The Maharashtra government recently notified Mendha village (Gadchiroli district forest), as a separate Gram Panchayat under The Maharashtra Gramdan Act, 1964.
What is Gramdan?
- Gramdan is an Act born of Vinoba Bhave’s 1950s Bhoodan Gramdan Movement. The Act gives wide powers and responsibilities to the gram-mandal (Gram Sabha) for the administration, development and welfare of the village.
- Gramdan is an expansion of the Bhoodan Movement started in 1951 by Gandhian Bhave.
- ‘Bhoodan’ meant redistribution of land from bigger landowners to the landless.
- Under Gramdan, the entire village will put its land under a common trust. But the landowners can continue to cultivate it and reap the benefits.
- Under the Act, at least 75 per cent of landowners in the village should surrender land ownership to the village community for it to be declared as ‘gramdan’. Such land should at least be 60 per cent of the village land.
- 5 per cent of the surrendered land is distributed to the landless in the village for cultivation.
- Recipients of such land cannot transfer the same without the permission of the community. The rest remains with the donors.
- They and their descendants can work on it and reap the benefits. But they cannot sell it outside the village or to a village resident who has not joined Gramdan.
- Today, 7 states in India have 3,660 Gramdan villages, the highest being in Odisha (1,309). The states are Andhra Pradesh, Bihar, Maharashtra, Odisha, Rajasthan, Tamil Nadu and Uttar Pradesh.
- In September 2022, the Assam government repealed the Assam Gramdan Act, 1961 and Assam Bhoodan Act, 1965.
(Source: Down to Earth)
