Accusing the State government of curtailing the powers of the Zilla Panchayat, Taluk Panchayat and Gram Panchayats, the panchayat members laid siege to the ZP office, here on Monday and staged a protest.
The leaders Devaraj, Kolala Krishnamurthy and others who spoke said, the State government was trying to tar the decentralisation system and the three stages of administration.
In the Panchayat Raj system there were three stages of elected representatives and each had their own powers. But the State government was  interfering in the system and trying to return the powers to the legislators. Already this decision has already been passed in the Cabinet and sent to the Governor for approval.
But the Governor had returned it without signing it. He has asked them to once again look into the issue. Keeping all these issues in focus, it is very clear that the government was interfering, they said.
According to the present arrangement, the Ashraya houses should be distributed at the gram panchayat level after holding gram sabha meetings. But this has been given a go by and instead there is an understanding that the committees will be formed under the leadership of the legislators and beneficiaries identified.
The panchayat members shouted slogans opposing this stand.
They also accused that it was an injustice done to the three tier decentralisation system to appoint the legislators for overseeing the distribution of grants to the students hostels and students appointment committees.
Similarly another example of interference is giving powers to the legislators for the selection of anganwadi workers when it should actually be done through the taluk panchayat.
Likewise setting up the Rural Road Development Corporation to please the legislators and in turn they giving contracts to the first grade contractors to take up road works is by getting the approval of the Cabinet is also illegal, they criticised.
By doing this the rural areas will be deprived of roads and they will be put to lot of trouble. Besides the main aim of this is to curtail the powers of the Zilla Panchayat, they charged.
If the government is so much concerned about the rural and district roads then we will have no objection if the MLAs local area development fund for which they are being given special grants are used and if the State government itself also supplements it by collecting sufficient grants and through them develop the roads, they said.
But we oppose the move of the State government  to curtail the powers of the panchayat members, they said.
The protesters warned that if the government did not heed to their demands they would tender mass resignations and intensify their agitation.
Later, they sent a memorandum to the Governor.