Local Bodies

It was decided to decentralise administration by promoting local government through municipalities and district boards which would administer local services like education, health, sanitation, water supply, roads and other basic amenities financed through local taxes. There were many factors which made it necessary for the British government in India to work towards establishing local bodies.

(i) Financial difficulties faced by the Government, due to overcentralisation, made decentralisation imperative.

(ii) It became necessary that modern advances in civic amenities in Europe be transplanted in India considering India’s increasing economic contacts with Europe.

(iii) The rising tide of nationalism had improvement in basic facilities as a point on its agenda.

(iv) A section of British policy-makers saw association of Indians with the administration in some form or the other,

without undermining the British supremacy in India, as an instrument to check the increasing politicisation of Indians.

(v) The utilisation of local taxes for local welfare could be used to counter any public criticism of British reluctance to draw upon an already overburdened treasury or to tax the rich upper classes.

The important stages in the evolution of local government can be identified as follows.