SOME ASPECTS OF BRITISH LAND REVENUE POLICY AND THE INDIAN NATIONAL

CONGRESS IN THE 1890s

Author(s): P. K. Shukla
Source: Proceedings of the Indian History Congress , 1978, Vol. 39, Volume II (1978), pp.
790-796
Published by: Indian History Congress
Stable URL: https://www.jstor.org/stable/44139425

JSTOR is a not-for-profit service that helps scholars, researchers, and students discover, use, and build upon a wide
range of content in a trusted digital archive. We use information technology and tools to increase productivity and
facilitate new forms of scholarship. For more information about JSTOR, please contact support@jstor.org.

Your use of the JSTOR archive indicates your acceptance of the Terms & Conditions of Use, available at
https://about.jstor.org/terms

Indian History Congress is collaborating with JSTOR to digitize, preserve and extend access to
Proceedings of the Indian History Congress

This content downloaded from

111.68.97.179 on Tue, 12 Dec 2023 03:45:52 +00:00
All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms
 SOME ASPECTS OF BRITISH LAND REVENUE POLICY AND
THE INDIAN NATIONAL CONGRESS IN THE 1890s

P. K. Shukla

The land revenue policy introduced by the British in India brought

about a drastic change in the existing land system and "grafted new
ties and property right into the existing framework of production."1
Prompted either by "the foice of subconscious ideology and practical
need to stabilize the land system"2 or by the colonial needs of the
Empire, British authorities in India created two forms of private pro-
pert/ in land : landlordism in some parts of the country and in other
individual peasant proprietorship. In all provinces except Bengal
government was "the landlord and all other people were rayats."3
It is to be noted that while the British superseded the traditional
rights of the village community over the village land by introducing
successively land tax and tenure systems in Zamindari and rayatwari
areas, they at the same time preserved many feuldal survivals in the
Indian social system.

In one way or another the distinctions between the three basic

systems of land revenue in India during the colonial rule mirrored the
pattern of relations in land ownership in the different regions of the
country. Marx, for example, regarded the Zamindari system as big
landed proprietorship, the rayatwari system as petty individual, and
principally, peasant land ownership, and the system of village taxation
in the North Western Provinces (Doab) as communal land ownership.
When exposing the British land revenue policy in India, he called the
Zamindari and rayatwari systems "caricatures on private land owner-
ship." Though distinctions in the different land systems were of some
significance "there was more similarity than distinctions in the condi-
tions of the peasants in different areas of India."4 New legislations
(the Rent Act of 1859 and Bengal Tenancy Act of 1885) were not
designed to increase the production but to create "a class that had
no role to play apart from collection of rents from the government
and for themselves."5

This content downloaded from

111.68.97.179 on Tue, 12 Dec 2023 03:45:52 +00:00
All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms
 791

In the second half of the 19th century, particularly in the 1890s,

a new development took place which further aggravated the agrarian
crisis in India. The development was the "communications revolution
and increassed competition for labour."6 It began to loosen the hold
of rich farmers over predial labour. The rich peasent began to be
comfortably sandwitched between pressure from above and below.
The period under discussion also coincided with the thirty-year revis-
ion of the land revenue demand in Northern, Central and Western
India. For the first time there was significant questioning of the
discretionary and authoritaiin character of direct British administration.
The Swadeshamitran of Madras (1900) stressed the need for the
permanent assessment of land revenue in India and attributed the
frequent occurrence of famines to the imposition of heavy tax on the
cultivating classes. Though it was very difficult to estimate the net
produce of land, the settlement officers without considering the
several incidental expenses of the rayats calculated the assessment
on "no definite princ¡ple,", and thus caused much loss to the rayats
and profit to the government.
Ths cry against the land revenue policy of the government was
taken up by Indian leaders. Realising the importance of agriculture
in the country and the hardships caused to the rayats by periodical
settlements the 4th Session of the Indian National Congress (1888)
referred the matter to the standing committee who were to report to
the Congress in 1889. But the attention of the Congress during the
period was drawn to the fixity and permanence of the land revenue
demand so as to permit "capital and labour to combine to develop
the agriculture of the country."8 Besides, the leaders of the Congress
pleaded for the extension of permanent settlement to other areas of
the country which were afflicted by devastating famines. S. N.
Banerjee, while advocating the introduction by the permanent settle-
ment of land revenue in India, argued that" it was a guarantee
against the recurrence of famines."' Madan Mohan Malaviya said
that the "permanent settlement is extremely desirable".10 The
National Congress, at its Nagpur Session held in 1891, pronounced
that the prevalence of poverty and starvation in the country was due
to a shortsighted system of land revenue administration. Not a single
year passed from 1888 to 1903 whithout the Congress passing résolu-

This content downloaded from

111.68.97.179 on Tue, 12 Dec 2023 03:45:52 +00:00
All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms
 792

tions on one or the other aspect of the land revenue administration.

The nationalist criticism of land assessment was transformed into a
campaign by R C Dutt who was spurred on by the devastating
famines occurring at the turn of the 20th century. In a series of articles
and speeches culminating in his famous 'Open Letters' to Curzon in
1900 and publication of the two-volume-fconom/c History of India,
Dutt repeatedly criticised the land revenue system. Dutt received
support from G. V. Joshi and J. Parekh. Many other Indian public
men and newspapers traced the decay of agriculture and the poverty
of the peasant to the administration of land revenue. But their
criticism was largely confined to the system of land assessment in
Bombay.
It was in 1902 that Curzon wrote the epitaph of the rent doctrine
known as the Land Revenue Policy of th8 Indian Government.
According to the Resolution of 1902 the government took notice of
only some aspects of the land revenue questions involving hardship
to the poorer landholders. The government of India claimed to have
established the following propositions which for the sake of conveni-
ence may be summarized.
(1) A permanent settlement whether in Bengal or elsewhere is no
protection against the incidence and consequences of famine; (2) In
areas where the state receives its land revenue from landlords, modera-
tion is the key note of the policy of the government; the standard of
50£percent is one which is almost uniformly observed in practice, and
is more often departed from on the side of deficiency than of excess;
(3) In the same areas the State has not objected to interfere by
legislation to protect the interest of the tenants against the opposi-
tion of the landlords. (4) In areas where the State takes the land
revenue from the cultivators, the proposal to fix the assessment
at one-fifth of the gross produce would result in the imposition of a
greatly increased burden upon the people, (5) The policy of long term
settlements is gradually being extended, the exceptions being justified
by conditions of local development, (6) The simlification and cheape-
ning of the proceedings connected with new settlements and the
avoidance of the army of subordinate officials are part of the delibe-
rate policy of Government (7) That assessments have ceased to be
made upon prospective assets (8) Local taxation as a whole is neither

This content downloaded from

111.68.97.179 on Tue, 12 Dec 2023 03:45:52 +00:00
All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms
 793

immoderate nor burdensome (9) Over assessment is not a general or

widespread source of poverty and indebtedness in India and it can
not fairly be regarded as a contributory cause of famine.
The Government of India further laid down liberal principles for
future guidance in respect of (10) The progressive and graduated
imposition of large enhancements; (11) greater elasticity in the land
revenue collection, facilitating its adjustment to the variations of the
seasons, and the circumstance of the people, and a more general
resort to reduction of assessment in cases of local deterioration,
where such reduction cannot be claimed under the terms of
settlement.

The elaborate document, partly historical and partly analytic

contains stal istical information on the subject, pieced together fro
the official point of view. It was more in the spirit of self def
than of self assessment. The Resolution laid emphasis on the rig
of the State, its share in the growth of national income and the leg
contract with the rayat. The government was presented in the
character of a private landlord. Thus the Resolution reiterated the
official theory that the cultivating classess suffered due to the fickle
nature of the monsoons in India.
The nationalist contention on the other hand was that the
government's assessments were very high and left no surplus wi
the cultivator. Though the government claimed that settlement
officer's were inclined to be lenient in assessment, reality was to the
contrary. The accurrancy of the mass of facts supplied by local
administration was doubted. "These facts, no doubt are collected in
the statistical or Revenue Department or both" and were "never
tested."14

There wpre despatches and resolutions- one set for the public,
the other for the inner circle. Each province issued every year a
veriety of publications, giving a variety of information. Among such
reports were those on land revenue assessments. The general attitute
towards the Land Resolution was "one of extreme reservation."14
The Kaiser- E Hind of Bombay urged the desirability of appointing a
commission of non-official experts to inquire into the question. R.C.
Dutt gave the first reply to Curzon's Land Resolution of 1902. He
was of the opinion that since within a period of over a hundred years

This content downloaded from

111.68.97.179 on Tue, 12 Dec 2023 03:45:52 +00:00
All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms
 794

there was no famine in permanently settled Bengal causing loss of

life, the system of permanent settlement should be extended to other
provinces of India.
As to the exact nature of the Congress demand for extension of
permanent settlement to other areas the nationalist leaders expressed
their views on this issue vaguely and variably. Even R C. Dutt can
be quoted to support the permanent Zamindari settlement at one time
and permanent rayatwari settlement at another time. The emphasis
of the Congress leaders on the permanent Zamindari settlement or
permanent rayatwari settlement might have been different with diffe-
rent leaders at different points of time, but the tenure-type of settle-
ment never crystallised into a big issue for the Congress. What the
nationalists really opposed was the frequent revision of assessments
but not the wholesale transformation of the institution of the exploita-
tion. They never attacked the system which created landed property
based on monopoly by certain persons to the exclusion of all others.
We notice two basic tenets of the official stand points :

(a) an insular view of the land revenue problem, and (b) a

technological bias for agricultural development. The insular view
implied that the land revenue policy was analysed in isolation from
the problem of general economic backwardness associated with the
colonial domination. It also implied that attempts to overcome the
general economic backwardness were unaccompanied by efforts
to improve industrialization The technological bias on the other
hand was reflected in the tendency to view the state of economy
unrelated to the effects of an agrarian institutional framework. The
fundamental unity of the economic ideas of the nationalist struggle
lay in the examination of these two basic tenets of the official British
approach.
Though the early nationalists showed keen insight into the relation-
ship between industrial development and agricultural backwardness,
they held the view that "while the improvement of agriculture and
the development of industry should go hand in hand in the Indian
condition, the latter should be given priority".19 Mohadev Govind
Ranade, for instance, emphasized that a purely agrarian economy
was stagnant. Subsequently, R. C. Dutt reiterated this interdepen-
dence of agriculture and industrial development even more sharply.

This content downloaded from

111.68.97.179 on Tue, 12 Dec 2023 03:45:52 +00:00
All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms
 795

He held the view that many of the benefits which might be achieved
by the reform of the agrarian structure might be nullified if there was
no simultaneous development in other sectors of economy.

While evaluating the ideas of early nationalists on these problems

a distinction has to be made between their role as economic thinkers
and as political agitators. As economic thinkers, the early nationalists
approached the agrarian problem from a scientific standpoint. But
being actively involved in the nationalist movement they were obliged
to concentrate their writings on issues which to them appeared as the
most crucial for building a unified, nationalist public opinion in the
country. They avoided public debate on issues which did not relate
to the immediate presenst and which could be a source of division
among the nationalists. Their criticism was directed against the
particular issue, viz, the "high pitch," the uncertain and fluctuating
character and the 'stringent mode of realisation' of the government
assessment of land. From 1888 to the close of the 19th century,
year after year, resolutions were passed by the Congress on various
aspects of the land revenue administration. They did not treat the
landlord-tenant problem as a major issue. Nor did they provide any
vigorous leadership to any anti-landlord movement or agitation in
support of the tenants' rights. Possibly this lack of attention to the
landlord-tenant problem was largely due to their concern for promo-
ting national unity among all communities and classes of the country.
No doubt they championed the cause of the occupancy rayats; but
they did not take into account the plight of the non-occupancy rayats
who were" ejected for refusal to pay a rent fixed by the landlord."17
Possibly the nationalists did not realize that the Bengal Tenancy Act
which in its entirely "applied only to the section of peasantry,"18 i.e.
occupancy rayats, leaving the rest unprotected. They raised the land
question in a limited way for providing an effective critique of British
rule. Their interest remained restricted owing to their urban bias and
semi-revolutionary character. They advocated a limited reform which
did not arouse the total hostility of the landed class. They seemed to
be operating under the basic assumption that the resistance to
economic and social development of the countryside were rooted less
in the institutional than in the technological sphere.

To conclude, it may be said the early nationalist movement was a

This content downloaded from

111.68.97.179 on Tue, 12 Dec 2023 03:45:52 +00:00
All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms
 796

movement led by nationalist intellectuals who ''adopted a capitalist

outlook not because of any narrow class interest but because of their
belief that the capitalist development was the only path along which
India could grow and prosper economically."19

REFERENCES

1. Charles Battleheim India Independent W. A. Case well, p. 19.

2. The Peasant and the Raj . Edited by E Stokes, p. 1.
3. Bengal Native Press Reports, 1900, p. 468.
4. Problems of the contemporary World, New Indian Studies by Soviet Sch
"Social Science Today" No. 33, 1976 p. 44.
5. A Ghash & S. K. Dutta Development of Capitalist Relations in Agriculture , p. 6
6. Quoted in lhe Peasant ana the Kaj , edited by tí ötokes, p. 276.
7. Madras Native Press Reports, 1900, p. 94-95.
8. B. Pattabhi Sitaramayya, History oj the Indian National Congress (1885-1935),
p. 59-61.
9. Bengal Native Press Repor ts, 1900 p. 468.
10. Ibid.
11. Land Revenue Policy of the Indian Government, (Supd Government Printing
Calcutta 1902) p. 37. 47.
12. North Western Provinces and Oudh Native Press Reports 1902, p. 71.
13. Bombay Native Press Reports, Jan-June 1902, p. 166-79.
14. P. K Gopal Krishna, Development of Economic Ideas in India, p.
15. Development of Capitalist Relations in Agriculture, p. 30.
16. Ibid p. 31.
17. Bipan Chandra, Rise and Growth of Economic Nationalism in India , p. 754.

This content downloaded from

111.68.97.179 on Tue, 12 Dec 2023 03:45:52 +00:00
All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms