Case study of Mirapur, village in Barabanki District, Uttar Pradesh.

Case study of Mirapur, village in Barabanki District, Uttar Pradesh.

Case study with reference to Shergarh village situated in Kurukshetra District of Haryana, India.

With special reference to Bihar.

Study, with reference to the Panchayati Raj set-up in Pudukkottai District, Tamil Nadu.

Taking cognisance of the lack of studies on leadership in modern India, this book explores how leadership is practiced in the Indian context, examining this across varied domains — from rural settings and urban neighbourhoods to political parties and state governments. The importance of individual leaders in the projection of politics in South Asia is evident from how political parties, mobilisation of movements and the media all focus on carefully constructed personalities. Besides, the politically ambitious have considerable room for manoeuvre in the institutional setup of the Indian subcontinent. This book focuses on actors making their political career and/or aspiring for leadership roles, even as it also foregrounds the range of choices open to them in particular contexts. The articles in this volume explore the variety of strategies used by politically engaged actors in trying to acquire (or keep) power — symbolic action, rhetorical usage, moral conviction, building of alliances — illustrating, in the process, both the opportunities and constraints experienced by them. In taking a qualitative approach and tracking both political styles and transactions, this book provides insights into the nature of democracy and the functioning of electoral politics in the subcontinent.

Rural leaders form a strong link between the policy makers and government machinery on one hand and the rural masses on the other. This research work aims at identifying the emerging leadership pattern in rural India, and examines the influence of a few selected social, educational and cultural development.

Based on fifteen years of intensive anthropological and sociological fieldwork, this book presents provocative insights in the daily life of men and women in various villages of India. The topics dealt with are varied as also important and policy relevant. The author deals with the propensity of the village panchayats and their actual working in Uttar Pradesh and West Bengal, the impact of land reforms on development, the causes of the high human development index in Kerala, communalism at the village level, the views of poor villagers on the post-modernist views on development, child labour and family views on children as capital, and with the changing world view in relation to religion, caste and the position of women. The author deals with these issues drawing on a multifaceted background, taking care at the same time that the views of the villagers, and their daily concerns come through as the principal empirical evidence.

Factional politics, undoubtedly, constitutes a very significant area as well as a pervasive theme in contemporary social science. Factionalism, a growing phenomenon in Indian government and politics, has not only of late, assumed new dimensions but also infected almost all organizations including political parties, interest group, pressure groups, trade unions, voluntary association etc. It is quite disheartening and distressing to observe that even village community and its government and politics are largely as well as deeply affected and afflicted by this all-pervading evil that has spread its tentacles to eat away the very vitals of the Indian rural society. It has assumed so much of importance and significance that it has attracted the attention of social scientists, policy-makers and administrators.