Democracy as a system of government encourages the participation of people at every level of governance. The local or grass-root level of a democratic set-up is called the local self government. No other system of governance involves the common people in administration as much as the democratic system. The democratic structure in India has three levels of governance,
- national or federal,
- state or regional,
- local or grass-root level.
Advantages
1. It is in this level of democracy that the participation of the people in the management of their own affairs is more direct, clear and significant.
2. Because here the supervision of people of the representative is direct and constant.
3. Lord Bryce believed “the best guarantee for the success of democracy is the practice of local self government’. Involving people at the lowest stratum of society or at the grass root level with the administration may be said to be the modern version of direct democracy. It brings the people and the local government face to face with one another.
4. In a problem ridden transitional society like India unless democracy is decentralized it cannot be meaningfully employed as a means to welfare administration.
5. Devolution of power from the higher to lower levels is a necessary democratic method to bring about a complete involvement of the sovereignty from the top to the bottom.