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The use of social network theories dates back to 1930s with the pioneering works of psycho-sociologist Moreno. With the advent of advanced technologies, there has been an explosion of its applications to various disciplines. The study applies social network theory to analyze agricultural knowledge exchange and decision-making network of farm women. The analysis identifies farm women who occupy central and strategic positions and acts as opinion leaders in the network. The study was carried out in the Himalayan regions of Uttarakhand, India. Descriptive research design and multi-stage sampling were adopted. A total of 298 respondents were selected purposively from the two villages of Uttarakhand. Data were collected through survey sociometric method. UCINET and SPSS were used for data analysis and interpretations. The findings showed that high in degree and Out degree centrality was recorded by 24 (12, 12) and 48 (26, 22) farm women in the two study villages. Total 24 opinion leaders were identified within the agricultural knowledge exchange and decision-making network. Their extent of opinion leadership was influenced by age, marital status, farming experience, socio-economic status, innovativeness, achievement motivation, decision making ability, risk preference, economic motivation, information seeking behaviour, cosmopoliteness and social participation.

The rural agrarian economy of Uttarakhand rests on the shoulders of the women especially rural women in the hill district of the state. The development of the hill regions of Uttarakhand is dependent on both technology generation and technology dissemination as per the needs of the target groups i. e. farm women in the farming system (Mettric, 1993). For effective dissemination of information and technology, the combined effort of extension personnel along with the opinion leaders is a critical component of any developmental strategy. The present investigation aims to identify opinion leaders among farm women in hill districts of Uttarakhand, who may not only enhance the pace of development by ensuring effective extension but can also play a significant role to promote development initiatives at various levels especially in agriculture and allied sectors. Besides, the present study analyzes the extent to which opinion leadership is exhibited by these opinion leaders in the study area. Total 24 farm women were identified as opinion leaders with high in-degree centrality scores and occupying the central positions in the communication network. While, the maximum percentage of the opinion leaders (58.34%) showed low opinion leadership followed by 25 per cent and 16.66 percent of opinion leaders who had high and low opinion leadership respectively.