Role of Panchayat in the Protection of Human Rights

Role of Panchayat in the Protection of Human Rights – A Study With
Regard to Dhankut Living in Bahraich District of U.P.
By
Dr. Alok Chantia & Dr. Preeti Misra
Abstract
Human rights mean the rights relating to life, liberty, equality and dignity of the
individual guaranteed by the Constitution or embodied in the International Covenants.
The implementation of the human rights is a subject of great importance in any society.
In a developing society such as ours where around 50 percent people are living below
poverty live and around 70 percent of the people are illiterate and large number of men
and women are living a life of want and destitution, misery and suffering, this subject
assumes great significance.
In a welfare state it is the responsibility of the government to provide all facilities to its
people for their upliftment. Generally human rights are guaranteed by the government. In
the tribal community, it is in the form of Panchayat, which is equivalent to the
government. It takes every decision for the welfare of its people.
At the level of community, people want security of their lands and other immovable
property from their own community men. They also want to solve their social and family
disputes within the community. So they form a political organization in the form of
Panchayat. It is a cultural form of court without any written literature. The elders of the
community listen to the community problems and take decisions regarding social
disputes.
In simple or traditional society, people are not very much interested in a judicial system
due to its complexity. They feel, it is a time taking and expensive process The courts are
not beneficial for a traditional community as they are not aware about their social and
cultural environment. In this regard the importance of the traditional panchayat proves its
significance.
Present study has been done on a group of people called Dhankut, residing in
Dhankuttypura of district Bahraich of U.P. It is a small, neglected, unobserved group by
the academicians. It is neither agricultural, occupational nor service class group. Mainly
they are engaged in retail works. They are listed in voter's list with the name of Dhankut
without any caste or sub-caste description of SC/ST/OBC. Though they claim themselves
to be of General category but they are not so recognized by the adjacent communities of
Brahmins, Kayastha and Vaish. Dhankut is almost an illiterate group. The spread of
education is either very low or absent amongst them. Since they have no socio-cultural
identity of their own, they indulge in cross cousin and parallel cousin marriage to save
their identity.
It is a primary data based work with the help of participant observation and schedule
based interview. Dhankut are 2687 in number (2001 census), 300 Dhankuts both male
and female, above the age of 18 years were chosen on the basis of random sampling for
the present study.
The study reveals that Dhankuts, still believe in their traditional panchayat. Even though
the civil court is at 500 yards away from their living place, they do not prefer going to the
court. They go to the panchayat for the solution of all their problems. Thus panchayat is
the very axis around which revolves the lives of Dhankut. Panchayat is also a supporting
factor of their lives, hence they cannot leave it. Even process of acculturation and
urbanization has not affected its existence.
Dr. Alok Chantia, Lecturer,
Dept. of Anthropology
Sri J.N.P.G.College,Lucknow
E-mail -alokchantia@rediffmail.com
alokchantia@gmail.com
Dr. Preeti Misra,Lecturer,
Dept of Human Rights,
Babasaheb Bhimrao Ambedkar University
,Lucknow
E-mail misra9_us@yahoo.com
Misra9us@gmail.com