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Gandhi’s Concept of Gram Swaraj and Decentralised Governance in Contemporary India: Relevance in the Post-Pandemic Era
Author(s): Aggya PandeyaAbstract
Gram Swaraj is a unique approach to decentralised village self-governance whereby political power economic functions and social responsibilities have strong linkages with the needs of the local community. While Swaraj can be viewed only as political independence of a country Gandhi defined it as the ability of the ordinary citizens to actively participate in making decisions which affect them. Institutionalisation of the Panchayati Raj due to the passage of the 73rd Constitutional Amendment created an institution for local self-governance even though the degree of devolution was different in different states. In turn the COVID-19 pandemic drew additional attention to the necessity of responsive local institutions in ensuring welfare providing essential services supporting vulnerable groups of the population and organising a response at the community level. This paper is aimed at analysing the significance of Gram Swaraj in the contemporary context on the basis of such themes as participatory governance self-reliance of the locals social inclusion rural development and institutional accountability. In particular it will be analysed whether Gandhian decentralisation remains important in the post-pandemic environment as resilient governance implies the existence of accessible participatory and responsive institutions.