Seventeenth International Conference on New Directions in the Humanities

Abstract

Within the rural hinterlands there are schemes and policies related to providing various developmental objectives to be achieved which are directed towards electricity, building roads, which will help in connectivity, as well as in providing safe drinking water. The difficulties begin when such provisions do not end up providing the expected outcome which in turn effects the communities. What happens when the communities residing there have always been on the side of the exploited? Or do they end up taking the matters into their own hands and approach the state themselves rather than being just beneficiaries of state provisions. Such is the case of the community living in the village Mohgoan. This paper focuses on on-going action research that has been taken up as a part of the course work in Mphil Development Practice of Ambedkar University, Delhi, in a village named Mohgoan, Karanjia Block, Dindori District, Madhya Pradesh, India, inhabited and dominated by the Gond community, where discussions around issues of ‘sarak’ and connectivity point towards understanding the role of citizenship and nature of infrastructure, gender, religion, and development that are being put forth by agents for the development of rural areas.