Indian agrarian crisis ?

Is everybody in crisis? Who is in crisis?

1997 onwards The period of neo-liberal reforms has

seen a significant curtailment of purchasing power in the hands of the working people, especially in rural India, which has caused growing distress on the one hand and an accumulation of unwanted foodstocks in the hands of the government on the other.

Patnaik 2003 Click to edit Master text styles

Second level Third level

Fourth level Fifth level

First suicide Lee Kyung-Hae, a south Korean

farmer was the first farmer who committed suicide.

WTO Kills farmers

Suicides Cumulative 16-year total from 1995 whenthe National Crime Records Bureau started recording farm suicide data 2,56,913, the worst-ever recorded wave ofsuicides of this kind in human history (Sainath). It has been seen as effect of privatisation ofinputs, changing cropping pattern and deregulation of prices (Utsa Patnaik 1997, Muzaffar Assadi )

Formal definition Farmers are those who work in agriculture for more than 150 days per year or those who have 50 percent of income from agriculture are to be categorised as a farmer in India?

lots of ambiguity.

Large farmers- more than 10 hectares

Medium farmers-4-10 hectaresSemi-medium 2-4 hectares

Small farmers(1-2 hectareMarginal farmer below 1 hectare

Three fold classification on landholding size

Large farmers- more than 10 hectares

Large farmers- more than 10 hectares

Tracing agricultural development through class caste relations

1950s: Daniel Thorner 1960s-90: Utsa Patnaik, T.J. Byres. 1990-2000: Srivastava and Lerche, 2000 onwards: V.K.Ramchandran,

Henry Bernstein

Daniel Thorners three-fold classification

Differentia is drawing a living from the land. These were malik, kisan and mazdoor. The maliks were landed proprietors who derived

their income by employing tenants and labourers. Kisans were those cultivators who live primarily

by their own toil on their own lands Mazdoors as those who gain their livelihood

primarily from working on other peoples land. emphasis on possession of land, relations of labour-hiring and land-renting between the proprietary maliks and landless mazdoors, with the kisans occupying the middle rank.

Only land size is not enough, after the green revolution particularly

Factors of production Landholding alone is found inappropriate by many. Other factors like capability to invest and adopt new technologies, capability to invest. So mixing capital and labour and how one does that becomes parameters of classifying classes among farmers.

Utsa Patnaik (1987) Factors like family size, cropping pattern

and intensity of cultivation, level of technology employed etc.

One main indication of this is the extent to which a household hires outside labour and the extent to which the household members work for others.

This and the exploitation criteria are used in Patnaiks method of labour use index for identifying classes.

Big landlords, rich peasants

Middle peasants subdivided into upper and middle

peasants

Poor peasants and Wage labour

She identified five rural classes

Middle peasants subdivided into upper and middle peasants

Poor peasants and Wage labour

First two are net exploiters of labour, the next two combine self cultivation and hired labour.

The landlord class is reluctant to invest in agricultural modernisation since profits in agriculture are lower than that earned from investing surplus in non agricultural sector and rent from leasing out land upper middle peasants generate surplus; Poor peasant and wage labour: no ownership of land and sustain

themselves through selling labour alone.

John Harriss (1990) Caste and class are co-terminus Upper class constitutes of upper casteMiddle class constitutes of middle casteLower class constitutes of lower caste The relationships between objective differences between groups of people, in terms of their relations with productive systems is class The subjective categories in terms of which people experience and understand their roles are castes

Position of class and caste may not always be the same

The Green Revolution has changed group positions; for instance, other backward classes (OBCs) coming from middle peasants have gained economically becoming surplus producing farmers and now often command the position of a dominant class in states like Bihar and Uttar Pradesh (Srivastava 1999, Lerche 1999).

The government of India has classified certain castes as socially and economically backward and termed them as other backward classes.

The GoI provides 27 per cent reservation for these castes in public sector higher education and employment.

V.K. Ramchandran- Big farmers and Landlords

Landlord is not used to refer to a feudal category, but rather a class which has its origin in feudal mode of production but has assumed a new character with technological advance. It is a term used to refer to capitalist landowners, who do not engage in cultivation. This surely is a differentiation arising from land-reform and tenancy reform.

Capitalist farmers Byres (1981) argues that a new capitalist farmer class

developed in India, as capitalist production and peasant differentiation took root.

A capitalist farmer is one who may originate from a big or middle farmer background but has adopted technological innovation to make agriculture profitable, investing surplus to upgrade capitalist production, sees agriculture as important to accumulation even if they have other means of income and do not undertake self cultivation.

Large farmers are more suitable to adopt high-value crops. Evidence has been presented in previous sections which show already prevailing skewed access to both land and credit along class lines. (Minot and Roy 2006)

Technology in Green revolution was seen as scale neutral but not resource neutral (Byres 1981)

In this structural situation that policy brought in change in cropping pattern.

characteristics The landlords are those who are urban-bound and do not have

stakes in the rural sector. They earn from farming but the surplus is diverted to the urban sector.

Ramchandran, Rawal and Swaminathan (2010) landlord households have the largest holdings and their land

is of high quality. Cultivation does not involve participation of family members. Enjoy land monopoly, hence economically dominant, but

given their high social status and direct or indirect access to political power, they also dominate traditional social and modern political structures.

Big farmers like Patels The big farmers are mostly from upper-middle peasant

families, and sometimes from rich peasant families. It is by generationally investing the surplus that they

have acquired more land and in the present situation They employ others to cultivate the land. They commonly

derive income from money-lending, salaried employment and trade (Ramchandran, Swaminathan and Rawal2010, pp 24-25).

Gentleman farmers Gentleman farmers are those who invest surplus

generated from other sectors in agriculture. Their holdings size vary, starting from 5 acres of land. They have made good use of the opening up of borders since liberalisation by investing in high value crops, oriented towards export market. Speculation is one thing that they understand and maneuver well, thus selling their produce when prices are high.

Interlocking as a characteristic of Indian agriculture which has been responsible for policy

Overlap between factor and credit market is common. Land, labour and credit market interlinkage. Same class is accumulating through various sources, education and urban/overseas jobs, trading, agroprocessing and moneylending; as well as possible land. Who are they?(Pranab Bardhan, Lerche ) The mahajan of the village is a big farmer and has now started a small business in seed. Often he sells seeds to small and marginal farmers.

Even for research-categories are crucial

A graduate has bought 10 acres of land near Bangalore city and started a nursery. Exportable flowers are grown there.

A Gujarat farmer owns a sugarcane factory then who is he?

A farmer s son has bifurcated into contract farming in Dharwad. Who is he?

Slide 11997 onwardsPatnaik 2003First suicideSuicidesFormal definitionThree fold classification on landholding sizeSlide 8Daniel Thorners three-fold classificationSlide 10Utsa Patnaik (1987)She identified five rural classesSlide 13John Harriss (1990)Position of class and caste may not always be the sameV.K. Ramchandran- Big farmers and LandlordsCapitalist farmersSlide 18characteristicsBig farmers like PatelsGentleman farmersSlide 22Even for research-categories are crucialSlide 24