ABSTRACT
Received wisdom, corresponding with the emphases recognisable in the public statements of the Congress under Nehru, is that India in the 1950s was obsessed with heavy industry, technological change, machinery and centralised planning. But there was also the recognition of the importance of decentralised initiatives and rural welfare, an obvious concern in a country whose population was still predominantly rural and agricultural, and where employment had to be created. These were embodied from 1952 in the so-called ‘Community Development’ schemes, which incorporated Gandhi as a crucial legitimating icon; thus, even as the remaining genuinely ideological Gandhians gradually began moving into the opposition to the Congress, the Congress discovered new uses for Gandhian ideas.
