Abstract
The present paper focuses on the idea of village in the Indian context and chronicles the various identical transformations it underwent during the colonial times and especially during the freedom movement of India. The paper studies how during the nationalist movement, the idea of village became central to the idea of ‘India’ in the attempt to critique the colonial regime and its means and ways. The paper studies the idea of village from the points of view of two of the most crucial figures of the Indian freedom struggle and the shapers of the independent India, Mahatma Gandhi and B. R. Ambedkar. Mahatma Gandhi was a strong proponent of the idea that India could achieve svaraj or Independence only by focusing more and more on its rural life and areas and also candidly pointed out the shortcomings of the contemporary Indian villages for their betterment. The paper also provides an overview of the influence of Gandhi’s views on village on Gujarati as well as Indian literature in English. On one hand where Gandhi’s views of village were a democratic one, B. R. Ambedkar’s views came from the viewpoint of the oppressed. For him, the village represented the microcosm of upper-caste dominance in which the Dalits had no place. Hence, the paper also throws lights on a different view of village than of Gandhi, one of the subaltern’s view.
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