Different concepts were emerging with the conception of this structure regarding the number and responsibilities of local governments implemented under the republican constitution. Some argued that it would not be relevant to reduce the number of village development committees and municipalities, which are about four thousand, to 753. Some leaders of the Congress, UML and Maoists also advocated for a lower number.

An agreement was reached on 753 amidst this tug-of-war of adding and reducing. The local government is completing two terms through the elections held accordingly. But the issue has been brought up again in the debate due to the phrase ‘reducing the number of 753 by one third’ in the first point of the economic-political proposal presented by Vice President Swarnim Wagle at the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) general convention, stating that the goal to be achieved through constitutional amendment is to reduce the number of local levels. This article attempts to analyze the possible effects of creating fewer local levels on Nepali society.

The concept of local government is not new to South Asia. In Nepal too, many practices have been practiced under the names of Panchayat, class organization, local body, local autonomous governance, etc. Currently, practices are being conducted at the local level up to rural municipality, municipality and district coordination committee. When examining global documents, JS Mill, in his book ‘Considerations of Representative Government’ published in 1859, has said in reference to the structure of local representation – local democracy will help citizens to exercise their existing freedom, express local identity and show that it is helpful for other bodies other than the higher body. This concept shows his essence that local political institutions will be closer to the people than the national government, that the locally elected government will benefit from it with a hint of diversity and provide the goods and facilities of local people’s priorities and overall guarantee a higher level of government or good governance.

On the other hand, Mahatma Gandhi, in his book ‘Hind Swaraj’ published in Gujarati in 1908 and later in English in 1909, has made a thorough analysis of the need and importance of Swaraj. In Gandhi’s view, Swaraj or self-government means rule over oneself and oneself. The lower the level of government or the level of the people, the stronger and more independent the decision-making body he envisioned. Which means that such bodies cannot take any decision without the permission of the citizen or individual. This concept can be said to be self-government in reality, where everyone is ruling himself and over himself.

Linking the then anti-British movement in India with the Swaraj movement, Gandhi had said, ‘Today, handing over the administrative machinery that the British have brought into practice and are trying to bring into the villages of India to the hands of Indians is not the solution to the problem. If we do this, India will not be Hindustan, but Englandstan, and such Swaraj is not my desire.’ Similarly, BP Koirala had said that socialism is my definition of socialism when everyone has at least one cow and a small piece of land, one plow bull and a milking cow, that is, a rural family that can afford two meals of milk and rice in the morning and evening, and asked the Planning Commission to keep a photograph of a farmer in the village and make village plans based on that. Therefore, there is a closeness and harmony between the views of Gandhi and BP here. Although the influence of Schumacher, the author of the book 'Small is Beautiful', can be seen in BP's writings in the latter half of his life, since Schumacher himself was inspired by Gandhi, we can guess the imprint of Gandhianism that was instilled in BP.

 Even the leaders of Nepal's indigenous peoples and Madhesh who advocated self-governance did not understand this issue or did not want to understand it and continued to advocate for a few provinces and large local bodies .  Today, on the one hand, words that seem progressive like self-government and priority are being used in the name. On the other hand, in the political structure, we seem to be reluctant to reuse practices that have failed elsewhere. The types of self-government such as the above have been raised, perhaps because they did not think about when they could be realized. But as a result, at the public level, today's local levels do not seem to have supported their desire for self-government and self-governance. On the one hand, today's system does not recognize the various practices of self-government that exist and have been successful in the country. On the other hand, in the name of making large structures easier and cheaper for those running the government, the structures of self-government that the people have become accustomed to to some extent have been destroyed.

When discussing locality, local autonomy or Swaraj in Nepal, the decision made with the advent of the Panchayat system to create a uniform structure for local bodies across the country in the name of village panchayats should be remembered.  From that decision, it is seen that the essence of local autonomy or Swaraj has begun to be weakened . The competition to declare the Village Development Committee as a municipality after the advent of multi-party politics and the ambition to reduce the number of local levels and orient them towards more self-governance seem to push the concept of self-governance of the local people to another predicament . As a result, money and power are gaining extreme importance in the elections called for self-governance today . The reason for this is clear . As mentioned above, the social situation of today's villages in Nepal, which has its own originality and has not been touched by modernism much, is that of today's villages . Even today, there are traditional thalus known in every village and tol, and they are often more visible in societies where the marginalized are in the majority. They are still respected locally. In a context where the reach of the modern state is very limited, the general public is forced to consult those thalus in village elections as well as in transactions, litigation and family management.

In other words, in elections too, people have been casting their votes mostly based on consultation with local people. Therefore, even though elections are held on the basis of adult suffrage, the traditional structures of the villages still prevail in today's village votes due to the fact that the traditional structures of the villages are still maintained. For the management of those people, the wards of the previous Panchayat and the Village Development Committees up until some time ago were formed by combining a maximum of 4-5 small tols. As is the case now, there was a system in which 5 people were elected, 4 ward members and a ward chairman. But the latest structure has practiced a new structure that does not allow many such groups of thalus to be identified in the name of reducing the number.

Compared to the previous one, 8-9 times larger wards with 40-45 thalus have been created, in which the number of posts has been reduced due to reservation for male thalus. The ironic scene of these thalus, who have been in some role till now, bargaining with the new structure that has not included them, for direct financial gain from those who are going to be candidates, is seen in the villages. That is, as soon as one of them brings a candidate's ticket, dozens of thalus unite and start defrauding the candidate of how and under what pretext. Due to the compulsion to spend money even to support a person working in his own party or group, 20-25 lakhs have started being spent in the ward elections in recent days.

In fact, in a social situation like Nepal, which has its own originality and has not been touched by modernism much, it was not necessary to make the concept of self-government nationwide at once. The state should have recognized the differences and diversity of self-government found in different regions and communities, if those self-government provisions did not affect another community and were not targeted against any other community in that country. By doing this, the local systems like Guthi of the Newar community, Beja of the Magar, Parm, Nogyar, Purima and Kipat of the Rai-Limbus, Choho of the Tamang community, Dhikur of the Thakali, and Khel of the Tharu, which have been going on in the society for centuries, would have had a chance to identify the weak points there and improve them and move forward. But such issues were neither appreciated by the Panchayat, which was brought in as being suitable for the soil, nor by the democratic and democratic system brought under the leadership of the so-called followers of BP.

In the context of the formation of the local level that has been implemented, the government had given the terms of reference and procedure that all the linguistic and ethnic groups in Nepal should be integrated as much as possible according to the National Census, 2068 BS and that a restructuring proposal should be proposed in a way that would ensure their identity, protection, promotion and development. However, the local technical committee at the district level did not give any importance to such provisions. Instead, it recommended structures based on its political interests, which were later recognized by the Local Level Restructuring Commission and have come to the current situation. Even the leaders of the Madhesh and indigenous peoples of Nepal who advocate self-government did not understand this issue or did not want to understand it and continued to advocate for a small number of provinces and large local bodies. On the one hand, the leadership of all the communities who pretend to advocate self-government and on the other hand, demanding that dozens of kilometers of diverse areas, including linguistic and cultural, be called municipalities or provinces, seems responsible for this.

The geographical or demographic shape of a locality or province directly projects the development policy to be taken by the government and the leadership to be elected there. As mentioned above, the development model of Nepal that we are talking about also reflects the restructured political structure. The influence of large wards and municipalities is also evident in the commentary on ‘small and fragmented plans’. While keeping the community away from small plans, the small shops seen in the community will gradually be replaced by big marts and departmental complexes. Similarly, the alleys will be replaced by roads. This will mean that there will be no shops left between 15-20 houses because they will not survive. When local markets and tea shops are displaced, the facilities of schools and health posts provided by the government are gradually being pulled towards larger places, saying that transportation has brought them closer and easier. Such a village has lost its traditional identity and is also modernly unattractive. Earlier, when there were small wards, ward-centered education, health, roads and other infrastructure-centered structures were gradually displaced. Such changes have started to be seen in the context of our local levels. Over time, there was no question of interest in increasing tourism or other attractions in a place that had lost its speciality. After that, migration became common.

Perhaps by assessing these results, BP Koirala has said in the context of development – ​​‘Whatever your political system or theory, if you adopt any (established) model to meet the basic physical needs of the people, it gives rise to those same defects.... It is not possible to develop a country like ours by adopting the American or European model. Such a model gives rise to an affluent class, it increases the same consumerist tendency and the rest of the people also become objects of imitation.’ His statement came as a sarcasm at the policy that the then Soviet Union and China were trying to adopt. According to him, both those countries have failed the theory they have been saying, i.e. Marxism, because they have taken America as a model of development.

‘When Lenin got the opportunity to implement Marxism with great results, he had America as a model of development. He always said – we will find America in twenty-five years. The American model is to run a factory that produces with a large-scale production system. When Russia also imitated the same, that is the root of the failure of Marxism’ – the support or source of BP’s above statement seems to be Gandhi. Gandhi, who emphasized economic self-reliance at the community level, opposed his colleague Nehru’s policy of considering modernization and rapid industrialization as the path to development and rejected it as an inhumane policy and contrary to the needs of the village. Different from Nehru’s policy, the ‘Sarvodaya’ campaign to end poverty in villages through improved agriculture and small cottage industries is the economic campaign propounded by Gandhi. उनले भनेका छन्– ‘हजारौं आत्मनिर्भर समुदायको उदय र अरूलाई अप्ठ्यारो नपर्ने गरी ती समुदायले गर्ने स्वशासनको अभ्यासपछि मात्र भारत स्वाधीन र स्वतन्त्र भएको मान्न सकिन्छ ।