India's massive attempt to provide access to justice for its rural population through the promotion of Nyaya Panchayats (village courts; hereafter NP)* is both theoretically provocative and practically important. Yet it remains largely unexamined empirically and virtually unknown outside India. Completing a process of judicial reform started under colonial rule, India's post-Independence Constitution directed states to establish local self-govermment and to separate judicial and executive functions at the village level. Some states created NP intended to combine the virtues of traditional legal institutions (accessibility, informality, economy of time and money, and familiarity of legal norms) with those of the state legal system (impartiality, uniformity of law and procedures, and legitimacy). On the one hand, NP were to be integral parts of the state judicial service; on the other, they were to assist Gaon Panchayats (village level administrative bodies) in administering village affairs and educating people about the new democratic order. Despite evidence that NP have atrophied since their modest success in the late 1940s and fail to inspire the confidence of either the educated elite or the illiterate masses (Purwar, 1956; 1960; Khera, 1962; Retzlaff, 1962; Bhalerao and Singh, 1965; Tinker, 1967; Madan, 1969; Baxi, 1976a; Baxi and Galanter 1979), these multiple and often conflicting goals have been reiterated in recent discussions, most of which prescribe NP as the panacea for India's rural legal problems (India, Ministry of Law, Justice and Company Affairs, 1962; Singhvi, 1970; Singh, 1974; Naidu, 1977; Kushawaha, 1977; India, Ministry of Agriculture and Irrigation, 1978). This chapter examines NP today in the state of Uttar Pradesh (UP) and offers a tentative explanation for the persistent loyalty they inspire despite their visible failure. Based on a study of previous reports of NP structure and authority and the first author's brief field study of two NP in Bharatpur Tahsil, Biswa District in 1978,^ this chapter demonstrates their political nature, reveals the penetration of social and political inequality into NP structure and process, and situates NP within a pattern of disputing common among Indian legal institutions.
Bibliographic Citation
In Search of Nyaya Panchayats: The Politics of a Moribund Institution' in R. Abel (ed.), The Politics of Informal Justice: Comparative Studies, New York: Academic Press (1982) pp. 47-77.