Panchayati Raj System And Community Development In India

Abstract

The Panchayati Raj in India generally refers to the system introduced by constitutional amendment in 1992, although it is based upon the traditional panchayat system of South Asia. The modern panchayati raj and its gram panchayats are not to be confused with the extra-constitutional khap panchayats (or caste panchayats) found in some parts of northern India. While the panchayati raj system was formalized in 1992, leading up to that change, a few Indian committees studied various ways of implementing more decentralized administration. Mahatma Gandhi advocated panchayati raj as the foundation of India's political system, it would have been a decentralized form of government where each village would be responsible for its own affairs. The term for such a vision was Gram Swaraj ("village self-governance"). Instead, India developed a highly centralized form of government. However, this has been moderated by the delegation of several administrative functions to the local level, empowering elected gram panchayats. There are significant differences between (1) the traditional panchayati raj system, (2) that envisioned by Gandhi, and (3) the system formalized in India in 1992.