Village Development Boards (VDBs) in Nagaland

This article describes the constitution and functions of village development boards (VDBs) in Nagaland.The VDB is a statutory body, synonymous with the concept of decentralized grass root level planning in Nagaland. VDBs are involved in all phases of developmental activities. These include receipt of funds, allocation, selection of beneficiaries or schemes, and monitoring progress of schemes. VDB funds are available to all villages and are used for schemes that benefit the entire community. Basic VDB objectives include:

• Making each VDB vibrant, with powers to take decisions and implement schemes;
• Enabling VDBs to mobilize internal resources for investment in various income generating and economically productive activities;
• Checking migration of educated unemployed rural youth to towns by ensuring self-employment opportunities;
• Gradually helping rural areas access basic facilities.

Several major schemes have been successfully implemented in Nagaland through the involvement of VDBs. The VDB approach, if successful, would ensure that grass root level organizations would control the credit/loan mechanism. Finally, there is a need to study the various types of innovative fundings and microenterprises financed through the VDB model to understand its impact.