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NCERT Solutions for Class 7th Social Science Chapter 18 Which level of government would you go to? — THINK ABOUT IT

Book page 162 Updated on2026-09-19

Q1.
If a streetlamp in your neighbourhood is broken, who would you contact to fix it?
Answer

The local government — your ward councillor or the municipal corporation / nagar palika office if you live in a town or city, and the gram panchayat (through your ward member or the sarpanch) if you live in a village. Streetlamps are named in the chapter’s own list of local government work: “Local governments: Work in villages, towns, and cities to solve local problems (like land, agriculture, water, drainage, streetlamps, parks, etc.).”

How you would actually do it:

  1. Note the exact place — street name, nearest landmark, the pole number if it is painted on.
  2. Tell the ward member or councillor, or file a complaint at the municipal office. Most cities now also take complaints by phone or on a website or app.
  3. Keep the complaint number, and follow up if nothing happens.
  4. If there is still no answer, raise it in the gram sabha or ward meeting, or use the state grievance portal.
Why the local body and not anyone higher: it owns the lamp, it has the electrician and the ladder, and it is the level that can act today. Sending a broken streetlamp to the state or union government would only mean the instruction travels all the way back down to this same office — slower, and with nothing gained. “The local municipal body can do it faster.”
Q2.
If a village road needs to be repaired, would the local people reach out to the Central Government?
Answer

No. They would go to their gram panchayat first, and to the state government — usually the Public Works Department or the rural roads programme — if the road is a bigger one beyond the panchayat’s means.

Which road goes where:

The roadWhom to approach
A lane inside the villageGram panchayat — raise it in the gram sabha so it enters the panchayat’s plan and budget
The road linking the village to the main road or the block townThe state government’s rural roads / public works department, through the panchayat, the block office or the MLA
A national highway passing byThat is a union subject — but even here the complaint normally travels through local and state offices

What the chapter wants you to notice. The right answer to both questions in this box is “the level closest to the problem”, because that is the level that knows the place, can act quickly, and can be held to account. “Generally, decisions regarding local matters are taken at the level closest to the people.”

Why going straight to the top usually fails: the central government is responsible for matters that affect the whole country — defence, foreign affairs, currency. It has neither the information about your village road nor the machinery on the spot to repair it. A letter to Delhi about a village lane ends up being forwarded down to the very office you could have reached in a morning.
Where the central government does come in: funds for rural roads often come from union schemes even when the work is done by the state and the village. The three tiers are not sealed off from one another — they work together, which is exactly what Fig. 6.19 shows for schools.
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