Rural Development

Since its inception, the performance of the self-help group programme in the area of rural development and women’s empowerment has been admirable. But, although the programme is being implemented in many parts of the country, its success has been patchy. This study evaluates its performance during 2011–19. It focuses on two aspects of the programme’s performance: its geographical expansion and the growth of non-performing assets. It shows that the programme has been more successful in well-off states, while in the central and north-eastern regions, it faces severe difficulties. The mounting NPAs in these regions require immediate intervention.

Looking at existing policy instruments and goals, and the economic and social outcomes they promise to deliver, it is argued that majoritarian politics and social and cultural outcomes are not part of fringe thinking. The politics of hate actually works to build a consensus for ruling class economics. It is not surprising, therefore, that the only "nationalist outlook" of our times is to stand firmly behind the policy programme for the global investor.

'Aggrandiser government', in most states, continues to hold on to most powers, even as they have been formally devolved to local government through conformity legislations. Deficiencies in facilitating the potential of panchayati raj persist at three levels - state, panchayati raj institutions and societal levels. Big government at the state level with a patrimonial perception of self and aggrandiser instincts has pushed the 'self-governance participatory model' of the panchayats to the periphery, both at the level of discourse and praxis. This coupled with conceptual inadequacies, epistemic and operational constraints, poor finances, and political interference have posed a serious challenge to the realisation of the potential role envisaged for panchayats in the 73rd Amendment. If panchayati raj has to fulfil its foundational tenets of empowering the community there is need to recognise the primacy of societal good over individual or political goals. PRIs have to transform themselves into community institutions fulfilling a social contract with an all inclusive participatory planning and associationalism as essential methodologies.

The state mediated-processes of social and economic development, involving science and technology, have been viewed as resources and cultural packages to respond to problems of development. National developmental priorities have been understood both in terms of abstract aggregation of collective aspirations imposed by the state and also in disaggregated terms implying expanding access of disadvantaged groups, such as rural poor, to resources they need to enhance their social and economic opportunities.