Panchayati Raj and the decentralisation of rural development in independent India

The long period of colonial subjection with its adverse effect on India’s economy made development one of the most urgent tasks. While the federal states were to a large extent enabled to devise and implement autonomous development policies, the centre also took up various initiatives aimed at optimising the use of resources in the localities. One of these initiatives, whose gradual evolution spanned over more than fifty years, is the establishment of village and district boards resulting in the so-called Panchayati Raj, i.e. a system of government by ‘committees of five’ acting as intersection nodes between locality, state and centre. The panchayat system has come to represent one of the salient features of the indian state promoting the active participation of all citizens in its economic and democratic life.