Though without drawbacks, the Indian village Republics were remarkable experiments in genuine democracy and local self-government. The modern development of centralised control without sufficient local and corporate life has everywhere made politics barren and mechanical. There is also an endless conflict between the interest of the individual and the group or the state. But the Indian rural Panchayats very successfully integrated these conflicting interests and made socio-political life human and productive. As Acharya Vinoba Bhave puts it, each individual in these Gram Sabhas was his own king; yet he was bound in indissoluble ties to his fellow-citizens.[59] While there was full scope for the development of his personality, every citizen was a responsible and useful member of the small state.
