall be postponed by one hour and then there shall be no need for quorum unless the majority of those present decide that the matters at hand are critical and the meeting should be adjourned and should take place at a later date so that larger number of people could participate. If such a resolution is passed, the meeting shall stand postponed to a date and time to be decided in this meeting only. (b) Special resolution: For such issues as provided in this Act or as decided by a Gram Sabha, the matter shall be treated to have been passed only if it is passed by two thirds of those present and voting in a meeting not attended by less than 30% of the members of that Gram Sabha, after all attempts at arriving at consensus on that issue fail. (9) All decisions of Gram sabha have to be in accordance with all existing laws of the land. If any of the decisions are not in accordance with any law, the same could be challenged by anyone before the Ombudsman. (10) No higher authority shall be competent to interfere in any manner in the functioning or in the decisions of Gram Sabha on the matters within the jurisdiction of Gram Sabha. However, State Government or Zilla Panchayat or Taluka Panchayat or any other Government agency may convey its objections or give any suggestions on any of the actions or proposals of Gram sabha at any time. Gram sabha shall consider these suggestions. The final decision however shall lie with Gram sabha. (11) On the recommendation of Zilla Panchayat or Taluka Panchayat or suo motu, two or more Gram sabhas can have a joint meeting, in which the members of participating Gram sabhas shall be present, to discuss or decide any issue. Decision in such a joint meeting shall be treated as having been taken by all these Gram sabhas individually. (12) Wherever possible, the proceedings of gram sabha shall be telecast on local cable TV. (13) All Gram Sabha meetings shall be video recorded, copies of which could be obtained by anyone on payment of copying charges to Panchayat Secretary. *Pesentation of proposed amendments made of Panchayat Raj Act, 1994 by Shri Arvind Kejriwal on 13th Oct, 2010 The Goa Law Commission has organised a at Seminar Hall , Secretariat, Porvorim.* * * *Visit :* http://panchayatamendment.blogspot.com/ -- With Regards Sanjay Vinayak Barve 9403176657