Examine how digital platforms like eGramSwaraj have changed bottom-up planning through GPDPs. What gaps remain?

Article 243G asks Gram Panchayats (GPs) to prepare plans for economic development and social justice. They do this through annual Gram Panchayat Development Plans (GPDPs). eGramSwaraj is one portal for planning, accounting, monitoring and payments, and it has moved GPDPs from paper to data [1]. Digitisation has changed how plans are made. Whether GPs can carry them out still depends on what States devolve.

How eGramSwaraj has changed GPDP planning

• Near-universal coverage: 2,53,992 GPs uploaded GPDPs for 2025-26 [1]. Village planning is now routine rather than occasional.
• Fiscal transparency: 94.37% of GPs make payments through the eGramSwaraj–PFMS interface [1]. This leaves a real-time audit trail and reduces cash leakage.
• Convergence: village priorities are matched to Central and State schemes on the portal. PM-VGSY adds "digital handholding" for evidence-based planning, aiming at 2.55 lakh GPDPs [3].
• Capacity: the national Capacity Enhancement score in MoPR's Devolution Index rose from 44.01 to 54.63 [2].

Gaps that remain

• Functions: States decide which of the 29 Eleventh Schedule subjects they hand over. "Functions" has the lowest national average among the Devolution Index dimensions [2]. A plan that covers subjects never devolved stays a wish-list.
• Funds: tied grants are not released once a sector is already saturated through other schemes. GPs also have weak own-source revenue [4]. So a GPDP may list a road or a school wall with no untied money to pay for it.
• Functionaries: one panchayat secretary often serves four to five panchayats [5]. That leaves too little staff time to run the portal properly.
• Upload is not outcome: the portal records that a plan was uploaded. It does not show whether the plan was funded or carried out.
• Uneven States: Karnataka (72.23) leads the index [2]. Weaker States get less out of the same digital tools.
• Participation: poor connectivity and digital literacy can move planning away from the Gram Sabha to a data-entry operator.

eGramSwaraj has made GPDPs universal, transparent and linked to schemes. Real bottom-up planning still needs all three Fs: functions, funds and functionaries. The way forward is:

• a dedicated panchayat cadre [5];
• converting unused tied grants into untied grants [4];
• performance grants linked to own-source revenue [5];
• judging GPDPs by outcomes, not uploads.

Together these would fulfil the 73rd Amendment's vision and SDG 16.7 (responsive, participatory decision-making).