The respect she commands is visible as she takes quick and determined steps along the lanes of Changa in Gujarat's Kheda district. Passers-by greet her, some approach her with complaints and children call out to her aloud. At 24, Sudha Patel is the youngest sarpanch in the country and the first blind person to be elected to the office.

Sudha even wears jeans to work but the villagers do not mind it. "We want her to win the next election, too," says Haridas Patel of Changa.

Born blind, Sudha has a sharp ear and a keen sense of direction. She recognises villagers by their voice and is familiar with all the narrow bylanes in Changa, particularly those which lead to the panchayat office. And she is gifted with a phenomenal memory. She can rattle off dates, events, conversations and the exact time of events that happened years ago.

If she has one regret it is that she was unable to see the applause she got when she received the Outstanding Person of the World award recently in Hawaii. "More than 10,000 people from all over the world were there and I missed the emotions, I wanted to share my feelings with them and see them," she said.

Spotting Sudha's house in Changa, 120 km from Ahmedabad, is not difficult; anybody would lead you to the sarpanch's home. Sudha owes her success to her family, her mother is a housewife and father, who was a sarpanch for 10 years, runs a food business along with Sudha's brother. Radha, Sudha's sister, is also blind and goes to college.

If her parents have been a source of encouragement, the Patels in Vidyanagar, a 45-minute drive from Changa, have been her source of inspiration. She met Ramesh and Usha Patel, whom she calls uncle and aunty, when she was doing her MA in Hindi at the Sardar Patel University in Anand. The Patels had been working in England and Africa for 12 years before they set up Purvaee, an English institute and a human welfare mission, in Vidyanagar and settled down there. "Sudha came to us to learn English, but fell ill," said the Patels. "We realised that she was very talented but she feared exams." The Patels motivated her and Sudha passed with a first class, making her the first blind post-graduate from the university. Sudha, who also has a degree in Law from the university, is now working for a doctorate in Hindi. Three days a week she is away in Anand studying.

When in Changa Sudha is in the panchayat office at 9.30 a.m. accompanied by her rakhi brother Pankaj Dave. Always by her side, Pankaj helps her check the documents, applications and files before she signs them.

"I had never dreamt that I would become a sarpanch," said Sudha, who beat seven other contestants to the post in June 1995. It was her 21st birthday; Sudha had never before celebrated her birthday and the bash was her uncle Ramesh Patel's idea. "During the party, my father called and said that people in Changa want you to be the sarpanch," said Sudha. She was hesitant; she had not lived in the village much, was "blind and a woman from an ordinary family". But Ramesh would not listen.

"But I am not going to stand again," she said. She believes that the young and non-corrupt should take part in the system instead of criticising it from outside and "would like to contest the MLA or MP's post from Anand in the next election".

Sudha's was a unique campaign. No money was spent and the Patels' students canvassed for her. Said Ramesh: "Just after she won, those opposing her raised an issue of water scarcity. There was some violence. Sudha kept her cool, called the police and within 15 minutes things were sorted out."

But Sudha had a tough time convincing her parents that she could handle the crisis. It was a near-riot situation and her father had asked her to resign. "I told my father that this is my fate and I will solve my own problem," she said.

The Helen Keller of Changa didn't make tall promises during her campaign. "I asked them to have faith in me and that I will work for them."

She did. "We needed Rs 4 lakh for development work, I got Rs 2 lakh from the government and Rs 2 lakh from the Panchayat," said Sudha. "We installed several water pumps to overcome the water scarcity."

Changa, when Sudha took over as sarpanch, had been showing steady progress thanks to the contribution from its NRI population of Patels in the US and the UK. Several projects including family planning programmes, an open school for the workers' children and new borewells were taken up at Sudha's own initiative and she has rented out eight village lakes to companies to generate income, up to Rs 8 lakh, for Changa. A village of 493 families and most of them educated till class 10, Changa today has a hospital, conference halls and several schools with computers.

Sudha often lives with the Patels, whose children are away in the US. "They have spent so much money on me. I always consult them when I have a problem," she said. It was the Patels who accompanied her to Hawaii and then on a tour to the US and the UK. The trips abroad, including Bangkok a couple of months ago to attend the Asian blind women's conference as part of the Indian delegation, made her realise that the disabled in India have very few concessions compared to their foreign counterparts. "In India the parents don't know how to treat their disabled children; there is no education and information available," said Sudha.

Usha and Ramesh Patel accompanied Sudha to Hawaii to receive the Outstanding Person of the World award.

She has a rehabilitation project for the blind and the mentally handicapped in her panchayat comprising 85 villages. The door-to-door project trains parents in handling their children and teaches children and adults to educate and rehabilitate themselves. "We teach them to be economically independent. I have also taken up several honorary projects for the blind," said Sudha. All this leaves her with very little time for herself though her interests include music, theatre and playing cricket. When not in office she is out in the panchayat, meeting people, attending weddings, making condolence visits and meeting the sick.

It is no surprise when the villagers proclaim that Sudha is the best thing that has happened to Changa. Said Haridas Patel of Changa, "Whether she likes it or not, we want her to win the next election, too." Sudha goes around in jeans, dresses and salwar kameez, unusual for a village sarpanch. "The villagers have made concessions for me," smiled Sudha.

However, she does not like it when people take pity on her. "But I know they are only sympathetic, it is psychological," she said. For strength and inspiration Sudha looks up to Gandhi and the Buddha, "as he had a scientific reason for everything and said that you don't have to believe everything." And then Kiran Bedi, "she has lot of moral courage and is not scared".

Being alone and a woman with a handicap has often not been to her advantage. "Once a man tried to be very friendly," said Sudha recounting the occasion when she showed her presence of mind. "I told him very nicely, I know you like me but at the bus stand my uncle is going to pick me up. I faked it and he immediately backed off. There is no point in getting angry and fighting."

Grooming Sudha has not been easy for the Patels. "Sudha is very intelligent with an independent mind," they said. "She has her bursts of anger, frustrations, and can be very insulting. But we are committed to her."

Though Sudha tries to forget her disability, she misses reading and doing things on her own. All the same, she has 25 poems, on themes varying from the ills of tobacco, selfish human values, family situations, love, peace and violence, and two short stories to her credit. "I prefer not to think about my handicap, it makes me unhappy and depressed and mad."

The vivacious sarpanch may need a lot of motivation. But for now she knows how to find her way.