Q1.
As a class activity, let four or five students form a Bal Panchayat and the rest of the class imagine they are the villagers. What issues will the Gram Sabha discuss? What challenges could it encounter? What solutions will it propose?
Answer
How to run the activity. Four or five students sit in front as the Bal Panchayat, with one as the Sarpanch and one as the Secretary who keeps the minutes. The rest of the class sits as the Gram Sabha. Anyone from the Gram Sabha may raise an issue; the Panchayat listens, discusses, and proposes a solution; a show of hands decides. Keep it to about 30 minutes and let the Secretary read out the decisions at the end.
Issues the Gram Sabha is likely to discuss — the chapter itself suggests most of them:
- Children out of school. The chapter says Maharashtra’s Bal Panchayats “have worked to eliminate child labour and child marriage” and “have brought many children back to school”.
- Child marriage, especially of girls “who should be studying”.
- Safety. A school without a compound wall, an unlit path, a road with fast traffic — Sangkhu Radhu Khandu Gram Panchayat in Sikkim built compound walls for exactly this reason.
- Mid-day meals and clean kitchens — the same Sikkim Panchayat built school kitchens so that meals were hygienically cooked.
- Drinking water and toilets in the school, and whether girls stay away because there is no usable toilet.
- A playground, a library, or lights so that children can study in the evening.
- Cleanliness — plastic waste, an open drain, a mosquito-breeding pond.
Challenges the Bal Panchayat could meet:
| Challenge | Why it happens |
|---|---|
| Not being taken seriously | Some adults feel children are too young to have an opinion on village matters |
| Families who need the child’s earnings | A family in difficulty may send a child to work; simply telling them to stop is not enough |
| Custom and pressure | Child marriage is often defended as ‘what we have always done’ — Vandana Bahadur Maida had to “defy patriarchal norms” to be heard at all |
| No money and no power to spend it | A Bal Panchayat can propose but not sanction; the Gram Panchayat holds the funds |
| Disagreement inside the Bal Panchayat | Members may want different things first — a playground or a library |
| Shyness | The children who most need to speak — often girls, or the poorest — speak least |
Solutions the Bal Panchayat can propose — each one small, specific and checkable:
- A list, not a complaint. Make a written list of children who have left school, with names and reasons, and give it to the Gram Panchayat.
- Visit the parents. Exactly what the chapter describes: “The Bal Panchayat members get together to convince parents and other adults to send their wards back to school.”
- Ask for one concrete work in the next Gram Panchayat plan — a compound wall, a school toilet, a hand pump, one street light on the school path.
- A fixed slot in the Gram Sabha. Request that ten minutes of every Gram Sabha meeting be kept for the Bal Panchayat to report.
- A cleanliness day once a month, run by the children themselves, with the Panchayat providing bins.
- Review at the next meeting. Read out what was promised last time and what actually happened.
Sample decision for the Secretary’s minutes: “The Bal Sabha met on 12 August. Six children of Ward 3 have stopped attending school. The Bal Panchayat will visit their homes with two Gram Panchayat members before the next meeting. The Bal Panchayat also requests the Gram Panchayat to repair the school toilet before the rains. Progress will be reported at the next Bal Sabha.” Short, dated, and easy to check — that is what makes a proposal work.
Why the book asks you to play the villagers too: a Bal Panchayat is not a debate that children win. Its work is persuasion — of parents, elders and the Gram Panchayat. Sitting on the villagers’ side teaches you the objections you will actually have to answer.