Research Report

Free-Riders or Victims:Women's Nonparticipationin Irrigation Management in Nepal'sChhattis Mauja Irrigation Scheme

Margreet ZwarteveenandNita Neupane

INTERNATIONAL IRRIGATION MANAGEMENT INSTITUTEP O Box 2075 Colombo, Sri Lanka

Tel (94-1) 867404 • Fax (94-1) 866854 • E-mail IIMI@cgnet.comInternet Home Page http:/ /www.cgiar.org

ISSN: 1026-0862ISBN: 92-9090-334-1

Research Report

Free-Riders or Victims:Women's Nonparticipationin Irrigation Management in Nepal'sChhattis Mauja Irrigation Scheme

Margreet ZwarteveenandNita Neupane

INTERNATIONAL IRRIGATION MANAGEMENT INSTITUTEP O Box 2075 Colombo, Sri Lanka

Tel (94-1) 867404 • Fax (94-1) 866854 • E-mail IIMI@cgnet.comInternet Home Page http:/ /www.cgiar.org

ISSN: 1026-0862ISBN: 92-9090-334-1

Research Reports

IIMI’s mission is to create sustainable increases in the productivity of irrigated agriculturewithin the overall context of water basins and the analysis of water resource systems as awhole. In serving this mission, IIMI concentrates on the integration of policies, technologiesand management systems to achieve workable solutions to real problems—practical, relevantresults in the field of irrigation and water resources.

The publications in this series cover a wide range of subjects—from computer model-ing to experience with water users associations—and vary in content from directly applicableresearch to more basic studies, on which applied work ultimately depends. Some researchreports are narrowly focused, analytical, and detailed empirical studies; others are wide-ranging and synthetic overviews of generic problems.

Although most of the reports are published by IIMI staff and their collaborators, we wel-come contributions from others. Each report is reviewed internally, by IIMI’s own staff, byIIMI’s senior research associates and by other external reviewers. The reports are publishedand distributed both in hard copy and electronically. They may be copied freely and citedwith due acknowledgment.

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Research Report 7

Free-Riders or Victims: Women’sNonparticipation in Irrigation Managementin Nepal’s Chhattis Mauja Irrigation Scheme

Margreet Zwarteveenand Nita Neupane

International Irrigation Management InstituteP O Box 2075, Colombo, Sri Lanka

The authors: M. Z. Zwarteveen is the Gender Specialist at the International Irrigation Man-agement Institute (IIMI) and Nita Neupane who conducted most of the Nepali fieldwork forthis report is at No Frills Consultants, Kathmandu, Nepal.

This report is revised and enlarged from Gender Aspects of Irrigation Management: The ChhattisMauja Irrigation System in Nepal published in July 1995 by Asia-Pacific Journal of Rural De-velopment, 5(1):1–26.

Zwarteveen, M. Z., and Nita Neupane. 1996. Free-riders or victims: Women’s nonparticipationin irrigation management in Nepal’s Chhattis Mauja irrigation scheme. Research Report 7. Co-lombo, Sri Lanka: International Irrigation Management Institute

/ irrigation management / farmer-managed irrigation systems / irrigation programs / water users’associations / irrigated farming / irrigation canals / water delivery / water allocation / water dis-tribution / maintenance / gender / women in development / farmers / female labor / agriculturalmanpower / households / family labor / living standards / social aspects / agricultural production/ villages / social organization / performance evaluation / Chhattis Mauja irrigation scheme / Nepal /

ISBN: 92-9090-334-1ISSN: 1026-0862

© IIMI, 1996. All rights reserved.

Responsibility for the contents of this publication rests with the authors.

Editor: Kingsley Kurukulasuriya; Consultant Editor: Steven Breth; Artist: D. C. Karunaratne;Typesetter: Kithsiri Jayakody; Editorial/Production Manager: Nimal A. Fernando.

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Contents

Summary v

Introduction 1

The Chhattis Mauja Irrigation Scheme 2

System description 2

Farm households 3

The Intra-Household Organization of Production 4

Gender division of labor 4

The actual organization of agricultural production 5

Gender Aspects of Irrigation Management 8

The kulara system 8

Levels of organization 8

Water allocation 10

Resource mobilization 13

Should Women Be More Involved in the Chhattis Mauja Organization? 15

Performance 15

Responsiveness of the organization to the needs of women 16

Future scenario 16

Annex 19

Literature Cited 21

Although irrigated farming at the head end of theChhattis Mauja irrigation scheme in Nepal is increas-ingly being done by women, female farmers do notformally participate in the scheme’s organization.However, women’s noninvolvement as formal mem-bers in meetings and the lack of female representationin the organization do not seem to negatively affecttheir access to irrigation services. On the contrary,women succeed extremely well in getting their irriga-tion needs accommodated, in part because they are notformally participating in the scheme’s management.This allows them to take more water than they are en-titled to, as well as to contribute less labor to mainte-nance than they should without being punished. Be-cause women are not recognized as members, the or-ganization has difficulty enforcing its rules on women.At the same time, female farmers cunningly make useof the prevailing gender ideology, which pictures them

as weak and in need of protection. Although this ide-ology does not reflect realities as perceived by womenthemselves, it strengthens them in their negotiationsfor more water and in their attempts to minimize theircontributions to the scheme’s maintenance.

Previous studies attribute the successful performanceof the Chhattis Mauja irrigation scheme to the fact that allusers are involved in its management. This study showsthat in the head end of the system, the group of users isnot identical to the group of managers: women are the mainusers, but only men participate in the Chhattis Mauja or-ganization. Although overall scheme management perfor-mance does not unduly suffer from the lack of users’ par-ticipation, the problems of free-riding and labor mobiliza-tion in the head end do create performance weaknesses. Iffeminization of agriculture continues to grow, these prob-lems will become more widespread and threaten thesustainability of the whole irrigation scheme.

Summary

v

1

Free-Riders or Victims: Women’s Nonparticipationin Irrigation Management in Nepal’s Chhattis MaujaIrrigation Scheme

Margreet Zwarteveen and Nita Neupane

Irrigation-related studies, policies, and inter-ventions are often based on the implicit as-sumption that irrigators, farmers, and waterusers are predominantly male and that theyfunction as individuals. Irrigation and farm-ing are consequently analyzed as reflectingindividual behavior, and the users arethought to consist of men only (Illo 1988;Hulsebosch and Ombara 1995; Zwarteveen1994). This assumption is not true for mostparts of the world. Farming is, almost ev-erywhere, a collective endeavor, involvingmale and female members of farm house-holds. The specific ways in which resources,labor, and incomes are shared and allocatedamong the various household membersvary across, and even within, cultures andregions, but women are much more in-volved than is generally assumed.

Glossary

kulara an irrigation share, assignedto a member village; also theirrigation rights and obliga-tions of that village

lahure person employed in the In-dian or British army

mauja village, or more than one vil-lage constituting an irrigationunit

meth muktiyar main-scheme irrigation leader

muktiyar village irrigation leader

Overlooking women as irrigators, farm-ers, or water users leads to a faulty under-standing of the determinants of the perfor-mance of irrigated agriculture. Policies andinterventions based on such an incompleteunderstanding risk being ineffective. Theabsence of women from organizations maylead to inefficiencies in management perfor-mance. A study carried out in Indonesia, forinstance, suggests that a major reason for thepoor functioning of water users’ associationswas the lack of women in these associations.The official members (the male “heads ofhouseholds”) were not the actual irrigatorsor farmers—their wives performed most ofthe agricultural and irrigation-related activi-ties, while men were away for long periodsof the year (Schrevel 1989). In a study of anirrigation scheme in Kenya, Hulsebosch andOmbara (1995, 2) observed that representa-tion and participation of women in thescheme’s management “is the only way tosecure their interests, which may differ fromthe interests of male water users.”

The proper recognition and under-standing of gender roles, responsibilities,and rights are particularly pertinent in anera when more and more state agencies areturning over responsibility for irrigationmanagement to users’ associations (Vermil-lion 1991). Many of the arguments support-ing such moves toward decentralization arederived from studies that aim to prove the

Introduction

2

greater success and sustainability of irriga-tion systems that are, and always havebeen, entirely operated and maintained byusers themselves. The Chhattis Mauja irri-gation scheme in Nepal is an example ofsuch a system. This irrigation scheme hasattracted IIMI and other researchers1 be-cause it was built by water users and is en-tirely operated, managed, and maintainedby them. As in other studies of farmer-man-aged irrigation systems, the success of theChhattis Mauja irrigation scheme is attrib-uted to the fact that “all users are involvedin the irrigation organization” (Yoder 1994).However, the earlier studies of ChhattisMauja do not specify who these users areand, more specifically, whether women areor should be considered as members of theusers’ group, nor do the studies examinehow social and economic differences amongusers influence their access to irrigation-re-lated services.

This report reexamines findings of ear-lier studies of the Chhattis Mauja irrigation

scheme from a gender perspective. First, anempirical analysis of the livelihood strate-gies of farm households2 in the ChhattisMauja irrigation scheme is made, the objec-tive of which is to determine who the mem-bers of the water users’ community are. Pri-ority is given to understanding the intra-household organization of production inorder to establish which household mem-bers are to be considered water users. Thenthe report documents the level and natureof women’s and men’s participation in thewater users’ organization, and analyzeswomen’s access to irrigation services. In theconcluding section, the desirability of in-creasing the participation of women in theChhattis Mauja organization is discussed interms of both the performance of thescheme and the responsiveness of the orga-nization to the irrigation needs of women.This report is based on findings of a casestudy (see Annex) carried out in theChhattis Mauja irrigation scheme betweenJune and December 1994.3

The Chhattis Mauja Irrigation Scheme

Scheme description

The Chhattis Mauja4 irrigation scheme di-verts water from the Tinau River at Butwalin the terai (plains) of Nepal. The main ca-nal is 11 kilometers long and has 44 branchcanals. Irrigation water is delivered to about2,500 households living in the 3,500-hectarecommand area. The scheme was originallyconstructed by local landowners in the1880s. From the late 1940s through the1970s, migrants from the hills cleared thedense jungle and settled in the upper com-mand area.

Diversion of water into the canal is ac-complished by two temporary stone-and-

brush structures (Kannya Dhunga andIttabhond) on the alluvial fan at Butwaltown. Because the fan is continually re-shaped by floods, the temporary wing wallsmust frequently be modified and main-tained. Farm households in the commandarea contribute the necessary labor and re-sources for maintaining the scheme, in re-turn for which they obtain the right to useirrigation water.

Monsoon rice is the most important ir-rigated crop; during the monsoon seasonthe whole command area is covered withrice. Wheat is the most important wintercrop, but lentil and mustard are also grownin winter. In recent years, wheat has been

3Illustrations (indicatedby ♦ symbol and itali-cized paragraphs) wereobtained from in-depthinterviews with house-holds in the head-end vil-lages of Shankar NagarTola, Naya Chapparhati,Kalika Nagar, and PurbiShankar Nagar.4Literally meaning “thirty-six villages,” which is theoriginal number of vil-lages in the system. Thesystem now has some 60villages.

1For example, Pradhan1983, Shresta andSharma 1987. Yoder(1994) summarizes mostof the previous studies ofthe scheme.2Although the field studycovered villages in allsections, this report fo-cuses only on the head-end villages. There is bet-ter access to irrigationwater in the head end,and cropping intensitiesare consequently higher.Average landholdingsare smaller. One othersignificant difference isthat a larger proportionof settlers in the headend belong to the so-called lahure group of set-tlers—those who boughtland with money earnedthrough employmentabroad, mostly by malehousehold membersworking in the army.

3

partly replaced by maize because of itshigher profitability. The only spring crop(which is only cultivated in the upper partof the command area) is maize (table 1).

Farm households

The nature and degree of involvement in ir-rigated farming by male and female house-hold members in Chhattis Mauja are verymuch a function of the importance of irri-gated farming in a household’s livelihoodstrategy.5 Taking the farm household mem-bers’ own socioeconomic classification as astarting point, a broad typology can bemade of three categories of household inthe head-end village of Purbi ShankarNagar: the rich, the middle class, and thepoor.6

Rich households. Households in therich category7 have access to 0.67 to 2 hect-ares of land, which, in combination withaccess to irrigation, is enough to meet theyearly food requirements of the family. Inaddition, in many rich households (56%),one or more male members earn some off-farm income or are receiving pensions.Many of these men formerly had high posi-tions in the British or Indian army beforesettling in Chhattis Mauja. They purchasedland in the command area of ChhattisMauja with the money thus earned. Thesehouseholds’ basic rationale for irrigatedproduction is to grow enough food for thefamily. None of the rich households have topurchase rice although occasionally somebuy wheat for a change of taste. In addition,67 percent of the rich households producesome crop surplus, which most of them sellto finance the following years’ agriculturalinvestments. Nonagricultural incomeearned by male members is both used forregular cash expenditures (clothes, electric-ity, school fees, etc.) and invested in off-

farm enterprises, such as small shops orbuses, or in livestock (67% of the richhouseholds rear cattle of improved breeds).

♦ An example of a rich household is a fam-ily in Shankar Nagar Tola with 20 members, 13of whom are living together. Three sons are work-ing in the army. The household owns 2.35 hect-ares of land. Rice, wheat, and maize are the ma-jor crops the family cultivates. Production fromtheir farm is enough for family consumption, andthe income earned by selling the surplus almostcovers the expenses of next years’ agricultural in-vestments. The by-products of crops are used asfodder. The sons’ army salaries and the pensionsreceived by the father (who is retired from thearmy) have helped the family invest in two buses,which run from Bhairawa to Pokhara. Part of themoney is also used in dhikuri, a sort of gambling.They have no intention of buying more land.

Middle-class households. Among themiddle-class households8 are those who de-pend almost entirely on farming irrigatedland for their livelihoods. Land, family la-bor, and irrigation water are the most im-portant productive resources of thesehouseholds. Landholdings in this categoryof households vary between 0.20 and 0.57hectare. Of these households, 25 percentgain access to additional land throughsharecropping.

For 56 percent of these households,their landholdings are large enough to meet

5The degree of women’sinvolvement in farmingis thus not a function ofthe amount of work theyhave “at home,” but isdetermined by the socio-economic status of thehousehold. See Whatmore1991 for an elaboration.6This typology is basedon a ranking of all thehouseholds in a villageby the villagers them-selves.7Of the village’s 69households, 20 percentwere categorized as rich.8In the sample village,this group constitutes 45percent of the total num-ber of households.

TABLE 1.Cropping patterns in the Chhatis Mauja com-mand area (based on a survey of 128 house-holds in three villages).

Monsoon Winter Spring

Rice/lentil wheat maizeEarly rice mustard+pea/gram maizeRice/lentil maize maizeRice lentil vegetables maize

Note: (/) = relay cropping. (+) = mixed cropping.

4

the family’s yearly food demand, and 10percent produce a surplus, which is sold onthe market. However, for most middle-classhouseholds that sell surpluses, the incomegained is not sufficient to meet their cashneeds, and sometimes it is not even enoughto purchase agricultural inputs and to paylabor costs. This explains why more thanhalf the middle-class households need regu-lar access to off-farm incomes, most oftenthrough full- or part-time employment ofmale members. Some of these men work asteachers, and others work as rickshaw pull-ers or in private companies in nearbytowns. Cash income is used for purchasesto supplement the households’ food re-quirement and to cover other necessitiessuch as clothes and school fees. Income isalso used to pay for agricultural inputs andto hire laborers. If anything remains it is in-vested in livestock.

♦ A male member of a middle-class house-hold in Shankar Nagar Tola who records the ex-penses for cultivating his 0.67 hectare of land in-dicated that in the previous year his rice cultiva-tion cost Rs 7,625.9 He had to spend 27 percentof his annual salary just to cover those costs. Inaddition, he had to pay an annual fee of Rs 1,400for using the Chhattis Mauja irrigation water be-cause no one from his family was available to domaintenance work. He and his wife explained thatif he were to lose his job, they would be forced to

gradually sell off their land to meet their cash re-quirements.

Poor households. The category ofhouseholds labeled as poor10 consists offamilies who own little or no land (land-holdings vary between 0 and 0.34 ha.) andwho have no stable off-farm income. Land-holdings are too small to produce enoughto meet the family’s food requirements. Fortheir livelihoods, the poor depend on acombination of sharecropping (57% of allpoor households), hiring out their labor(70%), off-farm employment (8%), and ir-regular sources of income, such as the (ille-gal) collection of fuel wood and timber.Most often, it is the female household mem-bers who work as agricultural wage labor-ers because demand for female wage laboris higher than for male wage labor.

♦ One of the poor households in ShankarNagar Tola has survived through sharecroppingfor the last 23 years. The household consists of fiveeconomically active members, and it owns noland. The family earns incomes through agricul-tural wage labor. Even though sharecropping isless profitable than working on others’ farms forwages, the family prefers to sharecrop because itassures them of at least having access to a tan-gible quantity of food. In addition, the landownerhas provided them with a house, and they haveaccess to loans through the landowner.

The Intra-Household Organization of Production

Gender division of labor

The way in which tasks and activities areshared and divided among the varioushousehold members is partly governed bycultural notions concerning male and femaleroles. An important aspect of this gender ide-

ology is the distinction made between taskson the basis of the supposed physicalstrength required to carry them out. Tasksconsidered physically demanding are usu-ally thought of as typical male tasks, whiletypical female tasks are those that requireless physical strength and more care and pa-

9US$1.00 = N Rs 47.50 (in1994, the time of thestudy).10Thirty-five percent ofthe households wereranked as poor.

5

Activities W B MRice preparing seeds •

preparing seedbed •sowing •plowing •leveling •preparing fooda •transplanting •weeding •irrigating •harvesting •bundling •transporting •threshing •storing straw •storing grain •manual winnowing •fan winnowing •

Wheat plowing •leveling •sowing •irrigating •fertilizing •harvesting •threshingb •cleaning •storing •

Maizec transporting manure •applying manure •plowing •leveling •broadcasting •line sowing •weeding •harvesting •removing kernels •storing •

Lentil broadcasting •harvesting •threshing •storing •

Mustard broadcasting •transporting manure •applying manure •irrigating •harvesting •threshing •storing •

Livestock milking •cleaning shed •watering •feeding •cutting grass •herding •

Other collecting fuel •cooking •cleaning •child caring •kitchen gardening •maintaining irrigation •

a For field laborers.b Usually done mechanically; female household members do manual threshing only if

the quantity is very small.c Winter/spring.

FIGURE 1.Gender division of tasks as perceived by villagers in 38 householdsin Purbi Shankar Nagar (W = women, M = men, B= both).

tience. In general, a greater value is attachedto male or heavy tasks, which is normallyreflected in higher wages for male labor.

The distinction between heavy maletasks and light female tasks appears to bebased on cultural norms rather than on theactual physical strength required to carrythem out. Transportation of rice from thefield to the threshing floor, for example, isconsidered to be physically demanding, andfor that reason it is carried out by men. Car-rying manure (which is as heavy as rice)from the livestock shed to the field is con-sidered easy and light work to be done bywomen.

In spite of the rather strict denomina-tion of tasks as being either male or female,in practice men often assist women in car-rying out female tasks and vice versa. Theideology thus seems to refer more to thevalue that is attached to certain work thanto a strict assignment of activities based ongender. Figure 1 shows the gender divisionof tasks according to the ideology; it doesnot necessarily reflect how tasks are actu-ally divided among household members.

The actual organization ofagricultural production

The actual involvement of male and femalehousehold members in agricultural activities isvery much a function of the household’s live-lihood strategy, or more specifically of theamount of off-farm income in relation to thesize of the landholding, and depending on ahousehold’s livelihood strategy, crop choicesalso vary (table 2). Households that can affordto do so, will replace family labor with hiredlaborers. If households have cash income, inaddition to having a relatively large landhold-ing, they may also decide to rent their land ona sharecrop basis. Most households identifiedas belonging to the middle class and poor cat-

6

egories try to save money by maximizing thelabor inputs of family members.

The organization of agricultural produc-tion in the rich households is either a jointaffair of husband and wife (22% of the richhouseholds), or it is done mostly by the wife.In some households, male members eitherhave hardly any experience in farming, be-cause they have never farmed (56%), or theyare absent for the greater part of the year(11%), being employed elsewhere. In thesecases, the responsibility for managing irri-gated agriculture lies almost entirely with fe-male household members. Women organizeagricultural production either by relyingheavily on hired and exchange laborers or byrenting their land on a sharecrop basis.

♦ An example of a rich household comesfrom a de facto female-headed farm. The woman,when interviewed, recalls how she used to be re-sponsible for carrying out all agricultural activi-ties because her husband was employed in India.“Once my husband came for a short visit duringthe rice season,” she relates. “I had to irrigate thefield at night, and my husband decided to accom-pany me. On the way to the field, my husbandsaw a snake. This made him realize the danger Ihad to face while farming, and he instantly de-cided to return home without even having irri-gated the field. He then found a sharecropper tocultivate the field for us.” If the household mem-bers can cultivate the fields by themselves, theyneed not buy any food. As it is, the husband comeshome once a year and buys all the necessary sup-

plies for the year. He also sends his wife Rs 1,000a month for regular expenditures. The woman isproud of her husband and proud that she has beenreleased from fieldwork.

If the land is not given out for sharecrop-ping, female household members often con-tinue to do all the “female” tasks, althoughthey are assisted by hired laborers. In addi-tion to doing fieldwork, they are expected toprepare meals for the hired laborers.11

Whether male household memberswork abroad or not, all the male labor re-quired for irrigated farming is often sup-plied by hired laborers. At most an adultmale household member accompanies theplowing team to the fields at the time ofland preparation, but even this task may becarried out by a permanent hired laborer.

♦ An example of such a rich household isa family of five members in Naya Chaparrhati,which owns 2.68 hectares of land, plus a smallplot in Kathmandu. All the children are in school.The family owns a store and a rice mill. One oftheir relatives helps manage the store. Most of thetime, the husband is busy with political activities.In his free time, he plays cards with other villag-ers. He is an advisor to the Sohra-Chhattis jointcommittee.12 His wife spends most of her time athome, except during busy periods in the fieldssuch as transplanting and harvesting rice or har-vesting wheat. Then she has to prepare meals forthe hired laborers. Sometimes, she also works withthe hired laborers to increase their efficiency. Thereis a permanent male domestic laborer in the houseto help her look after the livestock and collect fueland fodder; he also assists in the rice mill andsometimes with fieldwork (during land prepara-tion). The daughters sometimes help their motherin the kitchen.

It is in the middle-class households thatphysical involvement of family members infarming is highest; they usually have reason-

11When hiring tractors,preparation of meals isunnecessary. This ex-plains why many wom-en prefer to hire peoplewith tractors rather thanpeople with bullocks.12This is the highest levelof the organization man-aging the ChhattisMauja. It is responsiblefor the division of waterand maintenance respon-sibilities between theChhattis Mauja irrigationscheme and the Sohra ir-rigation system.

TABLE 2.Proportion of total cultivated land by crop and economic category ofhousehold in Purbi Shankar Nagar.

Average Proportion of land (%)

landholding Wheat Mustard Lentil Maize Maize

Household (ha) (winter) (winter) (winter) (winter) (spring)

Rich 1.14 20 51 13 1 67

Middle class 0.34 25 36 36 0 72

Poor 0.12 23 35 12 2 47

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ably large landholdings, but do not haveenough cash income to replace family laborwith hired labor. Family labor inputs are thusmaximized, and female household memberstry as much as possible to arrange for ex-change laborers, instead of hiring laborers.The “real farming couples,” that is, husbandand wife closely working together and help-ing each other to carry out field activities,can be found among the middle-class house-holds. In some of the households identifiedas middle class, agriculture is predominantlypracticed by women, while men earn somecash income. Even though the off-farm in-come helps meet the household’s cash needs,it often implies that women become almostsolely responsible for agriculture, and formany this experience is stressful. Many ofthese women complained about the largequantity of work they have to do and ex-pressed the wish to give up farming or togive out the land for sharecropping.

♦ At the time of land preparation, a visitwas paid to one of the middle-class households.The senior male member of this household is a vil-lage leader (chairman of the Shankar Nagar Tolavillage development committee) who is deeply in-volved in political and social activities. The house-hold owns 0.36 hectare of land. The man does notearn enough to hire laborers, so his wife organizesand carries out most of the tasks. She arrangesexchange laborers or tries to find laborers whoaccept wages in kind. For land preparation, a manwas contracted one day to come to their fields witha pair of bullocks to plow. The husband monitoredthe work and assisted by digging the borders ofthe field and leveling it. The woman had arrangedfor transplanters to come at 2 P.M. Suddenly, thehusband was called away for an urgent matter bya neighbor. He left, leaving his wife to do the dig-ging and leveling herself.

The start of the rice season is often atime of much stress for women belonging to

middle-class households. Plowing, laborand bullocks, irrigation water, and trans-planters all have to be arranged at a timewhen there is high competition for these re-sources.

♦ In Kalika Nagar, a woman remembersthe difficulties she experienced when trying to ar-range for transplanters and labor for plowing. Herhusband, who is an ex-army man, does not knowhow to plow, nor do her sons, who are in college.On the day she had arranged for draft animals,she could not find transplanters. Eventually,when she had found them, she could not get thebullocks. She recounts how she was crying andswearing in the field. She was almost certain thatshe would give out the land for sharecropping thefollowing year.

Some middle-class households ownbullocks and use them to plow their fieldsand often those of others. This providessome additional income or labor for trans-planting because labor for plowing can beexchanged for transplanters.13

Rearing livestock, however, requires alarge amount of female labor, and thus itincreases the workload of women. As onewoman puts it, “Every morning when Ihave to clean the shed, I am cursing myparents for not having allowed me to study,which would have enabled me to find someoff-farm job.”

The poor households often have fewerfarm-related activities because of their smalllandholdings. All field activities are carriedout by family members, and for labor-inten-sive activities such as transplanting and har-vesting, exchange labor is arranged. Malemembers of poor households either earn somecash income through the illegal collection andsale of timber and fuelwood, or they have alow-paid job with the government. Sharecrop-ping households can sometimes earn addi-tional income by using the landowners’ bul-

13One day of plowing isequivalent to three to fivedays of transplanting,depending on the loca-tion.

8

locks for plowing others’ fields. Female mem-bers of poor households may earn additionalincomes through agricultural wage labor.

♦ One of the poor households consists offive members (parents and three children, the twoyoungest still in school). The father has a low-paidjob in a bank in a bordering town in India. Hecomes home every weekend. The family own 0.09

hectare of land and has access to an additional0.12 hectare on a sharecropping basis. They re-cently bought two cows of an improved breed.Because of the investments in land and livestock,they are indebted, but hope to be able to pay backsoon. The mother and the eldest daughter, who hasfinished high school, carry out most of the fieldactivities, and during weekends the whole familyworks together in the fields.

14Yoder 1994 provides adetailed and accurate de-scription of the manage-ment, operation, and or-ganization of the Chhat-tis Mauja irrigationscheme.15It may be that not allmale irrigators are defacto members.

Gender Aspects of Irrigation Management

The kulara system

The management of the Chhattis Mauja irri-gation scheme is based on the use of thekulara, a unit that expresses a certain irriga-tion share, which is assigned to a membervillage,14 and also refers to the irrigationrights and obligations of that village. Waterrights and voting rights are in proportion tothe number of kularas held by the village,as are the amounts of labor and cash thevillage is obliged to provide for the upkeepof the scheme. The total number of kularasis not fixed. The Chhattis Mauja executivecommittee controls the number held by vil-lages according to certain rules and proce-dures. Each village or group of users of abranch canal can request the number ofkularas they think is most appropriate forthem. Whenever a village wants to increaseits share of water, they forward a request tothe executive committee. Such requests arediscussed at the general meeting, alongwith the implications for water allocationsto other branch canals. If the request is ap-proved, the applicants have to pay a fee ofRs 600 for each additional kulara of water.

A village that receives the right to opena branch canal outlet from the main canal isconsidered a member of the scheme. Mem-bership at that level thus refers to villages

served by a branch canal rather than to in-dividuals or to households. At the branchcanal level, the village organizations dealwith farm households. Most village organi-zations keep a list of households and theirlandholdings to assist in determining rightsand obligations within the branch, but theselists are not passed on to higher levels oforganization in the scheme.

Levels of organization

The final authority for decisions concerningthe Chhattis Mauja irrigation scheme isvested with the general assembly, of which,in principle, all irrigators are members. Inpractice, only male irrigators15 are encour-aged to participate in meetings. Each branchcanal can designate four voting membersfor each kulara water allocation unit it isentitled to. There are no women among thebranch canal representatives, and thus nofemale voting members in the general as-sembly.

Because the designation of kulara rep-resentatives for proportional representationis time-consuming and inconvenient formany irrigators, provision for another gen-eral-level decision-making meeting has beenmade in the constitution of the Chhattis

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Mauja executive committee. This is simplycalled a general meeting and is composedof all the muktiyars (village leaders) andmembers of the Chhattis Mauja executivecommittee. Often, the so-called “knowl-edgeable water users” are invited to thegeneral meetings; women are not consid-ered knowledgeable water users because sofar they have never been invited.

The Chhattis Mauja constitution speci-fies that a general assembly meeting shouldbe held at least once a year. The members ofthe executive committee and two-thirds ofthe kulara representatives constitute the quo-rum for the general assembly. The agenda ofgeneral assembly meetings includes (1) thescheduling of main canal desiltation works,(2) the presentation of the executivecommittee’s financial statement, and (3) theelection of the executive committee officials.The general assembly meeting is usuallyheld at the executive committee office lo-cated in Prem Nagar in January or February,before the main canal desiltation work starts.The users are given a month’s notice by themuktiyars of the respective maujas (villages).General assembly meetings can also becalled by the executive committee foramending the constitution or whenever thereis a need to discuss something that involvesmore than one branch canal.

Women never attend general assemblymeetings because (according to the menand women interviewed) they are not ableto voice their concerns and needs at suchmeetings.16 One reason is the cultural rulethat women are not supposed to speak upin front of male relatives. Women also re-ferred to their illiteracy as a reason for notattending meetings; they were afraid thatthey would not be able to understand whatwas being said and thought they had littleto contribute.

The Chhattis Mauja organization hasthree tiers.17 The first is the Chhattis Mauja

executive committee, consisting of 13 mem-bers. The chairman, vice chairman, and sec-retary are elected by ballot for 2-year terms byvoting members (kulara representatives). Sofar, only men have been elected to these po-sitions. A treasurer is appointed by the execu-tive committee from among the male waterusers. Nine area-level representatives (all ofwhom are male) bring geographical represen-tation to the executive committee and are di-rectly responsible to their constituencies.

The executive committee employs twometh muktiyars (main scheme irrigation lead-ers; one for the head reach and one for thetail end) to supervise day-to-day operationsand maintenance of the main scheme. Twomessengers are hired to assist the methmuktiyars. The meth muktiyar and messen-gers are all men. This is explained by the no-tion that the tasks of the meth muktiyar andmessengers are unsuitable for women—themeth muktiyars have to monitor and super-vise the emergency maintenance works andare responsible for making sure that water isdistributed properly among the maujas. Themost important duty of the messenger is tocommunicate information and orders re-ceived from the executive committee to thevillage-level muktiyar and to the area-levelrepresentatives, which requires a significantamount of traveling, even at night.

At the second tier are the area-levelcommittees, which link the executive com-mittee and the village-level committees. Anarea-level committee is composed of the vil-lage or branch-canal muktiyars. One of themembers is selected to serve as the area-level chairman for 1 year, and during thatperiod he is the area-level representative tothe executive committee. There are no fe-male muktiyars.

♦ In Kalika Nagar, a head-end village witha high percentage of de facto female-headed farms,a woman volunteered to become the muktiyar. She

16Nita Neupane, a coau-thor of this report, at-tended a general assem-bly meeting, which wasconducted in a very cha-otic way and where theatmosphere was ratherhostile. This explainedthe reluctance of womento attend meetings. Po-litical differences amongwater users and leadersinfluenced the decision-making process; manyamong those presentwere suspicious of theideas and proposals ofthe chairman. Amongthe men who attendedthe meeting, many re-mained silent.17Excluding the Sohra-Chhattis Mauja jointcommittee.

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thought she would be able to perform well becauseshe had gained experience in organizational mat-ters by being the local representative of thewomen’s wing of a political party. Other villag-ers shared this view and she was elected. How-ever, she was forced to resign from her job asmuktiyar after 5 months. Nobody could be foundto assist her; women did not think of themselvesas capable and knowledgeable enough, and the fewwho wanted to assist were prevented by their hus-bands. Men did not want to work under a woman.

When discussing the absence of femalemuktiyars, villagers pointed out that an im-portant capacity of a muktiyar is to be ableto negotiate with the meth muktiyar andthe executive committee chairman for extrawater. People think that such negotiatingskills are harder to find in women than inmen. The success of a muktiyar dependsvery much on whether he or she has a goodrelationship with the chairman, and chancesof having such a relationship are often bet-ter when the muktiyar shares the same po-litical preferences. Because women arehardly involved in politics, their chances ofestablishing a good relationship with thechairman are estimated to be lower. In thisrespect, it is noteworthy that the womanwho was briefly a muktiyar did have politi-cal experience and affiliations.

The village-level committee forms thelast tier of the Chhattis Mauja organization.This committee manages all the irrigationactivities within the branch canal. These in-clude (1) allocating the water the village isentitled to receive from the main canalamong irrigators in the branch, (2) monitor-ing water distribution in the main canal andwithin the branch, (3) managing conflicts,(4) planning and carrying out maintenancewithin the branch, (5) assessing fines to ir-rigators within the branch, and (6) appoint-ing branch canal representatives to vote inthe general assembly. In addition, the vil-

lage-level committee is responsible for mo-bilizing labor for main scheme maintenanceas directed by main scheme officials, andfor linking management of the main schemewith the branch canal. Except for activitiesthat involve other branches or the mainscheme, the village-level committees func-tion as autonomous units.

The structure of a village-level commit-tee differs from one branch to another. In allcases there is a muktiyar who is eitherelected by the villagers for a fixed period orappointed by the village and expected toserve as long as he is willing and as long ashe carries out his tasks satisfactorily. In somemaujas, the muktiyar is the only member ofthe village-level committee. In others, a mes-senger is assigned to assist the muktiyar. Instill other maujas, officials who are to forma committee are elected by the villagers.

The village-level irrigation meetings(which are held once to five times a year,depending on the mauja) are the only meet-ings that are sometimes attended bywomen. Female household members onlygo to these meetings when their husbandsare not around; they reported that they goonly to represent the household. When theygo, they usually do not actively participate,but just observe and listen to what is beingsaid. Instead of going to meetings, womenprefer to directly meet with the muktiyarwhenever they have an irrigation-relatedproblem. In most maujas, the muktiyar is atrusted person who is well known by allthe villagers.

Water allocation

If women, because of their nonparticipationin the organization, are systematically disfa-vored with respect to the quality and quan-tity of irrigation services they receive, thiscan become apparent at three levels:

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• irrigation scheme—as indicated by vil-lages with a greater number of de factofemale heads of farms receiving lesswater than other villages (or experienc-ing greater difficulty in obtaining theirfair share of water)

• mauja—as indicated by female farmersreceiving fewer irrigation services orlower quality services than male farm-ers

• household or farm—as indicated bywomen’s specific irrigation needs beingless well accommodated than men’s

Scheme level. Water is supposed to beallocated among the different branch canalsaccording to the kulara system. If there is acontinuous flow of water, water distributionis monitored and controlled by adjustingthe width of the outlet from the main canalto each branch canal.18 Whenever water be-comes scarce (which occurs most often dur-ing rice seedbed preparation and trans-planting, and for spring crops), water is dis-tributed according to a rotation schedule.

Although in principle water allocationis based on the number of kularas, in prac-tice several other factors govern water dis-tribution. The muktiyar of a branch canalfrequently appeals to the chairman for extrawater when water users in his branch canalcomplain of water shortages. In the headend, water users sometimes even appeal di-rectly to the executive committee chairmanfor more water. Many water users were, forinstance, upset that the chairman gave in toa request by a woman for more water to ir-rigate her maize field.

To answer the question whether vil-lages with a high percentage of de facto fe-male heads of farms are systematically dis-favored, Kalika Nagar was studied.

♦ In West Kalika Nagar, about 80 percentof the actual farmers are women. Many of them

have husbands who are retired from the army andnever work in the fields. Women in Kalika Nagarreported that the management of the ChhattisMauja caused problems for them, citing to twoinstances. In 1992, just after sowing wheat, theexecutive committee decided to reconstruct thedam beyond one of the intakes, close to the intakeof the Kalika Nagar branch canal. Water flow inthe branch canal was stopped during the wholeconstruction period, which seriously affectedwheat production. In 1993, at the time of riceseedbed preparation, the executive committee re-peated the mistake. Rice seeds were already broad-casted in the nurseries, but could not be irrigated.The women recounted how they had to lift waterfrom the river with buckets to water the seedbeds.The seedlings did not grow well, so they had tobuy seedlings from other areas to transplant intheir fields.

It is difficult to know whether theseproblems would also have occurred had themajority of farmers in Kalika Nagar beenmen. It is certain, however, that communi-cation between Kalika Nagar and the execu-tive committee is poor due to gender-re-lated factors. The muktiyar in Kalika Nagarhas a weak personality and does not per-form his task well. It is difficult to find agood male muktiyar partly because of thelarge number of female farmers in KalikaNagar; the one woman who volunteered tobecome a muktiyar in Kalika Nagar had togive up for reasons explained earlier. Fe-male farmers in Kalika Nagar do not like toapproach the muktiyar because he is adrunkard and also because his wife be-comes suspicious when he meets with otherwomen.

At the same time, Kalika Nagar isamong the four head-end villages that haveconstantly created problems for the ChhattisMauja management for taking more waterthan their legal share without even contrib-uting their share of labor to scheme mainte-

18The width is calculatedso that the ratio of theoutlet width to the maincanal width equals theratio of the number ofkularas served by thebranch canal outlet to thetotal number of kularasserved by the main canaldownstream of the out-let.

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nance. A former chairman reported in thegeneral assembly meeting, “When we wentto adjust the inlets to get more water duringperiods of water scarcity, we were oftenkept in the goat pen by the women of thesevillages” (Yoder 1994). This suggests thatthe noninvolvement of female water usersin the organization, rather than being a dis-advantage to women, actually enables themto become free-riders.

Mauja level. Another indication ofwhether water distribution is biased againstwomen, as a result of their peripheral posi-tion relative to formal decision-making bod-ies, is that de facto female heads of farmswithin a mauja systematically receive lesswater or poorer quality irrigation services,or have greater difficulties in obtaining theirfair share of water, than farms that arejointly managed by men and women. In thehead-end villages studied, almost the oppo-site appears to be the case. Female farmersare favored with respect to water distribu-tion—they are the first to receive water.

The rules for water distribution differwithin each mauja. In the villages studied,the muktiyar uses proportionality criteria asa starting point for adjusting irrigation de-liveries from the main canal, but during theperiods of continuous water flow, crop sta-tus, notions of fairness, and reduction offarmer complaints are the main criteriaused, rather than exactness of allocation ac-cording to official kulara entitlements.

One such notion of fairness adhered toby many muktiyars, which is not disputedby irrigators, is that female-headed farmsshould be given priority in water distribu-tion. Female farmers reported that whenthey have arranged bullocks and transplant-ers, they inform the muktiyar that theyneed water. Their fields are often among thefirst to be irrigated. The muktiyar con-firmed this. The reason given is that it ismore difficult for female heads of farms to

arrange for labor to plow and transplantthan it is for jointly managed farms.

Farm level. Water distribution may alsobe skewed at the level of the farm or house-hold because men’s irrigation needs are pri-oritized or better accommodated thanwomen’s. To examine this possibility, it firstneeds to be established whether womenhave specific irrigation needs different fromthose of men.

Women and men hold the same opin-ion with respect to the objectives of irri-gated farming: both expect to obtain yieldshigh enough to feed the family. But menand women differ19 about the quantity ofinputs required for irrigated farming.Women are especially concerned with theamount of their labor certain crops require.This is why many women are eager to plantless wheat and more maize.20

When discussing criteria for assessingirrigation supplies, male farmers stressedthe importance of having enough water totransplant on time. Female farmers did notdisagree, but they mentioned that, in addi-tion, water should be sufficient during therice season to prevent weed growth.Women explained that the inadequacy ofwater during the season leads to frequentstealing of water; when they go to irrigatethe fields and close all the upstream fieldinlets, it often happens that these areopened again by upstream users before wa-ter actually flows to the field.

Women’s noninvolvement in the organi-zation is not likely to negatively affect theamount of water available during the riceseason. On the one hand, both women andthe village muktiyar report that there is noth-ing to prevent women from meeting withhim. In fact, when they have a request or acomplaint to make regarding the quality ofirrigation services, women do go to meetwith the muktiyar. The muktiyar is aware oftheir need for more water and tries to accom-

19These differences ofopinion are not open orarticulated, but are ex-pressed through differentpreferences for crops andfor areas to be allocatedto different crops.20In addition, becausewomen attach great im-portance to havingenough oil for cooking,they often express thewish to expand the areaof their only oilseedcrop—mustard. How-ever, this hardly affectsirrigation requirements,because water is not aconstraint for growingmustard.

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modate this need by appealing to the chair-man for additional water. On the other hand,women are the ones who steal water if thereis scarcity during the season. There is a finefor stealing water, and women thus have aninterest in not being noticed. Their absencefrom the organization may make it relativelyeasier for them to steal water. The fact thatit is mostly women who steal water waseven given by one of the interviewedmuktiyars as a reason for increasing the in-volvement of women in the organization—at present, women can hardly be punished,because they can always claim not to beaware of the official rules.

Unlike men, women said that it wouldbe easier for them if some water is availablein the canal permanently because thiswould facilitate the use of water for a num-ber of nonagricultural tasks they are respon-sible for. Many women wash their clothesand clean the pots in nearby irrigationchannels, and they also use this water forfeeding and watering livestock and cleaningthe livestock sheds. Women explained thatShankar Nagar Tola has a domestic watersupply system, but it only operates a fewhours a day and at times inconvenient forthem. In Naya Chaparrhati, most house-holds have access to hand pumps for do-mestic water, but women said that it is dif-ficult and time-consuming to pump the wa-ter for washing and cleaning, and evenmore so for feeding and watering livestock,so they prefer to use irrigation water.

Shortage of water for domestic usesand livestock is a specific problem forwomen that might have been better ad-dressed had they been more involved in theorganization. However, it is partly the inad-equacy of the domestic water supply sys-tems that induces women to use irrigationwater. Thus it is debatable whether theChhattis Mauja organization can be heldaccountable for these problems.

When discussing gender-related irriga-tion problems, many muktiyars mentionedthat night irrigation is problematic forwomen and that that topic is frequentlybrought up at meetings. But both male andfemale farmers indicated they were reluc-tant to irrigate at night, mainly out of fearof snakes. Nonetheless both women andmen accept that it is essential to irrigate atnight once in a while. Each woman or mantries to find some companion when her orhis irrigation turn is at night. It is easier,however, for women to avoid night irriga-tion because the muktiyar and male villag-ers tend to believe it is worse for a womanto do night irrigation than for a man.

Resource mobilization

Labor is mobilized in the Chhattis Mauja ir-rigation scheme for the maintenance of thehead dam, the main canal, and the villagecanal. Regular maintenance of the head damis mostly carried out during winter months,and emergency work is carried out when-ever the need to do so arises. Each mauja hasto contribute a fixed number of kularas formaintenance work. The muktiyar informsthe villagers when and where to go for main-tenance work. The number of kularas to becontributed by each household is deter-mined at the village meetings.

In case of nonparticipation or failure tocontribute the required amount of labor,penalties are levied. Offenders have to paya fine of Rs 30 per working day. Fines formthe major source of income of the executivecommittee. This income is spent for staffsalaries and construction materials. Theamount to be paid as a fine is less than theexisting wage rate for men (Rs 45 to 50 perday), which was explained by the executivecommittee chairman as a measure to ensurecash income to the Chhattis Mauja organi-

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zation—if the fines were higher, then no-body would pay them anymore.

Construction and maintenance of theirrigation scheme are male domains in theChhattis Mauja. In fact, the executive com-mittee constitution stipulates that labor foremergency maintenance and maintenanceof the head dam and the main canal canonly be contributed by men. The chief ex-planation Chhattis Mauja officeholders gavefor this rule is that women are physicallyless able to carry out construction andmaintenance activities. Women’s labor, inother words, is considered to be of lessvalue. Thus sending female laborers to domaintenance work would imply contribut-ing less, which would be unfair. Male vil-lagers also explain that male laborers, whencarrying out maintenance activities, crackjokes that embarrass women. The explana-tions that most interviewed women give fornot being allowed to contribute labor referto the social undesirability of women work-ing alongside strange men. Women fromthe middle and tail-end sections also statedthat it would be inappropriate for them tocontribute labor to maintenance of the headdam because it would require traveling andworking in places unknown to them.

In households where men work abroadfor long periods, the constitutional rule thatprohibits women from carrying out mainte-nance work implies that they either have tohire male laborers to do the work, or theyhave to pay the fine. This amounts to a largeamount of money and a large share of thetotal household income; women in middle-class and poor families said that it was diffi-cult for them to pay this fine. Some familieshave given out their land for sharecroppingonly because they could not afford to pay thefines; the sharecropper household then be-comes responsible for contributing labor tothe irrigation scheme. In other households,women make arrangements with a male

neighbor to go in their place, in return forwhich they work in the neighbor’s field.

In many maujas, however, special ar-rangements are made to accommodatehouseholds facing difficulties in complyingwith the kulara rules. In some maujas, aprovision is made for making a cash contri-bution instead of providing labor.21 Whetheror not such a provision exists depends onthe total number of kularas to be contrib-uted by the mauja in proportion to theavailability of labor. The amount to be paidis determined by the village-level commit-tee, and in the villages studied it wasaround Rs 670/ha. Who among the irrigat-ing households should be allowed to payinstead of providing labor is decided at thevillage-level meeting; it was observed thatfemale heads of farms were often given pri-ority in this decision. In one village(Pedrahani), female heads of farms wereeven allowed to pay only half as much asothers had to pay because of the recognitionof their difficulty in paying the full amount.

In West and East Kalika Nagar, both ofwhich are close to the main intake, the rulethat women should not provide labor formaintenance is not adhered to because it isimpossible to mobilize enough male laborfrom these villages (around 80% of thefarms are headed by women). Women fromthese villages do participate in the mainte-nance of the head dam. The actual construc-tion work is carried out by men, whilewomen carry the construction materials(mainly logs and wood). Because these vil-lages are close to the intake, women do nothave to travel far to contribute labor, whichmakes it easier for them to go. Another rea-son that women participate in maintenancework, despite the rule, is that many of thembelong to the Magar ethnic group. Magarwomen are often less shy and more open.Women provide around 80 to 85 percent ofthe total kularas from these villages.

21 The cash contributionsare smaller than the po-tential fines.

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It is noteworthy that for many years thevillages of Kalika Nagar and Shankar NagarTola, did not contribute any labor to themaintenance of the main canal. The ratio-nale was that maintenance in the lowerreaches of the canal would not benefit them,so they should be released from doing thiswork. After several years of conflicts, it wasdecided that these villages must provide

relatively more labor for maintenance of thehead dam. At the 1989 general assemblymeeting, a former chairman reported howdifficult it was to get head-end villages(among which is Kalika Nagar) to contrib-ute labor for scheme maintenance and re-pairs, although they receive a higher shareof water than they were entitled to.

Should Women Be More Involved in the Chhattis MaujaOrganization?

Although there are no official or writtenrules preventing women from participatingin the Chhattis Mauja organization, there isnot one female representative, muktiyar,meth muktiyar, or officeholder, nor dowomen ever attend general meetings orgeneral assembly meetings. Women’s par-ticipation at village-level meetings is verylow, and when they do attend meetingsthey are inactive. At the same time, women(at least at the head-end section of theChhattis Mauja) constitute more than half ofall users. Female members of farms that arejointly managed by men and women arevery much involved in irrigated agriculture,and there are a large number of farms en-tirely managed by women.

Performance

According to the literature on participatorymanagement of irrigation systems, all usersshould be involved in the management ofthe system for it to operate efficiently. In theChhattis Mauja setup, the prevailing genderdivision of labor underlies a division in ir-rigation-related tasks, men being primarilyresponsible for the provision of water (orga-nizing water allocation and mobilizing andproviding labor for irrigation scheme main-

tenance) and women being primarily re-sponsible for using the water in their capac-ity as farmers. In the Chhattis Mauja irriga-tion scheme (contrary to earlier studies), thegroup of users is thus not identical to thegroup of managers.

Yet, management performance does notappear to suffer a great deal from the lackof participation of the real users in manage-ment. Earlier performance assessments ofthe Chhattis Mauja claimed that, given thephysical condition of the irrigation schemeand the market conditions, the ChhattisMauja organization was doing well (Yoder1994). Yields were higher than averageyields in similar irrigated areas, and thereseemed to be little scope for increasingyields through improved water allocation.Irrigated areas or cropping intensities werenot likely to increase much even if therewas better or more irrigation. The studyalso claimed that distribution efficiency can-not be increased through better manage-ment practices.

While the present study basically con-firms the findings of this earlier perfor-mance assessment, it also reveals two po-tential areas of performance improvementin terms of distribution efficiency. The rea-son head-end villages receive more water

16

than their official entitlement is likely to berelated to the higher proportion of female-headed farms at the head end. The de-scribed case of Kalika Nagar suggests thatthe absence of the majority of the users, i.e.,women, in the organization contributes notonly to these villages using more waterthan they are entitled to, but to the prob-lems encountered in mobilizing the re-quired amount of labor from these villages.And, although a more systematic assess-ment of water delivery performance at thelevel of the mauja would be needed to es-tablish performance weaknesses at thislevel, the difficulties the muktiyars have intrying to punish women when they stealwater also suggest a potential performanceweakness, which can be attributed to thenonparticipation of female water users inthe organization.

Responsiveness of the organizationto the needs of women

According to theories related to the role ofwomen, exclusion of women from formalparticipation in decision-making bodiesconstrains women’s ability to get theirneeds accommodated. In the ChhattisMauja, the opposite is true. Women, al-though they are entirely excluded from for-mal management, succeed in getting theirirrigation needs accommodated.

Women, including female heads offarms, see no need for formal participationin the organization and completely lack in-terest in it. Their inconsequential positionrelative to the organization is based on anideology that gives little importance towomen in terms of their contributions tothe provision of household food and in-come or in terms of their involvement incommunity matters and politics. Women areseen to be dependent on their husbands for

survival and in need of support and protec-tion from men. Although this ideology nei-ther reflects reality nor the way in whichmost women perceive themselves, it doesimply that social transaction costs of partici-pating in meetings are higher for womenthan for men, while at the same time theeffectiveness of meetings for women is less.It is far more effective and less time-con-suming for women to personally meet withthe village muktiyar whenever they have aproblem.

It is probably because they are not for-mal members of the Chhattis Mauja organi-zation that women succeed so well in get-ting their irrigation needs accommodated.The same ideology that prevents them fromformally participating in the organizationenables female heads of farms to reducetheir contributions to the maintenance ofthe scheme, without risking a reduction inthe amount of water they receive. Female-headed households are allowed to paysmaller irrigation fees, but women areamong the first to receive water, and theysteal water without being noticed or pun-ished. Women’s short-term interests withrespect to irrigation are thus not served bychallenging the prevailing gender ideologynor by promoting their formal participationin the organization.

Future scenario

At present, the inability to control thebranch canals that have a large number offemale-headed farms is a source of irritationto the Chhattis Mauja organization, but itdoes not undermine the efficiency of thescheme’s operations. The number of defacto female-headed farms is, as yet, a rela-tively small percentage of the scheme’sfarms, which makes it possible to allowthem special favors. However, if the num-

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ber of de facto female-headed farms in-creases, the absence of women in the orga-nization may very well become a threat tothe sustainability of the scheme.

When analyzing livelihood strategies ofhouseholds, it becomes clear that irrigatedagriculture is heavily subsistence-oriented.Rather than aiming to produce agriculturalsurpluses for generating household income,households increasingly seek and rely onoff-farm incomes. This trend is accompa-nied by a shift from labor to capital as theorganizing principle of the internal socialrelations of the family farm. This shift isstructured by gender relations; men pre-dominantly seek off-farm employment andnonagricultural businesses and enterprises,while women become increasingly respon-sible for farming. As the importance of irri-gated agriculture in terms of its contribu-tions to a household’s livelihood decreases,it is likely to become more and more the re-sponsibility and domain of women.

The fact that many parents stronglysupport and push their sons to get a goodeducation so that they can find well-paidjobs outside agriculture contributes to thistrend. Rather than investing in agriculture(buying land, livestock, or agriculturalimplements) parents prefer to invest in theeducation of their children, giving first pri-ority to sons. Some families even sell all or

part of their land to pay for the educationof their children or to cover the expenses oftheir sons’ travels abroad. This trend maylead households that succeed in findinggood sources of off-farm employment toabandon agriculture altogether. It may alsobe, however, that they will try to maintain afoothold in agriculture, leaving it to bemanaged by women.

If this happens, it will probably be nec-essary to formally involve women in theChhattis Mauja organization for it to con-tinue to effectively enforce the rules andregulations regarding water allocation andresource mobilization. Female farmers arelikely to become more interested in beinginvolved when problems related to a higherincidence of free-riders or to a low mobili-zation of resources for maintenance becomemore apparent.

Mobilization of labor for maintenanceprobably will become more difficult becauseof the decreased availability of male labor.Parallel to the shift from labor to capital inthe intra-household organization of irri-gated production, a shift to mobilizing cashinstead of labor for irrigation scheme main-tenance may occur. As a consequence, cashinvestments in scheme improvements to re-duce maintenance requirements that cur-rently seem economically unjustifiable maybecome attractive.

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19

ANNEX

Methodology

Data for this study were collectedthrough participant observation and re-peated in-depth interviews with a smallnumber of households in two head-end vil-lages in the Chhattis Mauja irrigationscheme (nine households in Shankar NagarTola and eight households in NayaChaparrhati). These are villages with a rela-tively large number of de facto female-headed farms. Most people in these villagesbelong to the lahure group of hill migrants,who settled in Chhattis Mauja quite re-cently (1970s). They purchased land in thecommand area of the Chhattis Mauja withmoney earned mostly through employmentof male household members in the Britishor Indian army. The “early” hill migrants,the lahure migrants, and the original inhab-itants (Tharu) of the Chhattis Mauja are so-cially three quite distinct groups. Many ofthe male members in the villages studiedare quite well-to-do (because of their armysalaries and pensions) and many are politi-cally influential. The number of samplehouseholds for the in-depth interviews andparticipant observation was as follows:

Shankar NayaNagar Tola Chaparrhati

Rich 1 2Middle 6 4Poor 2 2

Each sample was taken so as to includeat least two households headed by womenin each village. In Shankar Nagar Tola, one

female-headed household belonged to therich category and one to the middle class; inNaya Chaparrhati one belonged to themiddle and one to the poor category ofhouseholds. These households were all vis-ited at least once a week over a period of 6months, either in the house or in the fields.All of the examples and qualitative state-ments are derived from this part of the study.Two group discussions were organized withfemale farmers of the two villages to iden-tify and explore their irrigation-related prob-lems. A few long qualitative interviews werealso held with farmers (men and women) insurrounding villages (Shankar Nagar Tola,Kalika Nagar, Purbi Shankar Nagar, andPedrahani) and with irrigation leaders.

To cross-check and validate the infor-mation obtained, a survey was held to-wards the end of the study in three differ-ent villages (annex table 1). These villageswere selected to represent the head, middle,and tail sections of the Chhattis Maujascheme. Purbi Shankar Nagar, a settlementconsisting of lahure hill migrants was cho-sen in the head end; Madrahani, a commu-nity that consists predominantly of originalinhabitants of the area (Tharus) was se-lected in the mid-region; and Semara waschosen to represent the tail end. The totalnumber of respondents for the three vil-lages included in this “single-shot” surveywas 128. However, this report focuses pri-marily on the head-end village; thus thedata given in the text refer to Purbi Shankar

20

Nagar only.

ANNEX TABLE 1.Characteristics of rich, middle-class, and poor households (as classified by villagers) in the threesurvey villages—located at the head, middle, and tail end of the Chhattis Mauja irrigation scheme.

House- Average Buy Sell rice Off-farm OwnVillage holds landholding food or maize employmentb improved cattlelocationa (no.) (ha) (%) (%) (%) (%)

Rich

Head 9 1.14 0 67 56 67Middle 10 2.35 0 100 30 10Tail 5 4.02 20 80 60 0

Middle class

Head 16 0.34 44 10 56 25Middle 15 0.80 20 73 33 0Tail 18 1.01 17 39 77 0

Poor

Head 13 0.12 29 0 8 7Middle 20 0.47 90 0 40 0Tail 22 1.34 53 0 44 0

21

a Head-end village: Purbi Shankar Nagar. Middle village: Madrahani. Tail-end village: Semara.b One or more males employed off-farm.

Literature Cited

Hulsebosch, Joitske, and Doris Ombara. 1995. Towards gender balance in irrigation management: Experiencesin Kenya South West Kano Project. Irrigation and Drainage Systems 9:1–14.

Illo, Jean Frances I. 1988. Irrigation in the Philippines: Impact on women and their households. The Aslong Projectcase. Bangkok: The Population Council.

Pradhan, Prachandra. 1983. Community irrigation systems case study: Chhattis Mauja irrigation system. InWater management in Nepal: Proceedings of the seminar on water management issues held in Kathmandu, 31 July to2 August. Kathmandu: His Majesty’s Government of Nepal, Agricultural Projects Service Center /Agricul-tural Development Council.

Schrevel, Aart. 1989. Indonesia’s irrigation sector: Some preliminary conclusions from a socio-economic per-spective. In Organization and participation in southeast Asian irrigation systems, ed. Geert Kalshoven, Nenita E.Tapay, and Aart Schrevel. Wageningen Sociologische Studies 25. Wageningen, Netherlands: AgriculturalUniversity.

Shresta, Ratna Sansar, and Nirmal Kumar Sharma. 1987. A comparative study of farmer-managed and agency-managed irrigation systems. In Irrigation management in Nepal: Research papers from a national seminar. Bharatpur,Nepal, 4-6 June, 1987. Kathmandu: International Irrigation Management Institute.

Vermillion, Douglas L. 1991. The turnover and self-management of irrigation institutions in developing countries.Colombo: International Irrigation Management Institute.

Whatmore, Sarah. 1991. Farming women: Gender, work and family enterprise. London: MacMillan Academic andProfessional Ltd.

Yoder, Robert. 1994. Organization and management by farmers in the Chhattis Mauja Irrigation System, Nepal. Co-lombo: International Irrigation Management Institute.

Zwarteveen, Margreet Z. 1994. Gender issues, water issues: A gender perspective to irrigation management. WorkingPaper No. 32. Colombo: International Irrigation Management Institute.

Research Reports

1. The New Era of Water Resources Management: From “Dry” to “Wet” Water Savings.David Seckler, 1996.

2. Alternative Approaches to Cost Sharing for Water Service to Agriculture in Egypt.C. J. Perry, 1996.

3. Integrated Water Resource Systems: Theory and Policy Implications. Andrew Keller,Jack Keller, and David Seckler, 1996.

4. Results of Management Turnover in Two Irrigation Districts in Colombia: Douglas L.Vermillion, and Carlos Gracés-Restrepo, 1996.

5. The IIMI Water Balance Framework: A Model for Project Level Analysis. C. J. Perry, 1996.

6. Water and Salinity Balances for Irrigated Agriculture in Pakistan. Jacob W. Kijne, 1996.

7. Free-Riders or Victims: Women’s Nonparticipation in Irrigation Management in Nepal’sChhattis Mauja Irrigation Scheme. Margreet Zwarteveen, and Nita Neupane, 1996.