Role of Institutional Support System in Drought Management: The Case of Western Odisha

The paper assesses the major role played by the institutional support system such as government safety-nets, non-governmental and community based insurance mechanism in mitigating the drought risk and vulnerability in the region. Before assessing the effectiveness of the institutional supports, the paper critically analyses the factors that led to gradual refinement of drought management policies and programmes with special reference to western Odisha. The role played by Centre-State relationship and power equations in implementation of programmes for drought management has been critically examined. The study is based on secondary data analysis and the findings of a field survey on 139 households. The institutional support system to withstand drought in effective manner was found to be weak in the study region. Though a gradual improvement in drought management policies was observed and every major drought induced some qualitative improvement to the relief approach, the nature of Centre-State relationship and influence of pressure groups was found to play a key role in the sanction of funds and implementation of the development schemes for drought risk reduction. A large number of developmental programmes have been implemented in the drought-prone study region, but the benefits of these programmes reached very less proportion of rural households and these programmes have not sustained due to lack of long-term vision, poor quality of implementation and insufficient people's participation. Furthermore, the community based organisations were found to be more effective in earlier periods compared to the present.