Panchayati Raj Institutions and Rural Development : Narratives on Inclusion of Excluded
Contents: Acknowledgements. 1. Introduction: Panchayati Raj Institutions and rural development: contextualising the discourse/B.C. Barik, Santosh Kumar and U.C. Sahoo. 2. Including the excluded, empowering the powerless: case studies of Panchayati Raj in Maharashtra/B.S. Baviskar. 3. Representative and participatory democracy: indigenisation of Indian democracy/Partha Nath Mukherji. 4. Empowerment of Scheduled Castes and women: a study of three villages in Kolhapur District/R.B. Patil. 5. Factors influencing women's participation in Panchayati Raj Institutions/Archana Kamble (Jagatkar) and Sarjerao Salunkhe. 6. Can the modern and the traditional Panchayats co-exist in Schedule V areas?/R. Siva Prasad. 7. Decentralization, Panchayati Raj and the rights of marginalised groups in India: a case for civil society/Gaurang R. Sahay. 8. Development through people's empowerment: lessons from Rural Maharashtra/B.B. Mohanty. 9. Empowerment of PRI representatives: framework and realities/Aureliano Fernandes. 10. Functioning of Panchayati Raj in Scheduled Areas of Gujarat/Satyakam Joshi. 11. Impact of positive discrimination on leadership of marginalised sections in rural governance: some concerns/Santosh Kumar. 12. New Panchayat Raj system in India as an agency of "Bottom-up Approach" to rural development: a review/Kunj Bihari Nayak. 13. Representing village: state, rural development and the villager/Manish Thakur. 14. Inter-associational conflicts and cooperation: implications for development: a case study of two villages in Karnataka/Ozmond Roshan D'Souza. Index.
"The 73 Constitutional Amendment provided space for the first time to the invisible and excluded categories in the society to participate in the decentralized democratic institutions like Panchayati Raj, which works at the grassroots level for the development of these people and let alone the society at large.
The papers presented in this volume review through narratives the micro-macro ground realities on a broad canvas of interdisciplinary approach. It also offers a comprehensive account of development dynamics, participatory governance and empowerment of excluded categories." (jacket)
