Self-Governance Of Tribal Communities With Special Reference To Jharkhand: A Case Study
Ratna Priya, BBAU Lucknow Prof. Shashi Kumar, BBAU Lucknow
INTRODUCTION:
The Constitution of India has provision for democratic decentralisation of authority and function from centre to the local bodies. Though, it is an obligation and duty of state. Therefore, it morally obligates the state government to promote self-governance system at the local level of village. The local bodies have been existed since the ancient time of Indian civilisation. So, it is a part of local administration since the beginning of governance. It was prevalent in different states unevenly and dissimilar manner. It has been conceptualised and concretised through the 73rd and 74th amendments of the Constitution in 1992. The amendments seek to develop uniform and similar pattern of local governing bodies with constitutional status. It creates an institutional framework of grass roots democracy. It is expected to usher democratic decentralisation of powers and functions to the local self-governance institutions. It will give more participation of different groups of the society at the local level. Now, local people at village level determine their political and civic rights themselves. The local self-governing structure like Gram Sabha or the Village Assembly is existed since the emergence of the human civilisation of this country. It can be easily traced through text and scripture of Indian history. During the Vedic period, local self-governing village bodies known as Sabha and Samiti existed. A ‘Chaupal’ has always been an integral part of village life where people, generally the elders, sat together and discussed current local affairs. All community matters were decided in these meetings which came to be known as village Panchayats later. Similarly, Tribal people had their own system of governance at the local level. They are considered as the developer of the concept of democratic institution. Their local traditional self-governing bodies are one of the oldest known practices of local self-governance. Tribal’s traditional system of democracy is known differently in different parts of country.
