ABSTRACT
The Indian subcontinent is no stranger to the concept of local self-government. It was a part of ancient Indian society and culture. It refers to
the administration of a locality — a village, a town, a city or any other area smaller than a state, by a body representing local inhabitants, enjoying a certain degree of autonomy, raising a part of its revenue through local taxation and spending it on services which are local in character as distinct from the services provided by the State or central agencies’
(Venkatarangaiya and Pattabhiram quoted in Srivastava 2002: 3191).