local governance

Communities already carry deep knowledge of the commons through oral traditions, customary practices, and lived experience. The question is whether data systems are designed to recognise it.

ভারতে গ্রাম পঞ্চায়েত নির্বাচনে মহিলাদের জন্য আসন সংরক্ষিত থাকলেও, ভোটের আগে এবং পরে তাঁদের অনেক বাধার সম্মুখীন হতে হয়। এই বাধা বা প্রতিবন্ধকতার দৌড় পার করে আসল লিঙ্গ সমতা প্রতিষ্ঠা করতে হলে কিছু জরুরি পদক্ষেপ নেওয়া দরকার।

Using insights from existing IDR articles, we answer four key questions on India's panchayats, examining their mandate and the realities of grassroots governance.

The idea of local self-governance has been a key part of India’s political imagination. However, development has often meant centralisation, undermining communities’ rights over jal, jangal, and zameen.

Mission-mode programmes are celebrated for delivering immediate, tangible outputs at scale. But lasting social change depends on whether institutions, capacities, and accountability survive beyond the mission.

Embedding units across all tiers of administration can help nonprofits combine community knowledge and innovation with the government’s scale.

An experiment in Karnataka shows that students can meaningfully participate in local governance. But institutionalising this requires a shift in adult mindsets.

From legal frameworks to finances and functions, the Panchayat Devolution Index 2024 evaluates how states transfer power to local governments for a stronger democracy.

One of the key aims of the Forest Rights Act has been to decentralise forest governance by conferring powers on the gram sabha. DAJGUA, a new umbrella scheme for forest-dwelling communities in India, may upend this.