Panchayati Raj Institutions in India

Panchayati Raj Institution (PRI) is a system of rural local self-government in India. Panchayati Raj is a system of governance in which gram panchayats are the basic units of administration. It has 3 levels: village, block and district. “Panchayat” literally means assembly (yat) of five (panch) and ‘Raj’ literally means governance or government. Mahatma Gandhi advocated Panchayati Raj a decentralized form of Government where each village is responsible for its own affairs, as the foundation of India’s political system. His term for such a vision was “Gram Swaraj”(Village Self-governance).The dream of 'Gram Swaraj' of our beloved father of nation, Mahatma Gandhi and motto of 'Power to People' are essence of true democracy. The task of capacity building of these large numbers of Panchayats is quite gigantic exercise. As per the assessment of the Ministry of Panchayati Raj even after 22 years of enactment of 73rd Constitutional (Amendment) Act and also after having three rounds of Panchayat elections in many States in India the empowerment of Panchayats have not taken place as envisioned in the 73rd Constitution (Amendment) Act in 1992.The 73rd Amendment to the Constitution in 1992 gave Constitutional status to the Panchayats as institutions of local self government and also for planning and implementing programmes for economic development and social justice. The Panchayati Raj System is not a new concept and therefore is considered as one of the best ways of governance of the rural India. However, the System of Panchayati Raj despite having derived their power and existence from the constitution of India. In this paper discuss Panchayati raj Structure, Evolution, 73rd Constitutional (Amendment) Act, Ministry of Panchayati Raj and Panchayati Raj System in Andaman and Nicobar Islands. Keywords: Panchayati Raj, Constitution, Amendment and development