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This article examines some theoretical aspects of information transfer and the possibility of distortion in the retransmission process in India. The data from the study demonstrate that there is cleavage in perception of innovations between change agents and their clients, especially those with whom they interact most frequently. These data support propositions derived from studies of serial transmission, suggesting that message distortion occurs. Furthermore, one can infer from these data that distortion may be most severe at an early stage in a series of transmissions and this is also consisted with much serial transmission research. The data indicate that professional change agents disagree in some important respects with their primary clientele with regard to innovations being advocated for further adoption in the study area. It is apparent from these data that any distortion which may occur in this field situation is not systematic in a particular direction. If cleavages of the kind described in the paper are more general in other planned contexts, in agriculture or family planning, or whatever the objectives of the program, then it may well be that further research on message distortion should have a high priority.

This article underscores the strategic importance of the medium-sized population center and its trade area as a unit in national planning. The presentation is placed in a context of development and change by comparing the United States and India in terms of the problem of rural-urban balance. Town and city patterns of population growth are traced in historical perspective and the emerging role of the medium-sized locality is examined within the context of town and country problems, national policies, programs and strategies of development in the two countries. Finally, community images and ideology are briefly described and some critical public issues and needed areas of research pointed up. This article analyzes the relation between local initiative and development planning in the particular cultural and institutional setting of Zambia. Development planning has been taken as an accepted technique for modem political systems. It subscribes to the thesis that the success of development planning depends upon the interdependence of local initiative and development planning, as this facilitates the process of identification.

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The article focuses on issues related to the training of international rural sociologists. Rural sociology is in its early infancy in India. Its separate existence is rarely recognized. Most of the work done towards the study of rural society in India has gradually evolved through several stages. One such stage is a general study of rural communities or villages as a whole from an administrative point of view. Sociologists Charles Metcalfe, Henry Maine and Baden-Powell pioneered the way for such studies. The Research Projects Committee of the Planning Commission of India also initiated a number of sociological studies pertaining to rural society and covering economic development, social welfare and public administration. Other research organizations worthy of mention in this respect are the Indian Agricultural Research Institute, Programme Evaluation Organization, Planning Research and Action Institute, Lucknow, India, and the National Institute for Study and Research on Community Development.