Gram Swaraj: Its relevance in present context

- Dr. Bhaskar Kumar Kakati*

Abstract

Gram Swaraj - an idea of the self-reliant village is a unique concept of rural reconstruction proposed by Mahatma Gandhi much before India's independence that he developed over a period of times. His concept of Gram Swaraj is considered one of the alternative models of rural reconstruction, whose primary focus is on the holistic development of a society where individuals are placed in the economic system's centre. However, Gram Swaraj is considered an ideal development approach, yet Indian planners and policymakers emphasised economic development over an individual's moral and ethical values after independence. On the other hand, with gaining more importance to sustainable development, the Gandhian concept of Gram Swaraj starts gaining importance as his approach gave importance to the human being's overall development. Accordingly, in this paper, an attempt is made to relook the Gandhian concept of Gram Swaraj and its relevance to the present context.

SECTION-I: INTRODUCTION

Migration to cities from different parts became one of the significant challenges for the development planner in a country like India in where there is low per capita space availability in cities. A massive migration to urban areas ‘further contributes to urban poverty and leads to stress and societal turbulence’ (Kalam & Singh, 2011, p. vii). The Census 2011 shows that around 32.33 per cent of total migration migrated to urban areas in India, i.e. 23.13 per cent from rural to urban areas and 73.77 per cent from urban to urban areas (Register General of India, 2011). It is estimated that if this continues, then by 2030, India's urban population will likely reach 590 million by 2030 (Ministry of Rural Development, 2011).

So, a large number of rural populations migrated to different urban areas in India every year. Primary reasons for the migration of rural population to urban areas as per Census 2011 are employment, business, education and marriage. People from rural areas migrate to urban areas because the existing income sources in rural areas such as agriculture cannot address unemployment issues and uplift living standards. There is also lack of modern amenities and services in rural areas which are necessary for decent living in rural areas induces a large percentage of the population from rural areas to migrate to urban areas in search of these services, employment and livelihoods opportunities. Further studies show that many Indian farmers commit suicide every year because of indebtedness, deteriorating economic status, and crop failures (Mohanty, 2005; Mishra, 2006). Therefore, there is a need of bridging the rural-urban divide and make available the modern services and amenities in rural areas along with creating job opportunities and livelihoods for the rural population to address the issue of rural-urban migration hence lead to sustainable development.

In this context, in this paper, an attempt is being made to understand the relevance of Gandhian Concept of Gram Swaraj in mitigating different problems of rural areas such as migration, unemployment, access to livelihoods, education and health services. This paper is evaluative and highly dependent on the writings of Mahatma Gandhi and extensive literature review. The paper is organised into five sections. The first section introduces the research problem and methodology adopted for fulfilling the research objectives. In the second section, the researcher highlights the village's concept, as proposed by Gandhi. Gram Swaraj's concept has been discussed in the third section, while in the fourth section, an attempt is made to understand Gram Swaraj's relevance in the present context. Fifth, or in the last section, the researcher is making his concluding remarks.

SECTION-II: GANDHI’S IDEAL VILLAGE

The Gandhian development approach's primary target was village as he considered that rebuilding of a nation depends on the reconstruction of rural areas. He, based on his experiences, introduced his economic ideas to reconstruct many rural areas of India. Among them, the experiment of rural reconstruction in Champaran in 1917, Sevagram in 1920, Wardha in 1938 and constructive programmes were the prominent example of such initiative. Moreover, he directly introduced his rural reconstruction ideas and urged his followers and colleagues to focus on rural reconstruction. In one of his letters wrote on 13th November 1945 to first Prime Minister of Independent India Pandit Jawaharlal Nehru he suggested him mental, economic, political and moral development of each individual to have equal right and opportunity. He also asked him to focus on bridging the gap between rural-urban divide.

The village, according to Gandhi, is an ideal place to live. A glimpse of his dream village is reflected in his different writings published in Harijan and Young India and some of the personal letter he wrote to different persons. In one such letter written to Munnalal Shah on 04th April 1941, he depicted his ideal village idea. He dreamed of a village where everyone wears cloth made of own, uses oil of indigenous oil presses, and eats food produced by own. There would be 100 per cent literate people in his dream village with having harmony among different communities, and there would be no untouchability, free from quarrels and thefts. Therefore, the ideal village what he dreamed would be an independent unit or a complete republic. Accordingly, Gandhi considered that each village should be 'independent of its neighbours for its own vital wants, and yet interdependent for many others in which dependence is a necessity. Thus, every village's first concern will be to grow its own food crops and cotton for its cloth' (Joshi, 2002, p. 5). Accordingly, his dream village was based on no caste and class 'in which there are no vertical divisions but only horizontal; no high, no low; all service has equal status and carries equal wages; those who have more use their advantage not for themselves but as a trust to serve others who have less; the motivating factor in the choice of vocations is not personal advancement but self-expression and self-realisation through the service of society' (Gandhi, 1962, p. 23).

There are many components of Gandhian ideal village. These include revenue generation, village sanitation, village industries, high status of women etc. He considered that to be a complete republic, a village must have sources of revenue generation. So, he said that 'any village can become such a republic today without much interference even from the present Government whose sole effective connection with the villages is the exaction of the village revenue' (Joshi, 2002, p. 5).

Village sanitation and village industries were integral parts of Gandhi's dream village. Village sanitation is necessary as it is directly linked with individual mental and physical health and without sound mental and physical health development. His understanding of village sanitation's importance is reflected in one of the letters he wrote to D.D. Joshi on 01st August 1946. In his letter, he mentioned that 'village sanitation, domestic cleanliness, personal hygiene and health care have the first place and full scope, the underlying idea being that this done there can be no disease'(ibid:22). According to him, each one should be clean from externally and internally. The village of each individual should be free of dirt and dung and foul smells. So, in his village reconstruction programme, village sanitation gets a vital place. Accordingly, he urged the village workers to focus on village sanitation specifically. Therefore, he said, 'the village worker who is ignorant of village sanitation science, who is not a successful scavenger, cannot fit himself for village service' (ibid: 22).

Village industries in the Gandhian ideal village find a vital place because only village industries could cater to unemployment in rural areas. These industries, which include soap-making, matchmaking, hand-grinding, hand-pounding, oil pressing, cattle farming, farming, dairying, khadi, etc., are labour driven with the involvement of less machinery. He considered that urban-centric industries based on big machinery are the source of labour exploitation and only the profit source to their owner. Their objectives are not to solve the problem of unemployment. With the revival of village cottage and small-scale industries would lead to creating employment for mass, leading to an increase in income of rural people.

In Gandhian dream village women got high status. He dreamed of a village where 'there will be the same respect for women as vouchsafed to men, and the chastity and purity of men and women will be jealously guarded. Where every woman except one's wife, will be treated by men of all religions, as mother, sister or daughter according to her age' (Gandhi, 1962, pp. 23-24).

Therefore, Gandhi dreamed for a village where all the individual will be free of all diseases, exercise their physical labour, have all connectivities, and all necessities of life such as clean water, food, cloth, sanitation, education, and the house lead to self-reliant. He thus emphasised people's inclusion in decision-making as decision-making only can make a village self-reliant and self-rule or true republic. There would be no exploitation, and each individual will have equal right and opportunity in the Gandhian ideal village. Thus, the four characteristics of Gandhi's ideal village as by Dhiru Thadani (2011) are- access of each individual to healthcare and food production, respect to human actions and natural resources, having a democratic political, institutional framework and physical and electronic linkages among villages and between rural and urban areas (Thadani, 2011).

SECTION-III: GRAM SWARAJ- AN ALTERNATIVE APPROACHES TO RURAL RECONSTRUCTION

‘Our village-folk do not get fresh air though they are surrounded by fresh air; they don't get fresh food though they are surrounded by the freshest foods’ (Gandhi, 1962, p. 40). The primary concern of planners and policymakers of a country like India is to provide basic necessities of life to rural folk. Still, most rural people in India do not have access to food, shelter, education and health care despite producing the majority of food products and providing the raw materials for city-based industries. While experiencing these conditions of rural areas, Gandhi considered a need for reconstruction of rural areas to achieve the real goal of India's independence. He considered that independence must begin at the bottom, and economic independence cannot be separated from political independence. Political independence without economic independence has no meaning, and Gram Swaraj-the alternative model of rural reconstruction was the outcome of such under sanding.

Gram means village and Swaraj is a Vedic word means self-restraint and self-rule. So, in simple Gram Swaraj, means achieving self-rule and control by the villages. The concept of Swaraj, according to Gandhi, has two distinct but interrelated concepts such and individual and political. 'At the individual level, Swaraj is vitally connected with the capacity for dispassionate self-assessment, ceaseless self-purification and growing self-reliance' (Gandhi, 1928, p. 772). An individual without conquering the lust within him cannot rule over himself (Patil, 1983) so, it is essential for each human being to learn to 'rule over oneself or attaining the ability of self-rule’ (Anjaneyulu, 2003, p. 36). ‘Swaraj’ may, therefore, be rendered as discipline rule from inside’ (Chander, n.d., p. 543). According to Gandhi, the individual is the centre of power (Anjaneyulu, 2003) so it becomes essential for each individual to become self-discipline for attaining the self-government because 'self-government depends entirely upon our internal strength, upon our ability to fight against the heaviest odds' (Gandhi, 1962, p. 17). According to Gandhi, attaining self-discipline will further lead to eliminating all forms of domination which is a vital component of Swaraj. In Gram Swaraj, Gandhi emphasised the individual dimension because human life is a gift from nature to be used carefully and judiciously. 'A life was destined to be lived decently and worthily' (Behuria, 2015, p. 60). So, he urged for the individual's mental and moral growth and focused on distributing fruit of development equally among the individuals.

Politically, Swaraj implies self-governance in which every individual has self-rule and self-restraint through participation in decision making. Therefore, political adoption of Swaraj means the introduction of a system where the role of the state machinery become less and power lies with people's hand. According to him, a government is considered the best government that governs the least. Accordingly, Gandhi gave more importance to economic relationships between individuals and economic micro-groups, such as village communities where the state has a minor role in the development process.

Gandhian Gram Swaraj is based on certain principles such as human beings' supremacy, full employment, equality, Swadeshi, trusteeship, self-sufficiency and cooperation, Nai Talim, decentralisation. Gram Swaraj is a permanent feature, so he believed that objectives of Swaraj would be fulfilled when a village would attain Swaraj in all spheres of life such as economic, political, social and cultural. So, the Gandhian Gram Swaraj can be described as 'non-exploiting decentralised, simple village economy providing for full employment to each one of its citizens on the basis of voluntary cooperation and working for achieving self-sufficiency in its basic requirements of food, clothing, and other necessities of life' (Upadhyay, n.d., p. 103).

Gram Swaraj cannot be separated from non-violence because it 'is the practical embodiment of non-violence in the spheres of politics, economics and sociology' (Vyas, 1962, p. 8). Gandhi advocated for self-rule and self-control but not to rule others. He was in an opinion that Swaraj is only possible when an individual observes truth and non-violence. He said that ‘Swaraj of the masses can never come through untruthful and violent means, for the simple reason that the natural corollary to their use would be to remove all opposition through the suppression or extermination of the antagonists’ (Gandhi, 1962, p. 20). So, each individual only can avail freedom when they follow the path of non-violence. Thus, in Swaraj, Gandhi gave more importance to the duty of an individual. Only those who perform the duty for the state can avail the right of the citizen. So, 'who observes truth and non-violence comes prestige, and prestige brings rights. And people who obtain rights as a result of performance of duty, exercise them only for the service of society, never for themselves’(ibid:21).

To attained self-rule, a village must be self-sufficient. Gandhi considered that lack of self-sufficiency leads to exploitation of poor in the hand of rich and village in cities' hand (Sharma, 1992). So, the Gandhian philosophy of self-sufficiency was mainly influenced by economic equality. Therefore, to attain swaraj, one must self-sufficient in basic necessities such as food, cloth and house. To enhance their income, the rural household must focus on other sources of income along with agriculture. In rural India, village cottage and small-scale industries may fulfil this gap.

Furthermore, traditionally, rural people inherited different craft skills, which can be significant alternative sources for rural people. Thus, Gandhi emphasised on promotion of rural industries. According to Gandhi, it should be remembered that self-sufficiency is not boycotting of other, and it does not mean narrowness. In discussion with Shrikrishnadas Jaju on 10th October 1944, he considered that to be self-sufficient, the village no need to be self-contained. Some products may be collected from others, and some of their products may be sent to others. However, the main thing is that it should not be the village's aim to send their extra produce to cities or far away areas always rather their duties should be to meet the needs of immediate neighbour first before serving the far away areas. So, he said 'our outlook must be that we would serve the village first, then the neighbourhood, then the district and thereafter the province’ (Joshi, 2002, p. 6).

A village, according to his concept Gram Swaraj should be a self-sufficient unit independent of others but individuals are interdependent of each other. A village would become self-sufficient when the village residents will use the local product and promote rural industries. Use of more local products and promotion of rural industries means an increase in income because of fruitful employment and increased production because of an increase in local demand. So, when the consumers fulfil their requirements from the local produce and local producers, it will directly support the local producers like farmers, artisan, weavers etc., and accordingly, it will develop a natural economic order and harmony at society (Patil, 1983). Use of local products means the use of Swadeshi, according to Gandhi. His idea of Swadeshi was influenced by Swadharma philosophy of Gita, which means one's fundamental nature. Therefore, Swadeshi refers to 'use of all home-made things to exclude foreign things, so such use is necessary for protecting the home industry, more especially those industries without which India will become pauperised. In my opinion, therefore, Swadeshi which excludes the use of everything foreign no matter how beneficent it maybe is a narrow interpretation of Swadeshi' (Young India 17.02.1926, p. 213). However, his idea of Swadeshi never considered the exclusion of everything foreign or boycott movement undertaken through revenge (Prabhu & Rao, 1960). Thus, Swadeshi implies preference to the goods made by neighbours over goods made at far-way places. Through the doctrine of Swadeshi, he tried to make a nexus of concern for each other between producer and consumer who in the economic exchange process would work jointly by using local resources for the development of local areas so that 'every village of India will almost be a self-supporting and self-contained unit, exchanging only such necessary commodities with other villages as are not locally producible’ (Gandhi, 1962, p. 53).

Gandhi never distinguished economics from moral and ethical value. ‘Economics that hurt the moral well-being of an individual or a nation are immoral and, therefore, sinful’ (Prabhu & Rao, 1960, p. 253). Accordingly, Gandhi's economic philosophy was aimed at 'serving humanity' rather than accumulating economic wealth. He considered that fruit of development and production should be equally distributed among all the stakeholders. However, it is a common feature that in the production process, profit generally goes to a few hands despite many not massively benefited stakeholders involved with the generation of these profits. So, the owners of the mode of production cannot accumulate wealth without the poor's support. This is the basis for his trusteeship concept, one of the integral parts of Gram Swaraj of Gandhi. Trusteeship according to Gandhi is 'an organisational structure under which production could be organised, instead of large industrial houses where economic power was concentrated in the hands of a few and was inherently exploitative' (Mathur, 2012, p. 70). Thus, according to trusteeship, all the firm's assets must be used for society's welfare by keeping aside a few portions of the profit for the firm's owner as livelihoods.

Another integral part of Gandhian Gram Swaraj is Nai Talim. It is a craft-based education system where learners are being taught practical skills, emphasising spiritual, cultural and social development. He realised that learners' spirit could not be trained only through books; instead, it is necessary to introduce the learners with the human environment's practical concept. Handicraft was found to be the most accessible component of this process as a skill of which inherited from generation to generation. Further, he considered that 'handicrafts are to be taught, not merely for productive works, but for developing the intellect of the pupils' (Gandhi, 1962, p. 90). This method of training rural youth and children he developed from Tolstoy Farm's idea (Patil, 1983). He dreamed for such education which can develop both body and mind of the individual. Pertaining vocational training means giving training to groups of people of different socio-economic background means eradicating untouchability prevails at the society as such education can pertain to all in under one roof.

'In public policy framework decentralisation is mostly appreciated as an effective tool for efficient governance and service delivery' (Gopika, 2020, p. 160). Gandhi believed decentralisation of power to the individual through village panchayat as central of his economic development was individual. Accordingly, the Village Swaraj 'as conceived by Gandhiji is not the resurrection of the old village panchayats but the fresh formation of independent village units of Swaraj in the context of the present-day world. So, in Village Swaraj, he mainly focused on decentralising political power to individuals to have a direct voice in decision making. So, he dreamed of decentralised political power where each individual would be the architect of their own government.

Thus, in Gram Swaraj, Gandhi focused on the holistic development of individual objectives to attain happiness and harmony at the society. In Gram Swaraj's concept, he thus emphasised economic development and social, cultural and political development of the human being. The principles Gram Swaraj can be summarised as follows.

• India lives in its villages, not in cities.
• Rural Reconstruction is based on the non-exploitation of rural areas.
• Moral and ethical values are vital than materialistic gain.
• Sarvodaya - the welfare of all
• Promotion and use of Swadeshi products
• Village industrialisation through small scale and cottage industries.
• Each individual must perform their duty towards the state.
• Decision making should be lies in people's hand.
• Bottom-up Planning Process

SECTION-IV: RELEVANCE OF VILLAGE SWARAJ IN PRESENT DAYS

'There are two schools of thought current in the world. One wants to divide the world into cities and the other into villages. The village civilisation and the city civilisation are totally different things. One depends on machinery and industrialisation, and the other on handicrafts' (Gandhi, 1962, p. 35).
'The poor villagers are exploited by the foreign government and also by their own countrymen— the city-dwellers. They produce food and go hungry. They produce milk, and their children have to go without it. It is disgraceful’ (ibid:36).

In the above two statements of MK Gandhi is given, which are interrelated. It is clear from his statement that rural and urban areas are identically different, and there is a massive gap between these two areas. Further, despite the producer of different food products, the rural areas being exploited by the urban areas. The primary reason for the exploitation of rural areas by the urban areas lies in production mode. To achieve more economic benefit, the city-based industries, mass production have been increasing day by day, and the owner of the mode of production being the owner, appropriate majority of the profit, left a few sections to others. So, there is an uneven distribution of income in such kind of production process.

After the World War-II, the majority of nations focuses on peace, development and freedom. However, soon they realised that economic development on which they are focusing is vital for human development but not at the cost of environmental degradation. With the importance of preserving the environment and accelerating economic growth, the post-World War period started to focus on sustainable development. The World Commission on Environment and Development (WCED) defined sustainable development as development that meets the need of the present without compromising future generations' ability to meet their needs (WCED, 1987). Thus, the primary focus of sustainable development is the optimum utilisation of local resources and knowledge, conservation of the environment and social equality.

The modern economy which is rooted 'in self-indulgence, multiplicity of wants and divorce of ethics from economics are large-scale mechanised, centralised, complicated organisations' (Vyas, 1962, p. 11) lead to ‘unemployment, under-employment, pauperism, exploitation, a mad race for capturing markets and conquering lands for raw materials. Competitions, conflicts and class wars corrode the social fabric’ (ibid: 11-12). So the real economic problem of the world is wealth instead the real economic crisis is 'dying of the rivers, depletion of groundwater, the disappearance of glaciers, flow of the waste material into the seas, hole in the ozone layer, emission of excess carbon dioxide, methane and other acids in the air which are destroying the very foundation of the earth' (Bhatt, 2012, p. 1). Today we are suffering from major environmental problems evolved due to materialistic economic gain, which aims to gather more economic development and wealth on the cost of destruction of natural resources and environment. However, 'material gains are not sufficient measures or preservers of human well-being' (Gibson, 2001). Thus, today's global economy is in a severe crisis state based on the market economy.

In the context of India, the country suffers lots of challenges. According to the Human Development Report (HRD) 2019, India is the home of around 28 per cent poor among the total poor of the globe. It means out of 1.3 billion poor in India 364 million poor people live. Accordingly, India ranks at 129 places among 189 countries in the Human Development Index (HDI) (UNDP, 2019). According to the same report, India's poor do not have access to health services, education, technology, and climate. The primary reason for having more poor in India is the unequal distribution of wealth and power (Jitendra, 2019). Another primary concern for rural India is the sanitation. According to census 2011, around 67.3 per cent of rural households in India do not have access to toilets. 'India continues to have the largest number of people in the world defecating in the open’ (Garg & Raut, 2015, p. 1). So, rural India, occupied by poverty, no access to basic necessities and sanitation. These challenges are also complemented by other challenges like the migration of people to urban areas, lack of infrastructure and unemployment.

In India, the majority of rural people depends on agriculture for survival. However, the condition of Indian agriculture is not up to the mark. Growth of the agriculture sector has been fluctuating: it increased from -0.2 per cent in 2014-15 to 6.3 per cent in 2016-17, and then declined to 2.9 per cent in 2018-19. Gross fixed capital formation in agriculture has decreased from 17.7 per cent in 2013-14 to 15.2 per cent in 2017-18. The contribution of agriculture to the GVA has decreased from 15 per cent in 2015-16 to 14.4 per cent in 2018-19. The decline was mainly due to a decrease in the share of GVA of crops from 9.2 per cent in 2015-16 to 8.7 per cent in 2017-18 (Economic Survey, 2019). At present in India, one farmer can only support one non-agriculture people, whereas, in the United States of America, one farmer can support 58 non-agriculture people, and this ratio is 23 in the European Union case. Further, in India, every cubic metre of water consumed produces only 300 gm of crops, whereas the same amount of water can produce 1,300 gm of crops in the USA. This is a common phenomenon for the majority of underdeveloped and developing nations of the world (Kalam & Singh, 2011).

Another major challenge of development planner and policymaker related to agriculture is that India has to grow agriculture at the rate of 4 per cent per annum to meet India's needs and provide real employment to rural youth (ibid). However, it is not an easy task. Along with structural problems of agriculture, a country like India is also suffering from another problem. The educated youth are not interested in taking agriculture as a profession.¹ The NSS 59th Round report also found the same result. As per this report, around 40 per cent of the farmers did not like to continue with agriculture, and about 27 per cent were reluctant to continue because of non-viability (NSSO, 2005). So, planner and policymakers have to tackle two type of challenges- first to develop the infrastructure and secondly make agriculture lubricating for the educated youth. In simple words, they have to address two challenges, such as increasing productivity and creating employment.

The subsidy, which is one of the major components of India's different rural livelihoods programmes², cannot uplift rural areas' condition. It is one of the major factors of low development. Subsidy in any scheme is only a relief measure but not the permanent solution to a problem (Kalam & Pillai, 2004). So, there is a need for an alternative development model for the reconstruction of rural areas. The problem of rural areas needs to address immediately as 'holistic and real development can be achieved by only combining the rural areas into the mainstream of development, because rural development is a symbol of holistic development’ (Sharma, 2019, p. 151). Moreover, rural areas' development is also critical for human development as most people live in rural areas. In this context, an attempt is being made in this unit to understand the relevance of Gandhian Gram Swaraj in reconstructing the rural areas.

As discussed above, Gram Swaraj was based on moral values; in fact, moral values find more importance over the accumulation of wealth. Moreover, he ‘counterposed a vision of a radically decentralised economic order, wherein the key area of production was at the village level, oriented towards the fulfilment of basic human needs and utilising indigenous resources' (Rigby, 1997, p. 382). Thus, the primary focus of Gandhian Gram Swaraj was the empowerment of the individual through meaningful employment. So, while focusing on Swadeshi, he did not ask each village to produce all the items rather his emphasis was on working on core competency to tackle unemployment.

Gandhi considered that every individual has an equal right irrespective of race, colour, creed. Therefore, through his concept Swaraj, he ignores all form of inequality. He said ‘the Swaraj of my dream is the poor man's Swaraj’ (Gandhi, 1962, p. 19). Economic equality is the pre-condition for Sarvodaya, which focuses on uplift and welfare of all. Economic equality is only possible when all able body gets an equal chance to work and employment. Sustainable work is demand-driven but not made available from top. Demand-driven work is based on local knowledge, resource and skill. So, Gandhi brings economic equality among the people, mainly focusing on the village's local core competency. Accordingly, he focuses on development based on production for not earning profit instead of for use. According to him, production should be made 'to satisfy basic needs, organised along cooperative lines, providing work for unemployed villagers using appropriate technology in cottage and small-scale industries' (Rigby, 1997, p. 408).

Generally, many of his economic concepts have been misunderstood. He was not against modern industrialisation but was only against mechanisation. He considered that machinery has its own place but using machinery should not be allowing the economy to displace human labour. According to him, there is a need for mechanical innovation that does not displace considerable labour but provides employment avenue for human labour. Therefore, he welcomed the strategists, directly linked with the improvement of village cottage industries which could provide full and real employment to artisans of rural areas. So, it is rightly said that 'full employment is more desirable than increased production combined with unemployment' (Prof. Galbraith, as cited by (Narayan, 1962, p. 3). Accordingly, 'use of machinery is lawful, which subserves the interest of all' (Gandhi, 1962, p. 31).

As the Gandhian concept of Gram Swaraj was based on moral and ethical values, it also focuses on individual rights and duties to the state. According to Gandhi, individuals' rights and duties are regulated by the principle of interdependence and reciprocity. Accordingly, he believed that everyone has a moral responsibility towards the village. He considered that everyone must educate themselves towards rural areas. So, he said, 'I am not asking the city-dwellers to go to and live in the villages. But I am asking them to render unto the villagers what is due to them' (Joshi, 2002, p. 34). So, it would be the duty for the city dweller to change their mentality towards the village, and they have to 'learn the art of living after the manner of villagers' (Gandhi, 1962, p. 40). So, according to him, Village Swaraj is not attained in a short time; instead, it requires the whole outlook of individual, basically the town dwellers towards the rural areas. Moreover, it is also necessary for rural people to believe in their self-power.

SECTION-V: CONCLUSION

The major problem with the present economic system is the untrue economic system based on exploitation leading to the destruction of natural economic order and harmony. In this context, the Gandhian model of Gram Swaraj may be relevant because it focuses on self-sufficiency and self-reliant through economic development and encompassed moral and ethical values. Primarily his Gram Swaraj is an alternative model for serving humanity. Unfortunately, his rural reconstruction model was considered out-of-date and out-of-touch with modernised projects' introduction by the successive Indian government after his death (Rigby, 1997). However, with the increasing different development challenges in rural India, it became relevant for the policymaker. Introduction of different programmes such as Community Development Programme (CDP), Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (MGNREGA) and introduction of Panchayati Raj institutions was influenced by his approach of Gram Swaraj (Sharma, 2019). Therefore, the rural reconstruction approach of Gandhi through Gram Swaraj can be considered as one of the alternative development approaches (Rigby, 1997; Dube, 1988; Sachs, 1980)

Gandhi was not a professional economist, yet his economic philosophy has influenced many economists such as J C Kumarappa, J K Mehta, Shriman Narayan E F Schumacher etc. The industrialisation has led to massive economic growth but whether it is enough to make people happy. The Gandhian approach thus focuses on the development of happiness among the people. So, the Gandhian village Swaraj mainly focuses on radical decentralisation of economic order to fulfil the human needs and generate employment by utilising the local resources. To achieve this, his model recognised the importance of natural resources and the dignity of human labour.

Although it is not possible to replicate the Gandhian village swaraj to rural reconstruction as his proposed at the present context, it does not mean that the Gram Swaraj principle proposed by Gandhi does not have relevance in the present context. His principles, such as bridging the rural-urban divide, creating employment, concern for the environment, etc., have great importance in the present context, which can be utilised to make different policies of development. Therefore, Gram Swaraj ‘working in full swing will provide a model for the world to copy. It will then be a gift of India to the world’ (Vyas, 1962, p. 14).

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1. Dr APJ Abdul Kalam highlighted this issue at Indian Institute of Management, Shillong in 2013. He to a reply to a student's question said that agriculture is still the profession of illiterate people. Young educated generation are not interested in taking agriculture as a profession, one of the major concerns for a country like India.
2. Almost all the significant livelihoods programmes of India such as Swarnjayanti Gram Swarozgar Yojana (SGSY), Deendayal Antyodaya Yojana - National Rural Livelihoods Mission (DAY-NRLM) etc., has components like subsidy, interest subvention etc.

* Dr Bhaskar Kumar Kakati, Centre Manager, Dr. APJ Abdul Kalam Centre for Policy Research and Analysis, Indian Institute of Management Shillong, Shillong | Email: bhaskarkumarkakati@gmail.com