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Public Authority in a Developing Political Community: The Case of India

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  28 July 2009

Reinhard Bendix
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Since World War II, 54 former colonial or dependent territories have become independent states. Most of them, perhaps all, face the task of building a political community. In the context of the twentieth century that task is a by-product of national sovereignty and hence of the idea of a national community of citizens, first launched by the French Revolution and diffused throughout the world ever since.

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In quest of political participation
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European Journal of Sociology / Archives Européennes de Sociologie , Volume 4 , Issue 1 , May 1963 , pp. 39 - 85
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Copyright © Archives Européenes de Sociology 1963

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References

(1) In the 1951 Census a judgment of borderline cases was made so that some habitations with less [than 5,000 people but definite urban characteristics were included among cities and towns, while some definitely rural communities with more than 5,000 people were classified as villages. These criteria have been altered somewhat in the 1961 Census, but this need not concern us.

(2) See Report of the All-India Educational Survey (Delhi, Ministry of Education, Government of India, 1960), pp. 160, 163–165.Google Scholar Aside from some outlying areas this survey does not cover the state of West-Bengal (see ibid. pp. 15–16) so that figures based on this survey always understate the case. However, the survey is a very scholarly inventory of educational, facilities, and since it was undertaken with a view to assess India's position with reference to the goal of universal elementary education, it also provides a comprehensive inventory of rural and urban settlements.

(3) Enrollment of boys varied between a low of 69 per cent and a high of 100 per cent (with the average at 81.5 per cent) while that of girls varied from a low of 15 per cent to a high of 100 per cent, with the average at 40 per cent. The State of Kerala has 100 per cent primary school Enrollment for both boys and girls, but this is an exception which tends to distort the picture. See First Year Book of Education (New Delhi, National Council of Educational Research, 1961), p. 930Google Scholar for a detailed tabuwhile lation of these figures.

(4) For evidence that at the cultural level a network of communications existed through the Indian countryside, cf. Cohn, Bernard S. and Marriott, McKim, «Networks and Centres in the Integration of Indian Civilization, Journal of Social Research, I (Ranchi, Bihar, 1958), pp. 1–9Google Scholar, and Marriott, McKim, «Changing Channels of Cultural Transmission in Indian Civilization», in Vidyarthi, L. P., ed., Aspects of Religion in Indian Society (Meerut, Kedar Nath Ram Nath, 1961), pp. 13–25Google Scholar and the references cited there. The implications of this cultural communications-network for the distribution of power still need to be explored.

(5) See India, A Reference Annual, 1961 (Delhi, Publication Division, Ministry of Information and Broadcasting, 1961), PP. 359–360.Google Scholar For the average number of settlements per 100 square miles see All India Educational Survey, p. 177.Google Scholar

(6) For the figures on post-offices and literacy, cf. India, 1961, pp. 368, 392 and 559.Google Scholar Figures on past electrification are contained in India, 1962, p. 275.Google Scholar In this latest edition of the Reference Annual the number of broadcast licenses is given as 2,245,548 (p. 144), but it is not known what proportion of this total refers to the use of radios in villages.

(7) See India, 1962, p. 184.Google Scholar Percentages calculated on population estimates for 1961.

(8) Figures are taken from Report on the Second General Elections in India, 1957 (Delhi, Election Commission, 1959), I, pp. 33, 35, 142, 156 and 211.Google Scholar Figures for the 1962 election are based on press-releases of the Press Information Bureau, Government of India.

(9) To achieve a 47.5 per cent (in 1957) voting participation in a population that has a literacy rate of 23.7 per cent is remarkable enough. What is even more noteworthy is the fact that in the 1957 elections voting participation in the rural areas exceeded participation in the urban areas in 7 out of 17 States and Territories. See ibid. II, p. 95. Western experience with parliamentary elections would lead one to expect an excess of urban over rural voting-participation. Two reasonable explanations for this characteristic of Indian elections are that in the rural areas elections are welcome, almost festive interruptions of routine and that the ability of local leaders to enforce participation is great in view of their considerable personal control over the villagers. The two explanations are not necessarily incompatible.

(10) Examples of the Brahmin's legal position are given in U.S. Sarkar, , Epochs in Hindu Legal History (Hoshiapur, Vishveshvaranand Vedic Research Institute, 1958) esp. pp. 78–79Google Scholar and the references listed under “Criminal Law” in the Index. The significance of the literary upgrading of Brahmin dominance in contrast to the actual diversity of criteria of dominance has been emphasized by Beteille, André, The Dominant Caste in Indian SocietyGoogle Scholar (unpublished manuscript, Department of Sociology, University of Delhi). I am indebted to Professor M. N. Srinivas for the opportunity to examine this valuable study.

(11) See Duncan, J., Derrett, M., “The Administration of Hindu Law by the British”, Comparative Studies in Society and History, IV (1961), p. 32 n. 83Google Scholar and p. 33 n. 89 for the source of these state ments as well as Derrett's incisive characterization (on pp. 32–34) of the overall rigidities which resulted.

(12) Quoted in Ballhatchet, Kenneth, Social Policy and Social Change in Western India London, Oxford University Press, 1957), P. 250.Google Scholar Fuller documentation on the British approach is contained in the studies by Eric Stokes and George Bearce.

(13) Cf. Tangri, Shanti S., “Intellectuals and Society in Nineteenth Century India”, Comparative Studies in Society and History, III (1961), p. 369 and passim.Google Scholar

(14) See Bagehot, Walter, The English Constitution (London, Oxford University Press, 1958), pp. 263–264.Google Scholar

(15) Contrast in this respect Bagehot, 's argument, op. cit. p. 271Google Scholar and passim where the fear of the ordinary man is expressed unequivocally, with Max Weber's astringent observations on the incorrigible probity of German social democrats despite their radical language. See Weber, Max, Gesammelte Politische Schriften (Tübingen, Mohr, 1958)Google Scholar, page-references under “Sozial demokratie” in the index.

(16) See Schumpeter, Joseph, Capitalism, Socialism and Democracy (New York, Harper, 1950), pp. 134–139.Google Scholar

(17) Cf. Schumpeter's comment in ibid. p. 147 who emphasizes “the absence of direct responsibility for practical affairs” as the distinguishing characteristic of intellectuals, but without noting also that this characteristic is itself a by-product of the industrial order in Europe. In another sense it can, of course, be maintained that Western European intellectuals have been preoccupied ever since their emergence during the eighteenth century with the cultural repercussions of industrialization and democracy and in this sense have shown a considerable sense of responsibility. Cf. the analysis of this preoccupation in Lowenthal, Leo and Fiske, Marjorie, “The Debate over Art and Popular Culture in eighteenth century England”, in Komarovsky, Mirra, ed., Common Frontiers of the Social Sciences (Glencoe, The Free Press, 1957), pp. 33–112.Google Scholar But this concern involves the values of “high culture” and is in part responsible for the fact that European intellectuals were ill-suited to “represent” interest groups or the “public interest” in the more ordinary sense of these words. An interesting compilation of frictions between intellectuals and the workers they sought to represent, is contamed in Brin, Hennoch, Zur Akademiker und Intellektuellenfrage in der Arbeiter bewegung (Ph. D. dissertation, University of Basel, 1928).Google Scholar

(18) The application of these considerations to the Indian context must, of course, take into account that during British rule an independent, political community was still to be created. My discussion is indebted to the analysis of Fraenkel, Ernst, Die repräsentative und die plebiszitäre Komponente im demokratischen Verfassungsstaat, Recht und Staat, Heft 219–220 (Tubingen, Mohr, 1958).Google Scholar The most comprehensive analysis of the relevant literature is contained in Habermas, Jurgen, Strukturwandel der Öffentlichkeit (Neuwied, Luchterhand, 1962).Google Scholar

(19) For a general review of this social distance in its several dimensions see McCully, B. T., English Education and the Origins of Indian Nationalism (New York, Columbia University Press, 1940), chapter iv.Google Scholar

(20) In commenting on India at the time of the mutiny Tocqueville speculated that it had been the aloofness of English officers and administrators which had triggered that revolt. But he observed also—with an eye as much to Algeria as to India—that native feeling was likely to be aroused by foreign settlers rather than by a foreign government, especially if it man ages well. “Government by foreigners is opposed”, he said, “only to national feelings, which are weak. The foreign settler injures, or appears to injure, in a thousand ways, private interests which are strong”. One wonders whether this observation is not indeed a clue to the manifest differences between English and French colonial rule, See De Tocqueville, Alexis, Memoirs, Letters and Remains (Boston, Ticknor & Fields, 1862), II, pp. 398–399, 401–402Google Scholar for the text of these letters to Henry Reeve and Lord Hatherton.

(21) Ranade, M. G., Miscellaneous Writings (Bombay, Manoranjan Press, 1915), p. 124.Google Scholar I owe this and the following reference to Mr. D. K. Bedekar who cites them in his instructive essay “Must Social Reform Precede Political Reform?” in Poona University Teachers' Social Sciences Seminar, Thought Currents in Maharashtra, 1850–1920 (mimeographed, Poona, 1962), pp. 103–114.Google Scholar

(22) Mankar, G. A., The Late Mr. Justice Ranade (Bombay, 1902), pp. 109–110Google Scholar cited in Bedekar, , op. cit. pp. 108–109.Google ScholarTelang, K. T. (1850–1893)Google Scholar was another Maharashtrian reformer.

(23) A highly informative study of these disagreements is contained in Wolpert, Stanley A., Tilak and Gokhale: Revolution and Reform in the Making of Modern India (Berkeley, University of California Press, 1962).Google Scholar These two leaders stood for the “nativist” and the “assimilationist” program of political action. The parallel with the controversies in nineteenth century Russia between Slavophils and Westernizers is obvious and striking.

(24) I am indebted for this information moto the unpublished study of Beteille, André, The Dominant Caste in Indian SocietyGoogle Scholar, cited previously.

(25) The emulation of higher-caste practices by lower castes has been called “sanskritization” by M. N. Srinivas. For the original exposition of this much discussed process cf. Srinivas, M. N., Caste in Modern India and Others Essays (Bombay, Asia Publishing House, 1962), ch. II. Cf.Google Scholar also Gould, Harold A., “Sanskritization and Westernization”, Economic Weekly (06 1961), pp. 945–950Google Scholar who suggests that Westernization is as much a means of motobility for Brahmins as sanskritization for non-Brahmins. It should be remembered, however, that in the course of time social mobility changes in its terms of reference. If it be true that during the nineteenth century non-Brahmin castes strove to raise their status through “sanscussed kritization”, this resulted in part from the fact that they could not aspire to Westernization or to jobs under the contro of the British. It may be, however, that since Independence the terms of reference have changed once more.

(26) Gandhi, Mahatma, An Autobiography, The Story of My Experiments with Truth (Boston, Beacon Press, 1957), p. 393.Google Scholar

(27) This formulation seeks to take account of Gandhi's distinguishing characteristics, rather than merely apply the term “charismatic leadership” which would not do justice to the complexities of Gandhi's political role. The phrase “exemplary leader” is modelled after Weber, Max's “exemplary prophecy”Google Scholar since the appeal through exemplary conduct is the same in both; but Gandhi steadfastly denied that he was a prophet, even though the people treated him as if he was. So far as I know the conceptually most differentiated study of Gandhi is that of Mühlmann, W. E., Mahatma Gandhi, eine Untersuchung zur Religionssoziologie und politischen Ethik (Tubingen, Mohr, 1950).Google Scholar

(28) Gandhi, , op. cit. p. 390.Google Scholar

(29) See Mühlmann, , op. cit. pp. 267–268.Google Scholar

(30) Gandhi, , op. cit. p. 379Google Scholar and Mühlmann, , op. cit. p. 241.Google Scholar

(31) Third Five Year Plan, p. 276.Google Scholar

(32) Ibid. p. 277.

(33) Ibid. pp. 291–292.

(34) Systematic surveys of social and civic activities of caste-organizations are lacking so far. However, a good beginning is contained in Gadgil, D. R., Poona, A Socio-Econamic Survey (Poona, Gokhale Institute of Politics and Economics, 1952), II, pp. 172–222Google Scholar. Also, the Association of Voluntary Agencies for Rural Development is initiating a national survey of voluntary effort. See Avard, News Letter, IV (01–02 1962), pp. 31–32Google Scholar. The most comprehensive survey of caste-politics is contained in Harrison, Selig, India, The Most Dangerous Decades (Princeton, Princeton University Press, 1960)CrossRefGoogle Scholar, passim, but many graphic details are also discussed in Srinivas, M. N., Caste in Modern India, op. cit.Google Scholar esp. chapters I, VI, and VII. See also the discussion in Weiner, Myron, The Politics of Scarcity (Chicago, University of Chicago Press, 1962)Google Scholar, chapters II and III.

(35) It has been estimated that with over 80% of the population rural, public and private investment in agriculture and community development came to 12% of total investment during the Second Plan Period, while 44% of total investment went into organized industry, minerals, transport and communications. See Third Five Year Plan, p. 59.Google Scholar

(36) See Administrative Intelligence Unit, Important Figures at a Glance (mimeographed release, Ministry of Community Development and Cooperation, 03 31, 1961), p. 4.Google Scholar

(37) Under the Third Five Year Plan emphasis is to be shifted, as between agricultural production and community development. This shift is reflected in the personnel requirements envisaged during the Plan period, namely 29,558 additional Village Level Workers and 18,537 additional extension officers. Compared with the number currently employed under these two categories, Village Level Workers are reduced by one-seventh, while extension officers are increased by one-half. See Third Five Year Plan, p. 177Google Scholar. The averages given in the text result when the totals of currently employed and planned VLW's and extension officers are divided by the 5,223 Blocks into which the country has been divided. There are some other categories of officials employed under this program (like Block Development Officers at the top of the local hierarchy or social education organizers), which have not been considered in these rough calculations.

(38) For further details cf. Committee on Plan Projects, Report of the Team for the Study of Community Projects and National Extension Service (New Delhi, 1957), II, pp. 37–40Google Scholar. Cited below as Mehta Report, after Balvantray G. Mehta, the chairman of the study committee charged with the task of evaluating community development and national extension.

(39) Cf. the criticism by Prime MinisterNehru, in Kurukshetra, A Symposium (Delhi, Ministry of Community Development and Cooperation, 1961), p. 318Google Scholar. (The title of this volume is also the title of a periodical, edited and published by the Ministry; the articles contained in this volume are taken from this periodical. New editions of the symposium are published from time to time.) A review of the whole program in 1958 came to the conclusion that the extension of coverage was still proceeding faster than was compatible with an intensive development of the rural economy. See U. N. Commissioner for Technical Assistance, Report of a Community Development Evaluation Mission in India, 1958–1959 (Delhi, Government of India, Ministry of Community Development and Cooperation, n. d.), pp. 7–9Google Scholar. Cited below as U. N. Report.

(40) Kurukshetra, pp. 61–62.Google Scholar

(41) Ibid. p. 60.

(42) Ibid. p. 59.

(43) Ibid. p. 60.

(44) For a telling expression of this view cf. Morale in the Public Services (Report of a Conference, 01 3–4, 1959Google Scholar, Deshmukh, C. D., Chairman; New Delhi, Indian Institute of Public Administration), p. 17.Google Scholar

(45) See Ibid. pp. 75, 127 for comments along these lines by Indians directly associated with rural development work.

(46) U. N. Report, pp. 41–42, 48Google Scholar; Kurukshetra, pp. 126, 198, 389Google Scholar. A vivid description of the task of development work at the local level is contained in Dube, S. C., India's Changing Villages (London, Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1958), pp. 192 ffGoogle Scholar. See also Mehta Report, II, pp. 126–145.Google Scholar

(47) See Mehta Report, I, p. 4Google Scholar which states that welfare activities have been emphasized more than economic development. For specific examples of this emphasis and also of excessive expenditures for the more easily achieved objectives like construction of Block headquarters, etc., cf. Mehta Report, IGoogle Scholar, passim and U. N. Report, pp. 14, 21–2–3, 48–50Google Scholar. These emphases are clearly reflected in the frequently repeated admonition that “the people must be allowed to make mistakes”. (E. g. Kurukshetra, p. 173.)Google Scholar Presumably this means that frequently they have not been permitted to make the costly and time consuming mistakes that would have to be tolerated, if local officials are to encourage but also await the articulation of local wants and desires which presumably requires some trial and error. But in a national emergency it is difficult to allow public cooperation to emerge at its own pace, especially if development-officials depend for their own careers upon their demonstrated ability to get things done. The fact seems to be that the construction of facilities and amenities is more easily accomplished than extension services to increase agricultural production, since it requires less public cooperation.

(48) See Ramachandran, G., “Gandhian Approach to Rural Welfare”, in Planning Commission, Social Welfare in India (New Delhi, Government of India, 1960), pp. 87–88Google Scholar. New editions of this work appear from time to time.

(49) In its report of 1959 the U. N. Mission refers to the caste system as one of the major causes of stagnation in the rural sector. The traditional land tenure system has favored a class of land owners, who spend little or none of their rents on land improvements, while the lower castes are generally not in a position to purchase land and grow commercial crops. Other factors cited are the erosion of the land due to uncontrolled cultivation, extension of cultivation to marginal or submarginal lands due to population pressure, the persistence of money lending, share-cropping and the fragmentation of land-holdings. In one way or another, many of these factors are also related to caste. See U. N. Report, p. 20.Google Scholar

(50) See Krishnamachari, V. T., “The National Extension Movement”, Kurukshetra, op. cit. p. 35Google Scholar, for an expression of these objectives by the former Deputy Chairman of the Planning Commission.

(51) Ibid. p. 27.

(52) Ibid. pp. 173, 240.

(53) Ibid. p. 176.

(54) Ibid. P. 204.

(55) Mehta Report, I, pp. 43–44 and II, pp. 57–58Google Scholar.

(56) The figures also reveal that in the First Five Year Plan government expenditures for agricultural development were relatively high and have regained this earlier high level only in 1958–1959. These fluctuations reflect the fact that the major emphasis on the industrial sector began with the Second Plan. The inference that public cooperation would have continued at a high level if government expenditures in the rural sector had remained high also, fails to take account of the difference between public elation following independence and the inevitably lessened psychological involvement in the Second Plan period.

(57) Another 24 per cent assigned that responsibility to “other institutions” and the meaning of this response is unclear, except that no one in this study seems to have considered “beneficiaries” responsible as individuals. The percentages add up to more than 100 since more than one response was possible. Cf. Mehta Report, II, pp. 96–98, 114.Google Scholar

(58) That excess is especially noteworthy in populist phrases like the “giant potential” or the “limitless capacity” which have been freely attributed to the people. Cf. Kurukshetra, pp. 27, 399Google Scholar and passim. For a listing of the physical achievements of the community development program cf. India, 1961, pp. 209–210.Google Scholar

(59) Lest I be misunderstood I should add that the rhetoric of unity is often associated with denunciation of the caste system. But when the public's creative potential is declared to be great if only the state will lend a hand, then the people are urged to avail themselves of the great benefits which are theirs for the taking, and the obstructions arising from the caste-system are significantly omitted. By such omissions the fact of caste is not brought into direct confrontation with the people's creative potential, which is also treated as a fact. See below for further discussion especially with reference to the rule of unanimity in local elections or deliberations.

(60) Mehta Report, II, p. 103.Google Scholar

(61) Ibid. I, p. 5.

(62) For a survey of some of these changes cf. the essay “The Industrialization and Urbanization of Rural Areas”, by Srinivas, M. N., Caste in Modern IndiaGoogle Scholar, chapter v. However, evidence for this “urban impact” on the rural areas must be considered together with evidence showing that in many instances such impact is tenuous and superficial. See Lambert, Richard, “The Impact of Urban Society upon Village Life”, in Turner, Roy, ed., India's Urban Future (Berkeley, University of California Press, 1962), pp. 117–140.Google Scholar

(63) U. N. Report, pp. 49–50.Google Scholar

(64) Taylor, Carl, “Two Major Evils”, in Kurukshetra, p. 396Google Scholar. For several years Dr Taylor has been advisor on community development to the Ford Foundation and the Indian Government.

(65) Kurukshetra, pp. 28–29.Google Scholar

(66) Ibid. p. 26. This statement may stand for many of its kind; I choose it because of its clarity. From a policy-standpoint the same points are made in a statement by Tarlok Singh (Additional Secretary, Planning Commission), “Planning at the Village Level”, Ibid. pp. 134–135.

(67) Ibid. pp. 17, 19, 20, 23, 32, 70–71 and passim.

(68) Ibid. p. 32. Note in this connection the recent statement by S. K. Dey, Union Minister for Community Development, Panchayati Raj and Cooperation, according to which village democracy should be safeguarded from the pressures of power politics. Though admitting that it would be difficult to isolate Panchayat work from the activities of political parties, Mr Dey said: “What we want to avoid is power politics”, adding that there could be no objection to “good politics”. See Economic Weekly, XIV (07 1962), p. 1106.Google Scholar

(69) Kurukshetra, p. 332.Google Scholar

(70) The plea for an organization representing the whole village and the statement concerning the administrative approach are contained in Tarlok Singh's statement of 1954 (ibid. p. 134). The statement concerning unanimity and supporting arguments appear on p. 339 and passim of the Third Fine Year Plan.

(71) Third Five Year Plan, p. 334.Google Scholar

(72) Singh, Tarlok, op. cit. p. 134Google Scholar. Cf. also the statement by Raghubir Sahai in 1959 which declares that “we are woefully lacking in this kind of non-official element at each and every level” (Kurukshetra, p. 354).Google Scholar

(73) Report of the Backward Classes Commission (Delhi, Government of India Press, 1956), I, p. ivGoogle Scholar. This commission was appointed pursuant to Article 340 of the Constitution authorizing the president to initiate an investigation of the conditions of socially and educationally backward classes. These classes are distinct from the scheduled castes (untouchables) and tribes which are provided for separately in the Constitution and the government.

(74) The Planning Commission set up a “Public Cooperation Division” which was authorized to give grants to the Bharat Sevak Samaj (Indian Service Society), a nonpolitical and nonofficial organization that seeks to secure public participation in the work of the Five Year Plans. In 1958 the Bharat Sevak Samaj was invited to set up on an experimental basis Lok Karya Kshetras (areas especially designated for the purpose of enlisting cooperation). Through these special organizations voluntary labor and local resources were to be used to assist in local programs of development, to create popular enthusiasm for the plan-programs, to draw out promising young workers from the masses and to strengthen local institutions like panchayats and cooperatives. For a period of three years each of these Kshetras would receive Rs. 5,000 per annum. See Programme Evaluation Organization, Planning Commission, A Study of the Lok Karya Kshetras of the Bharat Sevak Samaj (New Delhi, Government of India, 1960), p. 1.Google Scholar

(75) Of the Rs. 50 million set aside for “public cooperation” in the Second Five Year Plan only Rs. 150,000 were actually spent. See Planning Commission (Public Cooperation Division), Summary Record of the Meeting of the National Advisory Committee on Public Cooperation (08 1960)Google Scholar, passim.

(76) Mehta Report, I, p. 5.Google Scholar

(77) Ibid. p. 7.

(78) Ibid. pp. 47, 64. No cross-tabulations are available but it may be presumed under the circumstances that there were more affirmative than negative responses among the “knowledgable” respondents, and vice versa.

(79) Ibid. p. 9. These considerations may be read together with the findings of a study in Rajasthan which shows that the percentage of unanimous Panchayat elections ranged from a high of 76 per cent in one district to a low of 6 per cent in another and that the decline in the proportion of unanimous elections is correlated with the increase in the population covered by each panchayat. The report “explains” this correlation by the greater homogeneity and the more limited number of candidates in the smaller constituencies, but it is probable that pressure tactics and personal dependence are at least equally important, especially in view of the fact that 52 per cent of the electorate was indebted not only for death feasts and marriages but for food, clothing and medicine. See Evaluation Organization (Cabinet Secretariat), A Report on the Panchayat Elections in Rajasthan (Jaipur, Government of Rajasthan, 1961), pp. 7, 19–20.Google Scholar

(80) P.E.O., A Study of Panchayat, pp. 24–25.Google Scholar

(81) See Karve, D. G., ed., The Pattern of Rural Government (New Delhi, Indian Institute of Public Administration, 1958), p. 58.Google Scholar

(82) Both are statements by V. T. Krishnamachari, former Deputy-Chairman of the Planning Commission. See his inaugural address in Karve, , op. cit. p. 21Google Scholar and the quotation from his address to the 1961 Conference on Community Development in Association of Voluntary Agencies for Rural Development [Avard, ], Report of a Study Team on Panchayati Raj in Andhra Pradesh (New Delhi, 1961), p. 43Google Scholar. Another parallel report of the same organization, Avard, Report on Rajasthan, pp. 12–13Google Scholar, states that the plans of the Panchayat Samitis do not differ from the old Block Development Plans, and that area-planning by these elected bodies at the District level will require much additional experience and effort.

(83) See Avard, Report on Andhra Pradesh, pp. 6, 11, 31–32, 43–44Google Scholar, and Avard, Report on Rajasthan, p. 7.Google Scholar

(84) For some preliminary assessments cf. Retzlaff, Ralph, “Panchayati Raj in Rajasthan”, Indian Journal of Public Administration, VI (1960), pp. 141–158CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Maheshwari, B., “Two Years of Panchayati Raj in Rajasthan”, Economic Weekly, XIV (05 1962), pp. 845–848Google Scholar; Alagh, Y. K., “Formulation of a State Plan-Rajasthan, a Case Study”Google Scholar, ibid., XIV (July 1962), pp. 1051–1055; and the special number, Indian Journal of Public Administration, VIII (10–12 1962).Google Scholar

(85) The new policy has been advanced with the proviso that the new panchayats require training and guidance, if they are to fulfill their designated functions. See Mehta Report, II, p. 6 and I, pp. 14–15Google Scholar. This means that executive powers are vested in elected representatives who must be trained in order to perform their functions properly! Also, the Panchayat Samitis will supervise the Bloek Development Officer, an executive official who is thus subordinate to elected officials at the same time that he is charged with the responsibility of advising his elected superiors in technical matters and in many instances against the wishes of local Panchayat leaders. Even complex arrangements can be made to work among men of good will, but the new policy is burdened by the difficulty of making some elected representatives and technical officials superior and subordinate to each other. See Avard, Report on Andhra Pradesh, pp. 12–13, 38Google Scholar. The Avard, Report on Rajasthan, pp. 10–11, 15, 17–18Google Scholar gives a more positive appraisal of the probable adjustment between elected nonofficials and the Block Development Officer, but notes also that the new system jeopardizes the Village Level Worker and also the village-panchayat.

(86) See Misra, B. B., The Indian Middle Classes (London, Oxford University Press, 1961), pp. 310–312Google Scholar. In lieu of quoting this passage at the required length, I attempt here to formulate the three-fold typology which it implies. Necessarily, this is a simplified developmental model, For a more differentiated, but still typological discussion of panchayats see Retzlaff, Ralph H., Village Government in India (New York, Asia Publishing House, 1962), Chapters 1–111.Google Scholar

(87) Ten years ago it was pointed out that panchayats are an inappropriate agency for Community development on an equalitarian basis, since local bodies inevitably reflect the great economic disparities of Indian villages. See Thorner, Daniel, “The Village Panchayat as a Vehicle of Change”, Economic Development and Cultural Change, II (1953), pp. 209–215Google Scholar. Cf. also the confrontation of Thorner's position with the equalitarian assumptions of the “project approach” to community development, as represented in the work of Mayer, Albert, in Hitchcock, John T., “Centrally Planned Rural Development in India,” Economic Weekly, XIII (03 1961), pp. 435–441.Google Scholar

* The foregoing discussion is part of a larger analysis based on research during a five-months stay in India. For the opportunity to undertake this work. I am indebted to a “reflective” year fellowship from the Carnegie Corporation.