Changing village India

This pioneering study of the changing face of village India highlights the significant developments that have taken place in the various material and organised sectors,
The study focusses attention on the 'secularization' of the views and attitudes of the villagers; the process of 'polarization of castes' and its changing forms; the roles of dominant castes in breaking the axis of traditional power-structure; the traditional forms of family and marriage; and the emerging 'innovational
personality'. Other important aspects such as 'Peoples' participation' and 'bureaucratic planning', which are related. to the revolutionary process and to the methods adopted for planned economic development and social change in the Indian villages, have also been examined with a view to highlighting the dysfunctional roles of bureaucratic planning and to suggesting operational measures to correct its failings and to promote people's involvement.
While drawing attention to the frustration of the landless villagers and their conviction that all governmental programmes are meant primarily for the landed village aristocracy, the author stresses the need for not only rationalising these programmes but also making them available to the less privileged. In analysing the gigantic process of change the author adopts a coordinated approach of the Marxian and the Mechanical Determinist schools of sociology. He shows the importance of planning for directed changes in the social superstructure of the village communities vis-a-vis planning for their directed economic development.