eassy about municipalities and village panchayati
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Answer:
We can be proud of the fact that the institution of village panchayat was “developed earliest and preserved longest in India among all the countries of the earth.” It is believed that the system was first introduced by King Prithu while colonizing the Doab between the Ganga and Jamuna. In fact, the village in India had been looked upon as the basic unit of administration as early as the Vedic Age. Gramini or the leader of the village is mentioned in the Rigveda. There are definite references to the existence of Gram Sanghas in the Shantiparva of the Mahabharat and Manu Smriti.
References to the Gram Sabhas or local village assemblies are found in the Jatakas also. Shreni was a well-known term for the merchant guilds. Kautilya who lived in 400 B. C. had also described these village communities in his Arthashastra. In his Valmiki Ramayana we hear of Janpada, which was a kind of federation of the numerous existence in this country at the time of Greek invasion; and Megasthenes has left vivid impression of these Pentads, as he termed the Panchayats.
Chinese travellers Hieuen Tsang and Fa Hien tell us how India at the time of their visits was very productive and the people were “flourishing and happy beyond compare.” An account of these panchayat during the 7th century is provided in Shukracharya’s Nitisara. According to him, “Village was a composite whole and provided a composite leadership of management of village affairs.
The Dharmsutras and the Shastras contain references to Gana and Puga, both of which denote some kind of village or town corporations. Archaeological findings also confirm the view that the system of village panchayats was prevalent in India through the centuries. These institutions continued to flourish during the Hindu, Muslim and Maratha Governments till the advent of the East India Company. They survived the wreck of dynasties and downfall of empires.”
“The independent development of local Government provided like the shell of the tortoise a heaven of peace where the national culture could draw in for its own safety when political storms burst over the land.” So said Mahatma Gandhi, “Long ago, how long history does not record, the Indian genius worked out the village and local panchayat. It remained our fort through many a turbulent period.
Kings and dynasties fought and failed, empires rose, ruled, misruled and disappeared, but the village’s life maintained its even tenor, away from the din of battle and the rush of rising and falling empires. We had a village state which protected the life and property and made civilized life possible.”
Even the Committee of the Secretary of E.I. Co. reported in 1812. “Under this simple form of municipal government, the inhabitants of the country have lived from time immemorial…. The inhabitants give themselves no trouble about the breaking up and division of kingdom; while the village remains entre, they care not to what power it is transferred or to what sovereign it devolves, its internal economy remains unchanged.”
Observed Sir Charles Trevellyn, “One foreign conqueror after another has swept over India but the village municipalities have stuck to the soil like their own kusha grass. Scythian, Greek, Saracen, Afghan, Mongol and others have come down from the mountains; and Portuguese, Dutch, French, English and Dane out of its seas and set up their successive dominations is the land but the religious trade union villages have remained as little affected by their coming going as a rock by the rising and falling of the tide.”