Dholi Samuday Ka Sarpanch

In one specific village of Rajasthan, as part of a training program, we attempted applying a couple of Participatory Rural Appraisal tools such as Transect Walk, Resource Map, and Venn Diagram on Institutions to make some initial inroads into understanding the community. We were divided into two teams and both these teams were asked to choose a location where it is easy to gather a lot of people for doing the activities. We were clearly told to not meet only the influential people like Sarpanch, landlords, Anganwadi staff, school principal etc.

As our team was exploring the village through a transect walk, we came across an interesting spot – Tejaji Ka Mandir. Right beside the temple was the village water tank.  A lot of women were gathered around the tank quarrelling for water. What a spot! We decided that here is where we’ll proceed with our resource mapping activity.

Through conversations it became further clear that water is a huge issue in the village. The villagers were desperate to know if we were Sarkari Babus (government clerks), who could do something about their desperate situation. We did break their hearts however by telling them the truth that we are here to learn. Disappointed, yet kind, they did come to us after filling their respective buckets.

Resource Mapping

We all stood in a circle to do the task assigned to us. Some villagers assembled around. To cheer the ones present and to gather some more crowd we did perform group songs (Matrwadi ones obviously). As we anticipated, more people from various mohallas did join. We took out our Rangoli powder and started. 

We started with the most obvious question – where does the sun rise. After this, we mapped all important institutions like temples, Anganwadis, elementary school etc. Then we delved into deeper questions – mohallas. Initially we were told that the village was homogenous. It indeed was as everyone’s varna was the same. We proceeded with what they said. Later through more sensible questions on understanding resource access and utilisation, we got to know that the Sarpanch of that Gram Panchayat was from scheduled caste. An information forgotten to mention is that this village comes under another Gram Panchayat. Never mind. After further enquiry it became clear that  he is from the Dholi community. 

The Next Day

In a further attempt to understand the village were were asked to to the wealth ranking. Wealth ranking in Participatory Rural Appraisal (PRA) helps communities assess and categorise households based on locally defined wealth indicators such as land ownership, income, and assets. Villagers rank households through discussions and sorting techniques, identifying socioeconomic disparities. This method aids in targeting vulnerable groups, planning welfare programmes, and designing inclusive development initiatives.

Through the previous day’s intensive activities we realised that the majority of the village was from the Rawat community, a couple of the households were from Cheetah, another community that comes under scheduled caste, a couple of Muslim families, and a couple of Dholi families. The members of the other community migrated as this village is inhabited by people of the same genealogy. Moving on, we proceed with wealth ranking. Obviously we had to keep the curiosity of the villagers and not break the suspense as the activity mandates. 

We kept placing the cards in a horizontal manner, an overt way of presenting hierarchy. Four broad categories emerged in this activity – families with more than five acres of land, families with two to five acres of land, families with half to two acres of land, and families with no land. Surprisingly, the Sarpanch came in the fourth category. We were shocked and enquired several times to ensure we placed the cards correctly. We weren’t sure, but the villagers assured us and we proceeded.

The Sarpanch

As a verification activity, post ranking, we went to understand if our activity was a success. It was. The Sarpanch was humble. We spent some time there just to realise that the Sarpanch was a namesake head as the Gram Panchayat was declared reserved for scheduled caste. Jut like how many women Sarpanch unfortunately are namesake and yield no power, similarly this Sarpanch was a puppet of the landlord of that village. He yielded no power and had no say in any village administrative activities. He was a mere rubber stamp. Another village that reflected the current fate of many reservation seats at the Panchayati Raj Institution level.