Panchayat

Panchayat 

(from Sanskrit and Hindi pancha, “five”), in southern Asian countries, especially India, an elective committee that administers various corporative organizations, such as castes, subcastes, rural cooperatives, certain types of communal groups, and temples. Both traditional and newly formed associations may be run by panchayats. In India, the village councils that serve as organs of rural self-government are also called panchayats. Despite its name, a panchayat usually consists not of five but of an arbitrary number of members.