Peasant Movement Essay Example

of the Peasant Movement 1) To summarise, we find that the land question still remains the major question in many areas. However, as the degree of implementation of land reforms differs from one state to another, the general slogan of advancing land reforms also takes different forms in different states.

2) Establishing people’s control over common property such as minor irrigation sources (Ahar, Pokhar, Talab etc. , rivers and sandbanks etc. is a major agenda of struggle. Generally, feudals and mafia groups exercise control over them. 3) The questions of wages, equal wages for equal work for men and women, better working conditions, homestead land and pucca houses etc. are more or less common demands of the rural proletariat throughout the country. In the case of land grants it should be demanded that pattas should be issued in the names of both men and women. ) Issues of corruption in panchayats, in block offices where money intended for relief to the rural poor or for the benefit of small and middle peasants is siphoned off by corrupt officials in league with powerful landlords and kulak groups who also control the political power are very important in popular mobilisation.

5) Tribal questions, whether they are reflected through the Jharkhand movement or in the movements of hill districts and other tribal areas of Assam, or in the girijan movement in Andhra Pradesh etc. re essentially peasant questions, and therefore usurpation of tribal land by usurers/merchants, rights over forest land and forest produce etc. , are major questions in these areas. 6) Wherever the movement assumes intensity, private armies of landlords or the goons of the reactionary political parties resort

to killing Party leaders and cadres and organise massacres of people. Police atrocities also invariably follow.

7) Anarchist organisations which are degenerating into money-collecting machines are indulging in a killing-spree of our cadres and people, and are using ultra-left rhetoric to the hilt to cover up their dubious links and their dirty mission of disrupting organised mass movements. Marwar farmers’ movement The farmers of the Marwar region are considered to be the most simple in the state of Rajasthan. The most dominating farmer community in the rural areas of Marwar is Jat. The Jats are politically and economically very sound.

The major land holdings in the present times are with Jats. Though the position of Kisan (farmer) in what was Khalsa (under the direct control of the state) was better in comparison to a Kisan of the Jagir areas, he was only a little above a beast of burden. In Jagir areas of Marwar state before independence all cultivators were really landless. There was no tenancy Law and one could be thrown away from the land one cultivated at the pleasure of Jagirdar, his "malik". In most of the Jagirs a Jagirdar would in the first instance be taking fifty percent of the produce.

This would be taken by actual division of the produce on the thrashing floor or by appraisal of the standing crop (kunta). The latter method proved at times more onerous as the appraisal depended on the whims of the Kamdar. Then over and above the share of the produce the farmer had to pay numerous "lags" or cesses. There were 64 kinds of begars (work without pay) prevalent in Marwar. Then the bigger Jagirdars

had judicial powers including magisterial powers. Further they had their own police force besides the revenue staff. This enabled them to keep their stronghold on the farmers.

Over and above this policy of divide and rule was fully practiced. By offering the temptation of giving better land for cultivation one farmer would be set against another. There were no schools worth the name in rural areas and the masses were steeped in ignorance. The oppression of the public by traditional Samantas (chiefs) and Jagirdars (feudatories) of Marwar state made their life difficult, which led to a class war. In urban areas, Jaynarayan Vyas started agitation against oppression, under the banner of "Marwar Lok Parishad" founded on 16 May 1938. This movement was supported by National Congress.

The persons who played important role in "Marwar Lok Parishad" were: Shiv Dayal Dave and Jorawar Singh Oswal of Nagaur, Rajpurohit Manji Jagarwal of Bagra, Marwar (Jalore District), Kishanlal Sahu, Manak Chand Konari and Sari Mal of Kuchaman City, Tulsiram of Didwana, Srikishan Pandit of Kolia and Sukhdev Dipankar of Ladnu. Rural masses of Marwar were united by Kisan Kesari-Baldev Ram Mirdha under the banner of "Marwar Kisan Sabha" founded in 1940. After the formation of Rajasthan, Baldev Ram Mirdha who had by then retired from Government service formed the "Rajathan Kisan Sabha" and unified the Kisans of Rajasthan under its banner.

He was its first president. Since the broad objectives of the Kisan Sabha and the congress were identical the congress leaders approached Baldev Ram Mirdha to unite the Rajasthan Kisan Sabha with the Congress. Baldev Ram Mirdha was a visionary and he realized that the two could not and should

not remain separate. Therefore, he just made one demand from the national leaders that the Jagirs be abolished forthwith in Rajasthan. This was agreed to by the Congress high command with the result that the Jagirs were soon abolished. A tenancy law was passed and the cultivating farmers were made the owners of the land.