Abstract: The Village Panchayat or elected council had large powers, both executive and judicial. The land was distributed by this panchayat. In the time of the Rigveda (1700 BC), evidence suggests that self-governing village bodies called 'sabhas' existed. The panchayat was destroyed by the East India Company when it was granted the office of Diwan in 1765 in Bengal by the Mughal Emperor. The Royal Commission on Decentralization (1907) under the chairmanship of C.E.H. Hobhouse recognized the importance of panchayat at the village level. At least in part to provide the Gandhiji goal of direct political participation of people at the grass root level, in 1956, the National Development Council appointed a committee under Balwant Rai Mehta, which submitted its report in 1957 in which it recommended. The 73rd Amendment to the Constitution enacted in 1992 added a new part-IX to the Constitution. It also added a new XI schedule containing a list of 29 functional items for Panchyat and made statutory provisions for the establishment, empowerment, and functioning of Panchayat Raj institutions. Some provisions of this amendment are binding on the States, while others have been left to be decided by respective State Legislatures at their discretion