Localising Governance: Strengthening the Role of Last Mile Institutions in Karnataka – Volume 1

The Karnataka Administrative Reforms Commission II (ARC 2) invited the Public Affairs Centre (PAC), Bengaluru to extend research support to help the Commission make appropriate recommendations for the functioning of these six institutions crucial for last mile governance on the basis of the Terms of Reference set out by the ARC 2. Accordingly, PAC conducted a short-term study in a small sample of GPs in the state to study the current functioning, the gaps between actual and normative standards and suggested how the performance of the 6 institutions can be improved to foster efficiency and effectiveness at the last mile.

The broad areas of the study included:

• An activity analysis of the core sectors of governance to identify the need for and the rationale to restructure the departments, programmes, and processes to enhance outcome
• An evaluation of the delivery of key social services to identify the gaps and propose relevant process re-engineering to improve the adequacy and quality of service
• An assessment of the span of control in both the staff and line functions and consider shifts to self-directed cross functional teams for efficiency improvements, and rationalisation of staff strength
• An evaluation of the indicators used to measure employee productivity to introduce structural and parametric improvements in the measurement framework, and training and capacity-building.