Analyze the land reform’s effects in the years following independence with a critical eye.
Dalits are those groups of people who have faced social discrimination including the untouchability. They largely belong to the economically disadvantaged groups of our society. Dalit movement raises issues of caste-based discrimination and economic inequality. It is a struggle for social justice. TRead more
Dalits are those groups of people who have faced social discrimination including the untouchability. They largely belong to the economically disadvantaged groups of our society. Dalit movement raises issues of caste-based discrimination and economic inequality. It is a struggle for social justice. There is no single unified Dalit movement in the country either in the past or in the present. Different movements highlighted different issues related to Dalits based on different ideologies. The common thread however among all the movements is all of them assert a Dalit identity.
Dalit Movements During Pre Independence Period
- During the pre-Independence period, there were Dalit movements at both levels in India – the national and the provincial. At the national level M K Gandhi and Dr B R Ambedkar attempted to take up the problems of Dalits. But Ambedkar and Gandhi followed different approaches to solve them.
- Gandhi found untouchability as a corrupt form of Hinduism and suggested that it can be solved by moral reform of the Hindus. He coined the term “Harijans” with the purpose to say that Dalits or untouchables were also “people of God” like those of the high castes.
- Dr B R Ambedkar, on the other hand, saw the real cause of untouchability in the very nature of Hinduism and believed that unless the caste system is destroyed the social evil of untouchability cannot end and that it is possible only if Dalits acquire power. Hence in 1942, he formed the All India Scheduled Caste Federation (AISCF).
- At provincial levels, there were also single caste movements in different parts of India – of Nadars, Pulayas, Ezhavas in South; of Namsudra movement in West Bengal; Adi Darm movement led by Mangu Ram of Punjab. 5. Narayana Guru led a movement among the Ezhavas in Travancore and Ayyankali- led a movement among the Pulayas of Kerala. These movements were committed to self-reform in the rituals, advancement of their education, gaining access to employment under the state.
Dalit Movements During Pre Independence Period
- Republican Party of India (RPI) – RPI was formed based on the ideas and principles of Ambedkar. In the late 1950s and 1960s, RPI launched a cultural and political movement in UP and Maharashtra for achieving political and cultural autonomy from the dominant formations. A large number of Dalits converted to Buddhism.
- Dalit Panther – An educated group of Dalits – young Dalit writers and poets, from Maharastra set up an organisation known as Dalit Panther in 1972. Influenced by Amedkarism, Marxism and “Negro literature”, they aimed at rejecting the caste system, which according to them was based on the Brahminical Hinduism.
- Bahujan Samaj Party – The formation of the BSP by Kanshi Ram in 1984 marks a new beginning in the history of Dalit mobilisation and politics in the country. The BSP has not only succeeded in establishing a stronghold in some states in northern India but it has also been able to form governments in the critically important state of Uttar Pradesh.
- The post-independence movements saw Dalits consciously distancing themselves from patronizing politics of upper caste. The period of 1970s saw the popularization of the word Dalit as a critique of the term Harijan.
- The term “Dalit” referred to those who have broken, ground down by those above them ”, in a deliberate way there is in the word itself a denial of pollution, karma and justified hierarchy.
- The post-Ambedkar Dalit movement had revolutionary practice. It ranged from providing alternative ways of living, changes in behaviour such as giving up beef, to religious conversions.
- While the pre-independence movements by many reformers were mostly focused on reforming the existing caste system and in creating space for Dalits in that system, post independence movements ranged from reform the caste to abolishing the system altogether.
Dalit movements cannot be explained satisfactorily by referring only to economic exploitation or political oppression. The movement at its core is a struggle for recognition of fellow human beings. Dalit mobilisation and movements in India have helped in the virtual disappearance of untouchability in urban areas and in rural areas that it has declined drastically. It helped in creating awareness among Dalits about their Political rights. But still, there is a need for greater participation, assertion and mobilisation of Dalits at the all India level for the complete annihilation of Caste.
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Land reforms refer to a series of policy measures taken by the government of India after independence, to regulate ownership, operation, and leasing of land. Nearly two centuries of British revenue policy has caused extreme indebtedness of farmers, land fragmentation, increase in income inequality iRead more
Land reforms refer to a series of policy measures taken by the government of India after independence, to regulate ownership, operation, and leasing of land. Nearly two centuries of British revenue policy has caused extreme indebtedness of farmers, land fragmentation, increase in income inequality in rural India, less productivity, and stagnation of agriculture. After independence, the government of India took up issues of farmers on mission mode and initiated a series of reforms to rid Indian agriculture of feudalistic and exploitative agrarian structure.
Evaluation Of Land Reforms
1.Abolition of Intermediaries: Abolition of zamindari and similar intermediary tenures during 1950-55 essentially involved the removal of intermediaries between state and actual cultivators. a.
i. It led to the large-scale eviction of poor tenants from land. While landlordism has been abolished, absentee landlordism now continues to flourish. ii. The legislation conferred ownership rights not upon the actual cultivator, but on the statutory tenant, who himself was an intermediary with a chain of sub-tenants under him. c. Assessment: Thus, the abolition of intermediary rights on land has been a mixed blessing. Undoubtedly, this zamindari abolition has paved the way for a remarkable shift in the balance of power. But the goal of “land to the tiller” was not achieved. 2. Tenancy reforms: These reforms include, regulation of rent, providing security of tenure, and conferring rights of ownership for tenants.
Positives of this measure
This policy mandated that the Rent payable to the landowners should not exceed one-fifth to one-fourth of the gross produce of the land. In the light of this guideline, all the states have enacted laws for the fixation of rent. A very important aspect of tenancy reform is the conferment of ownership rights to tenants. This reform resulted in nearly 124.2 lac tenants getting ownership rights.
Issues with this measure
There existed a large-scale inter-state variation in rents fixed by the states. Due to a loose definition of the term personal cultivation, landowners continued to resume land for self-cultivation and evicted the tenants despite it being illegal. These reforms have failed to regulate rents because of the poor position of land-hungry farmers. Conferment of ownership also failed as only tenants operating in 4 percent of land got ownership rights. Assessment: Overall impact of tenancy reforms has been rather limited. Legislation for conferment of ownership rights could not yield good results because many tenants are incapable of buying land from the landowners and many of them are unwilling to do so. 3.Ceiling on Landholdings: To reduce the existing disparities in the pattern of land-ownership and make some land available for distribution to landless agricultural workers, the imposition of ceilings on agricultural holdings above a certain limit was envisaged. Positives of this measure: Till 2001, the total amount of land declared surplus was 73.67 lakh acres, 64.95 lakh acres of land had been taken over by the states. A total of 53.79 lakh acres of land have been distributed among 54.84 lakh tenants. Issues with this measure: In the second phase of this reform that started after 1972, ceiling limits have also been lowered. Besides this, the exemption for orchards, grazing land, religious/charitable/educational trusts, sugarcane plantations, tanks, fisheries have made the ceiling laws virtually redundant. Assessment of this measure: The operations of the ceiling law made virtually no impact on the agrarian structure. The public debate preceding this law over several years enabled landowners to manipulate land records. 4. Consolidation of Landholdings: Fragmented and subdivided landholdings, as well as small sized holdings, have made Indian agriculture unremunerative. So consolidation of these lands was necessary to boost efficiency and economy in India’s agriculture. This process till now is completed only in very few states, prominent among them being Punjab, Haryana, and Uttar Pradesh. One of the reasons for the tardy progress of this aspect of land reforms is that small farmers have a strong fear that consolidation favours large farmers.
Impact Of Land Reforms
After more than 70 years of independence, one notices some achievements in the sphere of land reforms. At the same time, our efforts in this direction have not yielded desired results. Most of the planks of land reform measures are ambivalent and there are large gaps between policy and legislation and between legislation and implementation.
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