Negotiating Authority at the Margins: Tribal Women’s Political Empowerment, Capacity Deficits, and AI-Enabled Governance in Jharkhand’s Panchayati Raj Institutions

The Constitution of India (73rd Constitutional Amendment) requires that women be reserved a place in Panchayati Raj Institutions (PRIs), but there is a huge disparity between women representation and political power, especially for the women of STs who are marginalised on two fronts – gender and ethnic. This paper records the major fieldwork done from June to November 2025 in Mandar Block, Ranchi district, Jharkhand. The study focuses on the quality of political participation of the elected tribal women leaders of Oraon tribe (Mukhya, Up-Mukhya and Panchayat Samiti Members), constraints faced by them in exercising political role, role of information and communication technologies (ICTs) in their political functioning and how their political role has changed over time. These women are afforded the ability to exercise substantive agency (to do their own development work, to campaign for their administrative rights and to challenge the implicit assumption of proxy leadership) but their power is invariably constrained, both because they enjoy limited formal education and because of time poverty, mobility barriers, bureaucratic gender bias and the rising digital divide. The study also shows that the traditional governance system – parallel, which is perceived as non-conflictual, allows the community to work together. Given the results of this study, this paper recommends that AI tools built with a genuinely co-participatory, vernacular-based approach can have some real value as a capacity development tool that can lessen the literacy barrier to access to digital governance; and can provide low-stakes, confidence-building spaces. The implications or ethics of using AI in this case are discussed.