“You see,” Gandhi began, “the centre of power now is in New Delhi, or in Calcutta and Bombay, in the big cities. I would have it distributed among the seven hundred thousand villages of India. That will mean that there is no power… nobody could deprive them of their assets. There will then be voluntary cooperation between these seven hundred thousand units, voluntary cooperation – not cooperation induced by Nazi methods. Voluntary cooperation will produce real freedom and a new order vastly superior to the new order in Soviet Russia…. a system like the one I have outlined to you did exist though it undoubtedly had its weakness, else it would not have succumbed before the Moghuls and the British. I would like to think that parts of it have survived, that the roots have survived despite the ravages of British rule. Those roots and the stock are waiting to sprout…” Mahatma Gandhi‘s these words were noted by American journalist Louis Fischer in his book “A week with Gandhi” (4 to 10 June 1942).
There have been many attempts to realise this vision of Mahatma Gandhi that Indian villages are empowered and model of development. There certainly is a need to audit why Member of Parliament Model Village Yojana has not been successful since its inception in 2014. On the other hand, PMAGY was started in 2009 but the work could begin only in 2014 and now once more, Prime Minister Adarsh Gram Yojana has set a target to develop 8,000 model villages in next six months. Further, Ministry of Social Justice and Empowerment has determined to convert every scheduled caste majority village into a model village by 2025. As there are over 27,000 such villages, the work needs to be taken up on priority basis to achieve this target.
With monitorable indicators of villages provided with adequate sources of drinking water, villages with school creation, villages connected with all-weather road, and number of villages electrified, this programme is indeed the need of the hour to achieve Mahatma Gandhi‘s vision. Yet less than 20,000 villages have been covered so far under this Yojna. The slow progress highlights the need of much more aggressive redressal of implementation issues.
Why Members of Parliament, cutting across party lines, have not been able to develop model villages is a serious cause of concern. Perhaps a debate on this in the upcoming parliamentary session to find out the causes and resolve them would be a welcome step.
SHARE
