Moi Sept Final
1 Editorial? The subsequent decades after independence have seen a process of institutionalisation of a democratic A fter India got independence in 1947, there were political society, but the class character of the state various pronouncements about the likelihood of it has remained feudal and hierarchical, with a clear collapsing, becoming a failed state, and breaking up continuation moreover, of colonial structures and again, on account of the weight of its own internal cultures of governance. Simultaneously however, those contradictions. The scale of the attempt to establish, who have historically been at the margins of social, in such a huge, diverse, and deeply segmented society, political, and economic power - Dalits, landless formal democracy with all its paraphernalia of a farmers, the marginal peasantry, Adivasis, and workers, parliament, universal franchise, an independent and women - have, all over the country, and through judiciary, was something that had never been tried myriad actions, constantly challenged the power and before. Sixty-two years on, India survives as a legitimacy of this feudal, hierarchical, and colonial state democracy (some say ‘thriving’, others are more and underlined its constitutional responsibilities. restrained), and is now even touted widely as an These struggles have been expressions of the needs emerging super power on the world stage. The of the time and of interest groups and developments reasons for this happening are many, but one of the at the local, regional, national, and global levels. And important – little recognised but crucial – has been the they have on several occasions and in several contexts contributions that numerous people’s movements expanded upon and given new meaning to rights, have made over the decades to the democratisation of justice, freedoms, and development.
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