Q.As a local-government-plan designer, what powers would you give village panchayats as self-government units? Mention 5 powers + justification.

For panchayats to function as real self-government units rather than just elected bodies, they need actual powers over local resources, money, welfare delivery, and decision-making — not just the right to hold meetings.

As the chapter's own account of the Eleventh Schedule shows, the Constitution already lists 29 possible subjects for transfer to Panchayats, but leaves it to each State to decide how many are actually handed over. Designing a genuinely empowering local-government plan means deliberately choosing powers that give panchayats real, not just symbolic, authority:

1. Power to plan and execute local infrastructure (roads, drinking water supply, sanitation) — because villagers themselves know which roads are unusable or which water source is unreliable far better than a distant state department, and can prioritise accordingly.

2. Power to raise and manage local funds, such as property tax, market fees, or local cesses — because, as the chapter notes, rural local bodies currently raise barely 0.24% of total revenue while spending around 4% of total government expenditure; without their own revenue base, panchayats cannot act independently of state grants.

3. Power over local primary-school administration — such as monitoring teacher attendance, maintaining the school building, and tracking enrolment — because local oversight, closer to the ground than a district education office, is likelier to catch real problems quickly.

4. Power to identify beneficiaries and administer local welfare/poverty-alleviation schemes and the public distribution system — because local people know local poverty and need far more accurately than a centrally-drawn list ever can.

5. Power to summon the Gram Sabha and require its consent before major local decisions (for example, on land use or a resource allocation) — because this converts the Gram Sabha from a formality into a genuine check, deepening participatory, not just representative, democracy.