TEXT-IV B : CPI on the Peasant Front

1

Analysis of Bardoli

The heroic struggle of the Bardoli peasantry has come to a close with the Government consenting to reduce the amount of increase in assessments from 20% to 5%. This climb down of the Government has been hailed as a political victory of the Bardoli peasantry and the personal victory of Sardar Vallabhai Patel. It is glorified as the acme of the triumph of the principle of Satyagraha, of the political intelligence and strategic ability of the astute Sardar. While admitting that for various political reasons the Government has thought it tactical and wise (the principal reason being the Government’s desire to win over the sympathy and support of the Indian politicians for the imminent Simon Commission report) to yield to the popular demand, we desire to point out that the actual achievement falls short of what could have been achieved by the militant Bardoli peasantry if it had been led by more representative, courageous and able leadership. Sardar Vallabhai who led the struggle represented the outlook and interests of the wealthy farmer class and as such the whole strategy and conception of the Bardoli struggle led by him were dominated by that outlook and those interests …. whatever has been achieved is due to the militancy and solidarity of the Bardoli peasantry and what could be achieved but had not been achieved is due to the wrong leadership.

… Since even the normal rents which the Bordoli peasantry has to pay to the State are so heavy as to leave poor and middle peasants in a chronic state of want and semi-starvation the proposed increase stood self-condemned. It could only occur to the mind of the wealthy farmer and landlord in the Bardoli district, himself thriving on the exploitation of the hired labour of agricultural labourers “Dublas”, to make this increase a matter of controversy and re-inquiry. At the very outset Vallabhai and Co., the leaders of the Bardoli struggle, behaved as the representatives of the wealthy farmer class and instead of rejecting the imposition of the increase of land assessment demanded only a judicial re-inquiry into the proposed increase.

… Recently when a section of the “Dublas”, the agricultural labourers of Bardoli, manifested signs of discontent against the social and other disabilities imposed on them by the thriving landlord class, the heroic Sardar of Bardoli, instead of leading the social revolt of the “Dublas”, capitulated before the big men of the countryside …

Unless this supine leadership working in the interests of and for the perpetuation of the wealthy agrarian population is not replaced by another type of leadership which stands for the liberation of the exploited peasant masses and hired land- labourers not only from Imperialist exploitation but also from the clutches of predatory landlords and moneylenders, no strong peasant movement can develop in the country.

The social basis of the peasant movement should be shifted from the wealthy farmer (as it is at present) to the broad masses of poor and middle peasantry and agricultural labourers. The interests, political and economic, of these sections should determine the peasant programme of the political party which desires to see the the real exploited of the rural area free. …

Source: The New Spark, 26 May and 2 June, 1929

2

The Peasant Uprising in Kishoreganj

– August 1930

Comrades,

A wave of peasant uprising against the money lenders, Zamindars and the agents of British Imperialism had just passed through Kishoreganj, sub-division of Mymensingh in Bengal. This uprising is being crushed by fire and sword by British Imperialism TOGETHER WITH THE LEADERSHIP OF THE INDIAN NATIONAL CONGRESS.

The working class and the peasants of India must learn the full truth of Kishoreganj. This will help the masses understand who are their friends and who are their enemies.

The peasants could not stand the oppression any longer:

… The peasantry of Kishoreganj, which covers an area of several hundred square miles, have never been able to recover from the effects of last year’s famine. As a result of this famine, they have gone still deeper into debt to the money-lenders who have been charging the peasants a rate of interest of 60, 100 and 120 per cent. The peasants were unable to pay it. The money lenders, who in many cases are also zamindars, proceeded TO TAKE THE LAND AWAY FROM THE PEASANTS.

On the top of this came the present economic crisis. Kishoreganj is predominantly a jute area. As the price of jute was falling the miserable income of the peasants was dwindling away until there was practically no income. The landless agricultural workers found themselves unemployed. Sheer naked starvation become the lot of the peasantry and labourers in Kishoreganj.

This desperate situation was utilised by the money-lenders and Zamindars to squeeze the peasantry some more. As usual, the so-called DOCUMENTS manipulated by fraud and swindle to sell the peasants’ indebtedness and to tighten the grip of the money-lender upon the peasants’ land and income. Seeing the economic helplessness and bankruptcy of the peasants the moneylenders and zamindars began to appropriate TO THEMSELVES THE LAND HOLDING OF THE PEASANTS. The bankrupt peasants of Kishoreganj were being transformed into virtual slaves of the moneylenders and zamindars. All this was being done with the help of the courts and police of British Imperialism.

The outraged and angry peasantry had reached the limit of endurance. Seeing in the so-called DOCUMENTS the symbol of the slavery the peasants of KISHOREGANJ started a mass movement to recover these fraudulent documents from the moneylenders and to destroy them. The moneylenders and zamindars resisted the peasants, with guns in many cases. The police and military were soon called in to crush the peasant uprising. Subsequently a veritable hell of terror had been institute against the peasants of KISHOREGANJ.

The leaders of the National Congress demand more repression against the peasants

The leaders of the Indian National Congress, Gandhi, Nehru, Patel, Bose are telling the masses that they are the friends of the workers and peasants. WE THE COMMUNISTS, say that this is a swindle to fool the masses.

The agents of the Congress in the Labour Unions and among the peasants are calling upon the masses to support the Congress. Others, who are expelled from the Communist movement because they betrayed the interests of the masses, are going around the workers — specially in Bombay — trying to fool the workers into supporting the Congress by the slogan of “capture the Congress”. But these deceivers of the masses do not tell us that in Kishoreganj the Congress has joined hands with British Imperialism to crush the uprising of the peasants against moneylenders and zamindars.

The Congress organs in Calcutta, such as the “LIBERTY”, “ADVANCE”, etc. were trying to represent the peasant uprising in Kishoreganj as an attack of MUSLIMS upon HINDUS, as a communal “riot” and on that ground the nationalist press was demanding from British Imperialism “more stern measures” of repression. …

The papers of the “left” nationalist Subhas Bose — The Liberty-wrote on July 28th, as follows :

“In spite of the Governor’s readiness to strengthen the hands of the local officials, looting and arson is still going on to the discredit of those charged with the duty of maintaining peace and order in KISHOREGANJ”. The “Liberty” praises the Governor and demands more repression “whatever may be the nature of the crimes” IN KISHOREGANJ. …

The agrarian revolution is the backbone of the Indian National Revolution

… The peasantry needs land which is held by the zamindars, the moneylenders and the British Imperialism. THE PEASANTRY MUST SEIZE LAND. The peasantry must free itself from the burden of debt and taxation. THE PEASANTRY MUST REPUDIATE THEIR DEBTS, STOP PAYING RENT TO THE ZAMINDARS AND TAXES TO THE GOVERNMENT. The peasantry must overthrow the rule of the landlords and moneylenders, abolishing all remnants of feudal slavery. The peasants must overthrow British Imperialism in India which supports and maintain the present system. …

It is the duty of the Communists, and of the revolutionary elements who follow the leadership of the All India Communist Party, to help organise the peasants and bring to them the programme of the revolution. THE COMMUNIST PARTY CALLS UPON ITS MEMBERS AND SYMPATHISERS TO CONCENTRATE UPON THE WORK AMONG THE PEASANTRY ALONG THE FOLLOWING LINES :

2. The Revolutionary Peasant Committees should initiate mass movements FOR THE SEIZURE OF THE LAND from the rich zamindars, landlords, moneylenders and the Government. The peasantry should be organised to refuse PAYMENT OF RENT, TAXES AND LAND REVENUE. The main slogan of the struggle must be : LAND TO THE PEASANTS, OVERTHROW THE RULE OF MONEYLENDERS, ZAMINDARS AND BRITISH IMPERIALISM, REPUDIATE YOUR DEBTS TO THE EXPLOITERS, FOR FULL AND COMPLETE INDEPENDENCE, AGAINST THE BETRAYAL OF THE MASSES BY THE CONGRESS LEADERSHIP, FOR ALLIANCE BETWEEN THE WORKERS AND PEASANTS, FOR A WORKERS’ AND PEASANTS’ REPUBLIC.

3. Organise the more conscious and revolutionary elements, especially the agricultural workers, into the village nuclei of the Communist Party.

4. Organise the agricultural workers into labour unions.

5. Organise and send worker delegations from the mills into neighbouring villages to carry out this work. Mobilise the revolutionary students and youth for this work under the leadership of the Communist Party.

The National Congress is also sending students into the villages. But the policy of the Congress is not to arouse the peasants for revolutionary struggle but to PREVENT THE REVOLUTIONARY STRUGGLE from developing. … Without systematically exposing the treachery and counter revolutionary character of the Congress leadership we cannot successfully promote the revolution.

The deepening economic and political crisis, is arousing the masses to action. Kishoreganj is symptomatic of the readiness of the masses all over the country to engage in decisive revolutionary action. But the masses lack programme, organisation and leadership. The masses are being demoralised by the ideology of GANDHI and the arising revolutionary movements are being crushed as in Kishoreganj by the combined forces of British Imperialism, and the nationalist bourgeoisie.

No time can be lost for putting into effect the above programme of work in the villages. Delay and hesitation are playing into the hands of British Imperialism and of the National Congress leadership which is betraying the struggle. … MAKE THE LESSON OF KISHOREGANJ KNOWN TO THE WIDEST SECTION OF THE WORKERS AND PEASANTS. BUILD THE REVOLUTIONARY ALLIANCE OF THE WORKERS AND PEASANTS UNDER THE LEADERSHIP OF THE WORKING CLASS ! FIGHT FOR THE HEGEMONY OF THE PROLETARIAT IN THE NATIONALIST REVOLUTION !

3

The All India Kisan Manifesto

As adopted by the All-India Kisan Committee on 21 August 1936

Kisans’ charter of rights

The object and main task of the Kisan movement are stated in the following resolution passed at the first All-India Kisan Congress held at Lucknow on the llth April 1936 :

“The object of the Kisan movement is to secure complete freedom from economic exploitation and the achievement of full economic and political power for the peasants and workers and all other exploited classes.

“The main task of the Kisan movement shall be the organisation of peasants and fight for their immediate political and economic demands in order to prepare them for their emancipation from every form of exploitation.

“The Kisan movement stands for the achievement of ultimate economic and political power for the producing masses through its active participation in the national struggle for winning complete independence.”

In as much as the Indian National Congress is today the only effective political body with country-wide organisation claiming to champion the cause of the masses it must necessarily make the solutions of the problems of the peasantry the chief plank of its political and economic policy.

The terrible conditions of the Indian peasants is too well-known to need repetition. The tenants are oppressed by Zamindars, Taluk-dars and Malguzars, Inamdars and other landlords. The peasant proprietors have to bear the yoke of a harsh system of land Revenue. The agricultural labour receive, if at all, starvation wages and work and live in conditions bordering on slavery.

But unfortunately while the condition of the peasantry dominates the whole political and economic life of the country, the peasants themselves have been most backward politically and organisationally. The results are two fold; firstly the peasants have been deprived of all the ameliorative legislation, that could have been passed during the last 16 years, even by the present legislative, if the legislators had felt obliged to satisfy the peasants; and secondly, the political movement itself in the country has remained more or less unconcerned with both the immediate and basic problems of the peasantry.

Our objectives may not be possible of realisation under the present system of Government. Yet the peasants if they are to save themselves from utter ruin, must fight to secure them. The system of Government must go if it stands in the way as it undoubtedly does …

Under these circumstances it is essential that a political movement must be developed in our country as to draw its main strength and inspiration from the peasantry. It must also strive for the removal of all those obstacles that stand in the way of a true and lasting solution conducive to the fullest well-being of the agricultural masses of the country. The peasants’ fight for bread and land is linked up with the national fight for political freedom.

Fortunately, the Kisans all over the country are becoming more and more conscious, politically and economically, of their basic problems. The All-India Kisan Committee is an expression of this awakening among the peasantry. They have at last realised that they must fashion out their own militant class organisations if they are to make any sustained advance towards their goal. The Kisan Sabha represents not only the ryots, the tenants and the landless labourers but in some places the petty Zamindars. In other words it represents and speaks and fights for all those who live by the cultivation of the soil. … They must fight for complete National, Socio-economic Independence. India, a Dependency of Britain, must be transformed into free, progressive and Democratic India of the masses. The fight for such an India can only effectively be conducted on a programme based on the grievances and demands of the Kisans of India.

While the fight for these basic changes goes on, the peasants must also fight for all that can be gained within the framework of the existing economic order. Only in this manner can they prepare themselves for the bigger struggle, the objective of which must be kept ever present in the minds of the kisans.

To this end, we frame the following charter of fundamental and minimum demands of our Kisans, the Provincial Kisan Sabhas having the right to supplement it by a list of their local needs :

Fundamental demands

And whereas the Zamindars, etc., rack-rent their crores of tenants while neglecting the irrigation sources,

All such systems of landlordism shall be abolished, and all the right over such lands be vested in the cultivators and these Kisans made to pay income tax like the Ryotwari ryots.

2. Whereas the present systems of land-revenue and resettlement imposed by Government is Ryotwari areas have proved too vexations and resulted in the progressive pauperization of peasants, all such systems of land revenue and resettlement shall be abolished and replaced by a graduated land-tax upon net incomes of Rs 500 and more (for a family not exceeding five) (as also recommended by the Taxation Enquiry Committee).

3. Whereas the peasants have been over-burdened by oppressive rural indebtedness and the usurious rates of interest, Whereas the lands of most of the peasants have cither passed or are passing into the hands of absentee landlords, sowcars and urban classes,

The peasants shall be completely relieved from all liability to pay their old debts or interest thereon and the State shall immediately put into operation the necessary machinery to provide agricultural credit for peasants’ current needs.

4. This Committee demands that landless peasants and those having less than five acres each be provided with land to cultivate on the basis of cooperative farming (without the right of alienation) and since one-third of the total cultivated land is still unoccupied and vested in Government and landlords, this Committee resolves that all such lands be granted to the landless Kisans.

Minimum demand

The peasants will immediately take all possible steps to achieve the following minimum demands: —

2. Abolition of all Land Revenue Assessment and rent from uneconomic holdings.

3. Reduction by at least 50 per cent of rent and revenue and also of water rates; and in no case shall the rent charged by landlords be more than what the Ryotwari ryots have to pay to Government.

4. Immediate grant of the right of permanent cultivation without the right of alienation to all tenants and actual cultivators of the lands Zamindars, Talukdars, Inamdars, Malguzars, Istimardars, Zanmis, Khotes, etc.

5. To grant the right of remission of rent for all tenants of landlords whenever crops fail and to stop all resettlement operations and all kinds of enhancements of the rent or land revenue and to survey and settle all the Zamindari, etc., lands.

6. To immediately impose an adequate and graduated income-tax, death duty and inheritance tax upon all the agricultural revenues of landlords and merchants.

7.Abolition and penalisation of all feudal and customary dues and forced labour, including Begar and illegal exactions.

8. The declaration of a 5 years’ moratorium for all agrarian indebtedness …
10. Freedom from arrest and imprisonment for inability to pay debts, rents and revenue. …

22. A Peasants’ Union Act must be enacted to safeguard their fundamental rights by collective action.

23. Minimum Wage shall be assured and the Workmen’s Cmpen-sation Act be extended to all agricultural
workers ….

4

Comilla Kisan Congress

PC Joshi

“Tlie surging tide of the Kisan Movement has been gradually gaining strength. It is no longer easy for any one to check this surging tide of awakening [among] the Kisans. Utmost care is necessary to prevent any misdirection of the movement of the Kisans for a single false step may result is further strengthening of their shackles” — Swami Sahajanand President of the Kisan Congress.

Twenty five thousand peasants attended the Comilla Congress in Fazlul Huq’s own province and proved the truth that lay behind the assertion of their reversed President, Swami Sahajanand, “Hunger made class war and made communal differences.” An overwhelming majority of them were Muslims. They came marching on foot, from long distances, behind Red banners. Muslim Leaguers blocked the way of marching peasants, strewing Qurans where they had to tread. Peasants lifted up the Qurans, asked the Leaguers to mind their own business and marched on.. More harm was done, however, by some Right Wing Congressmen, who reached far into the villages with their false propaganda and prevented large numbers of peasants, who were already on the march, from attending. Unknown agents distributed lying pamphlets all over the place, seeking to create panic of rioting. Scuffles did take place; the police were benevolently neutral, but the overwhelming numbers of peaceful and determined peasants soon sent the hooligans into hiding.

The cowardly mean efforts of the communal reactionaries and the police agents failed as ignominiously to break up the Conference as the arrests and conviction of N Dutt-Mazumdar and Ananta Mukerji had failed to impede the preliminary work for the Congress.

This was the third session of the All-India Kisan Sabha, but in reality it was the first Congress of the organised Kisans. The Comilla Session was held with properly elected delegates from functioning Provincial Kisan Sabhas, accepting the discipline of and owing loyalty to one central organisation-the All India Kisan Sabha (AIKS).

The last two and a half years have witnessed the meteoric rise of the Kisan movement and its growth into a vital political force in our land. At Lucknow (March 1936) the leading Kisan workers from the various provinces came together. At Faizpur (Dec. ’36) the movement was yet in its agitational stage, it evolved a common agitational platform and gave the call for organising local Sabhas as the constituent units of the AIKS. The year following led to great organisational work and heroically fought local struggles which endeared these local Kisan Sabhas to vast masses of the peasantry. The Camilla Session represented the organised strength of five and a half lacs paying membership. The figures (upto Feb. ’38) for the different provinces being, Bihar 2,50000, Punjab 73000, UP 60,000, Andhra 53,000, Bengal 34,000, Utkal 18,000, Surma Valley 15,000, Gujrat 2,500, CP (Hindi) 2000, CP marathi 2000, Maharashtra 1300, a total of 546,800, members for the AIKS whose accredited representatives attended the Comilla session.

In 32 resolutions the session sought to clarify the fundamental aims of the Kisan Movement and guide its further course …

Fundamental aim

The session decisively rejected the theory of class collaboration and proclaimed class-struggle to be the basis of the Kisan movement. Through another historic resolution it declared “the goal of the peasant movement can be nothing short of an agrarian revolution, meaning a fundamental change in the agrarian economic relationships including the abolition of the present land revenue, Zamindari, and Sahukari system, vesting ownership of land in the tillers of the soil and freeing them from all manner of exploitation. An agrarian revolution in India cannot be completed within the frame work of imperialist rule and therefore the session declares that the fundamental task of the peasants of the country requires that while fighting for their class demands through their class organisations, they should also fight in alliance with other sections of the people and work through the Indian National Congress against Imperialism and replace it with a full democratic Swaraj. “The basic demands of the abolition of landlordism and cancellation of all debts,” was retained.

Political aim

The session saw in the Federation “a future enslavement of our nation” and exhorted “the Kisans to prepare themselves to fight the imposition of the Federation and to convene the Constituent Assembly based on adult suffrage.” …

Immediate demands

The session expressed itself on the inadequacy of the agrarian reforms so far proposed by the various Provincial Governments and demanded land-tax on income-tax basis, exposed the hoax and burdens of the present Co-operative Credit System, demanded facilities for agricultural marketing on a co-operative basis under popular control, irrigation reforms and concessions.

Peasant struggle

The session congratulated the peasants of Burdwan, Surma Valley, 24 Parganas and Mansa on their heroic partial struggles and declared that the further growth of the Kisan movement depended on initiating and developing such partial struggles. The Kisan movement has entered the phase of struggles which are to be widened and deepened.

New organisational lead

The Session appointed a sub-committee to evolve a scheme for the organisation of a Volunteer Corps, by another resolution it welcomed the emergence of agricultural labourers’ movement and associations, declared solidarity with them and called upon the Kisans to concede and jointly fight for the demands of the agricultural labourers and thus “pave the way for a united peasant front.”

Theoretical confusion

Some of the resolutions betray a mechanical understanding of the concept of class-struggle which expresses itself in the inability to see the difference and the inter-relations between the immediate and the more remote demands; between demands which can and should be made the basis of immediate action and the more remote demands which will in their turn arise as slogans of action in the next stage of the struggle. This criticism would apply for example, to the resolutions on landlordism and cancellation of debts. After the recent offensive against the Kisan Sabhas there has been a tendency to go “more left”. This led to the lamentable failure to formulate really immediate demands about rent and debt relief and tenancy reforms, which are possible within the framework of the present constitution itself, which the popular ministries in Congress Provinces are already pledged to implement, and evolve a plan of action parliamentary and extra-parliamentary which would get peasants these demands and fill them with courage and confidence to fight for more. This is the line of real class-struggle. The Provincial Kisan Sabhas are already on this track, we naturally looked forward to the AIKS to clear the track, put up the signals and not whistle from far away.

This raises the big issue of the relation of the Kisan Sabhas to the Congress.

Kisans and Congress

There has been a systematic campaign of calumny against and hardly veiled hostility to the Kisan Sabhas from some leading elements inside the Congress. The resolution of the Session however is “This Sabha declares that it has never done anything to weaken the Congress but on the other hand has sought and still endeavours to strengthen the freedom movement as represented by the National Congress”.

The Kisans have thus once again proved themselves to be the best sons of the people who would not be provoked to fight their own kith and kin, who would on no account weaken the people’s own organisation. Some of the speeches by Kisan leaders at Comilla disclosed that their patience is fraying and they are striking off at a sectarian tangent. Their speeches boiled down to this: they want unity with the Congress but the Congress leadership demands their head, such national leadership must go and if it has its way the consequent split will weaken the Congress and not the Kisan Sabhas. This may be a righteous course but it is not sound politics. The Kisans are not apart from the people and their existing leadership. They have not only to jealously guard their class-independence and the right to form kisan organisations but also to demonstrate to the rest of the people that the strength of the Kisans is only used to strengthen and forge national unity without any conditions, without equivocation. Advancing national struggle is furthering class struggle and weakening the class enemies of the kisans.

After Comilla

The sectarian traits in the kisan movement are the direct products of the recently started offensive against the Kisan Sabhas and the failure of some of the Congress Ministries to push forward with speed and determination the Faizpore agrarian programme and the inability of the Left inside the Congress to decisively turn the scale. It is the task of the Communists and Socialists to bridge the gulf between the Kisan Sabhas and the Congress by doing not less but more Congress work so as to demonstrate to every honest Congressman that the existence of and unity with the Kisan Sabha strengthens the Congress cause, by participating with redoubled energy in Kisan work and proving to every kisan worker that unity with the Congress leads to the strengthening of the kisan movement and disunity to its weakness and isolation. An intense ideological campaign for the policy of the United National Front as being the only policy for the Kisans and for the whole of the Indian people and all round practical organisational work to implement that policy is the imperative call from Comilla and after Haripura. Cawnpore workers, supported by the peasants of the country side and the whole Congress in UP are proving this very hour that the policy of United National Front is the only way out, and is possible of being carried out here and now. Sands of time are running out, Federation conies closer, the menace of world war grows more imminent. The round of events is running faster and faster. The Kisan workers are undergoing their first practical disillusionment with the policy of reformism. The Communists and Socialists must light their path and show that it is their task, as the representatives of the kisans — one of the exploited and revolutionary classes, which is an overwhelming majority of our people — to come out as the boldest champions of national unity.

Source: National Front, 5 June, 1938

5

Agrarian Crisis in India

By Bhowani Sen

Nature of the problem

The world economic crisis has exposed the danger to which Imperialism has delivered the people. There is no corner of the earth left untouched by its tentacles. The world economic crisis is a crisis of Imperialism. In all its phases, agricultural countries have been most hard hit by this devastating plague and it is in colonial countries that it has staged the most horrible death drama. … In order to realise its meaning, to grasp the seriousness of its extent and to find out the proper solution in so far as the present condition of India is concerned, we must first of all understand the specific nature of India’s social economy and its bearing upon the present crisis.

Indian Society is dominated by remnants of feudalism. There is a belated appearance of capitalist production but only an insignificant part of the population is dependent upon capitalist industries. The great majority of the people earn their living by agriculture and greater part of cultivated land is engaged in the production of food crops. Inspite of this, food grain production is insufficient from the point of view of national need, but this insufficiency, instead of raising economic demand and thereby the price level, had been accompanied by relative over-production and falling price. Landlordism by its medieval exploitation, has extremely impoverished the peasant and is depressing the productivity of land to an alarming degree. Primitive method of cultivation, feudal form of land-ownership and capitalist mode of exchange are combined in agricultural production and leading the peasant to an inescapable ruin.

… Indian agriculture has been so besieged on all sides, that there remains no specific way out, no automatic remedy, no capitalist solution of our agrarian crisis. The only solution lies in a successful agrarian revolution that will completely sweep away the colonial character of our national economy. There is only one way, the revolutionary way, out of the crisis.

This conclusion does not rule out the value of concrete relief measures. When a ship crashes in the mid sea, another ship becomes necessary to save her crew but before the rescue ship arrives, the captain of the sinking ship never withholds life belts from the terrified passengers. Concrete relief measures like life belts will give temporary relief to the people, thereby strengthening their fight for final solution.

Out of 36 crores of India’s population, 67% live by agricultural occupation. Besides, there are almost 11% of the population who are engaged in partly agriculture and partly domestic service. … The total cultivated area amounts to almost 228 million acre, 85% of this area is engaged in the production of food crops. From the nature of the case, the peasantry consumes the greater part of these crops and from this it might be assumed that only the surplus over consumption is sold in the market. Had it been so, the crisis would not have affected the peasantry in such a serious scale as it has actually done. But the record of abnormal slump in prices tells a different story. Between September 1929 and March 1934, the prices of rice and oil seeds fell by 52% and 55% respectively. The seriousness of the situation will be more easily grasped by an analysis of the conditions under which the peasant raises and sells his products. The holdings of 80% of the peasants are uneconomic. For these peasants it is impossible to earn their living by the sale of their products. Out of the proceeds of his commodity sale, the peasant has to pay rent to the landlord in zamindari area, to the Imperialist Government in ryotwari area. If he fails to pay up his dues, his holding will be confiscated and sold in auction. During the period of economic crisis there has been an abnormal increase of auction sales in lands. … The total amount of peasant indebtedness amounted to Rs. 900 crores at the time of Banking Enquiry Committee’s investigation. The enormous burden of rent, debt and interest together with government taxes and other assessments of the landlords have impoverished the peasant to an alarming extent. The degree of this impoverishment can be imagined by the fact that between 1921 and 1931 the number of landless labourers has increased from 21 million to 31 million, the number of landowning peasants has diminished and the number of cultivating tenants i.e., of peasants with subordinate titles in land increased. The confiscation of peasants’ land by landlords, moneylenders and the state and its resale by them has increased subdivision and fragmentation of landholdings. Primitive method of cultivation, uneconomic size of the holdings, constant fragmentation and subdivision, and want of proper irrigation, all these factors are combined to deteriorate agricultural productivity. The degree of this decline can be estimated from the following figures:

Periods : I. 1919-20 to 1923-24

Average annual acreage under wheat : 23,000,694

Average yield of wheat : 9,258,000 tons

Average Productiviy : 40 ton per acre

Decline of Productiviy in relation to period I :

Periods : II. 1924-25 to 1928-29

Average annual acreage under wheat : 24,500,433

Average yield of wheat : 8,583,000 tons

Average Productiviy : .35 ton per acre

Decline of Productiviy in relation to period I : 12.5%

Periods : III. 1931-32 to 1334-35

Average annual acreage under wheat : 34,333,750

Average yield of wheat : 9,414,250 tons

Average Productiviy : .27 ton per acre

Decline of Productiviy in relation to period I : 32.5%

Imperialist exploitation and agrarian crisis

We have seen that under the existing mode of production in India, economic conditions of the country largely depend upon the condition of our foreign trade. Our imports mostly consist of primary products such as raw materials and food grains. Besides export of merchandise, we have to export treasure as tributes to imperialism in the form of profits, interests, and home charges. Our export of merchandise are ordinarily greater than imports; so under normal conditions there should have been net imports of treasure but our forced exports of treasure create a different situation. From the point of view of national finance, Indian- export-commodities have less elasticity of supply; any shortage or delay in selling our commodities to the foreign market will put a severe drain on our national treasure for realisation of our tributes to imperialism. Likewise the peasant producer’s tributes to feudalism have, as we have seen, played an important role in making the supply of our export commodities almost inelastic. On the other hand, the demand for our commodities mainly comes from the monopoly capitalist industries of other countries, crisis of these industries (falling profit, declining production and closing of factories) has made the demand extremely elastic, i.e., they can refuse to purchase our products unless prices are abnormally cut down. Thus our commodities are sold under conditions of elastic demand and inelastic supply. Concretely speaking, India has weaker bargaining power in her foreign trade. This is one of the reasons why India has been so hard hit in the crisis, why prices have so sharply fallen below value …

Immediate relief for the peasants

In order to mitigate the sufferings of the peasants we must vigorously fight for the reduction of land rent by fifty percent. Prices have fallen more than that ratio, so the landlords must not be allowed to make extraordinary gains at the cost of the peasants, rather the peasants must mitigate their sufferings at the cost of the landlords, who have built up their fortunes by exploiting the peasants. We must redouble our energy to diminish the tax burdens on the peasants and get new Tenancy Acts to protect the actual tillers of the soil from expropriation by landlords and moneylenders. … Uneconomic holdings must be rent free and debts be liquidated through state action by declaring the poorest peasants absolved of all liability, and re-writing the debts of well-to-do peasants on the basis of the latter’s capacity to pay. We must redouble our energy to compel the state to regulate the prices of agricultural products by legislation in order to raise them to the pre-crisis level. In order to eradicate the middle man’s exploitation, legislation must be introduced by the provincial legislatures for compulsory registration of trading agencies dealing in agricultural products, by making it obligatory on the latter to pay the statutory price to the peasant for his commodities, as a condition for granting registration. We must strongly put forward the demand for the levying of an emergency tax on the firms dealings in export of primary products by specified rates on their annual gross profits and a specified processing tax on the native capitalist firms using raw materials. …

Agrarian revolution

It must be remembered that the above measures are only relief measures and that relief is not the solution of the crisis. Only a successful agrarian revolution can go a long way to eradicate the causes responsible for the crisis. It means that landlordism must be abolished, land must belong to the tillers of the soil, rents must be abolished, and in its place, a system of income tax instituted on the basis of exempting uneconomic holding from all taxes. It further means that a comprehensive plan of industrialisation must be adopted to reduce the agricultural population, raise the amount of average holding and thereby to increase the productivity of land. These tasks cannot be fulfilled unless India is free from Imperialist rule and a national revolutionary democratic Government is established through a Constituent Assembly. Agrarian revolution, therefore, means the achievement of complete independence, establishment of a national revolutionary democratic Government, nationalisation of mercantile marine, foreign trade, and the key Industries, planned industrial development under state measures and state bounty, removal from land of all remnants of feudalism, confiscation of the properties of landlords, princess, imperialist state and the churches without any compensation and encouragement to develop co-operative farming.

Source: New age, October 1938

6

The UP Kisan Movement

PC Joshi

The UP has given us the word Kisan. This is no accident but are reflection of the role that the Kisan has played in its political life. In the past, agrarian and national upheavals have coincided in time: the Kisan participated in the Congress movement and Congressmen made Kisan demands their own.

When the All-India Kisan Sabha (AIKS) was formed, the UP was found to offer complications of its own which offered difficulties in forming straight way and going ahead with a UP Kisan Committee (UPKC) as a branch of the AIKS, the UP Kisan Sangh, formed in 1934, under the leadership of B Purshottam Das Tandon, a veteran Congress leader and the present Speaker of the Assembly, existed. He accepted the minimum Charter of Kisan Rights but not the abolition of Landlordism without compensation. He stood for compensation. He did not oppose the Red Flag but would not accept it as the official flag of the Kisan movement. Because of these differences he was not for affiliation to the AIKS. He accepted the need for independent Kisan Sabhas. He represented the Kisan orientation within the Congress, a link with the past, a progressive force for the future. …

The majority of Congressmen were sympathetic to Kisan demands, but considered Kisan Sabhas uncalled for, owing to the danger of their becoming “rivals to the Congress.”

The UPKC and the kisan sangh

In July, 1937, the UPKC was formed with Left Congress, Socialists and Communists. They offered a unity formula that all Kisan workers work through the UP Kisan Sangh, the questions of Flag, landlordism and affiliation to the AIKS be decided democratically, by a representative Kisan Conference. It was thought this would keep unity of leadership in the critical times that were ahead, maintain and strengthen links with the Congress, be in line with the policy of United National Front and lead the Kisan workers, through their own experience, in to the AIKS. At this stage hardly any local Kisan Sabhas existed. The UPKC by bringing out the fortnightly “Kisan”, by sending out organisers, by the participation of its members in Kisan Conferences prepared the ground for them.

The Kisan on his feet

When the Congress Ministry announced its interim relief measures, suspending the arrears of rent and execution of debt decrees, the Kisan got up on his feet, inspired with confidence and hope. The zamindars began resorting to legal and illegal tricks to evade these measures. Congress workers were commanded to propagate payment of current rents, waiting for the Tenancy Bill, trusting the Ministry, and keeping the peace. The infant Kisan Sabhas took up the fight against zamindar evasions and harassment and won a base for themselves. More and more Congress workers became kisan workers. The Kisan looked up to the Congress Ministry and looked after himself collectively, militant demonstrations and marches became common wherever any lead was given. In December, the Pilibhit Kisan Conference was held through which the united Kisan movement formulated its demands (a provincial adaptation of the AIKS Charter) for being incorporated in the legislation of the Ministry. All organizational issues were postponed. The agrarian resolutions of the Harduaganj Provincial Political Conference closely followed these demands.

When the Tenancy Bill was published this spring, it was found to be more pro-Kisan than that of any other Ministry though falling far short of the Congress Election Manifesto. The Premier and the Revenue Minister wished it be more far-reaching but were held back by the desire to win the co-operation of the zamindars. The Bill, however, met with virulent opposition from the zamindars. From within the Congress Assembly Party, they began pressing the Ministry. The Non-Congress zamindars began organising the petty zamindars against the congress through a series of conferences and threatened Satyagraha. Against their own Kisans, they let loose a reign of terror, and resorted to large-scale ejectments to get round conferment of tenancy rights. The Tenancy Bill was disappointing but the zamindars’ offensive was intolerable. The Kisan Sabhas grew rapidly by taking the initiative in organising Kisan resistance to ejectments. The struggles were local and partial and took the form of collective Satyagraha. Kisans flocked to the Sabhas as the organisers of their struggles. Congress workers became Kisan workers for Kisan Sabhas were defenders of and fighters for all that had been promised the Kisans. In several places, Congress Committees themselves took up the organisation of Kisan Satyagraha.

A Conspiracy of vested interests

Zamindar opposition grew and during and through the Cawnpore general strike it was disclosed as a part of the general conspiracy of the vested interests to pull down the Congress Ministry. The Cawnpore strike hammered other lessons too into the consciousness of Congressmen as a whole : the anti-national vested interests cannot be reconciled to the Congress, they have to be and could be beaten down. The Congress to defend its own programme had to unite the workers’ organisation, the Mazdoor Sabha. How could the Kisan Sabha be its rival, was it not a true ally, instead? The day-to-day work of Kisan workers, themselves Congressmen, the rapid growth of the Kisan Sabhas, their repeated declarations of loyalty to the Congress, turned the scale …

The UPKC – A platform

The Kisan had made the UP Congress the most Left Congress, the UP Congress Ministry the most advanced, and created the most far-flung Kisan movement than probably exists anywhere. There are about 30 District Kisan Sabhas in the 48 [?] districts of the Provinces. They have been built on local initiative and work in solution from each other. The only help and guidance they get is from the UP Kisan Committee comrades, but the UPKC cannot affiliate them for it is pledged to remain only a platform to popularise the full line of the AIKS and work through the UP Kisan Sangh as the leading provincial organisation of all Kisans.

The tasks facing the Kisan movement today are :

(2) This unified lead on the Tenancy Bill must be made the basis of a mass campaign, through a series of conferences to popularise the Bill and defeat zamindar opposition.

(3) Immediate organisation, by the Kisan Sabhas in unity with the local Congress units, of resistance to ejectment and all illegal harassment. Application of security sections against recalcitrant zamindars, full freedom to Congress and Kisan workers.

(4) Immediate organisation of the Kisan headquarters, the UP Kisan Sangh, as a functioning centre guiding and coordinating the activities of local Sabhas. What is unity worth if the leading organisation does not function as a united centre? The UP Kisan Sangh continues to be as defunct as before. The UP Kisan Conference which was to elect a new Executive is being postponed from month to month. It is now fixed for the 11th September but this must be the last and final date. To call for a movement and deny it leadership is to perpetuate a fraud. It is a crime which no leadership can be forgiven.

A Congress-Mazdoor united front has already been achieved. If the above tasks are fulfilled Congress-Kisan unity as well will get forged. The UP Congress then as our foremost united national front unit would become the spear-head of the struggle against the Federation. The UP Kisan-workers and the Socialists have in their hands not only the responsibility of their provincial sectional movement but the fate of our national movement itself.

Source: National Front, September, 1938

7

Kisan Movement

By PC Joshi

THE elected representatives of about 8 lac organised Kisans meet at Gaya. The AH India Kisan Sabha has became the second biggest mass organisation in our country after the National Congress.

Kisan struggles

The Kisans have forged new weapons, effectively used older ones, and reshaped new to suit their own purposes.

The March has been a specific Kisan contribution to our national armoury. It has been used with remarkable success to achieve different ends. It has been initiated by the most militant locality in a district to gather the rest of their brethren and approach the District Magistrate with their common grievance — may be remission, extortion, or the demand for taccavi and to bring the local officials face to take with their united strength. It has taken the form of a cross-country march initiated from the Provincial Kisan headquarters as in Behar, Andhra, Maharashtra to forge the sanctions behind their demands before the Congress Ministeries and mobilise the Kisan behind his organisation and get him into it too. It has been used for fraternisation with and paying homage to the Congress. A Kisan March has been organised to every session of the Congress. By now almost every province has had its Kisan march which has put the Kisan Sabha on its political map.

In the actual struggles against rack-renting, ejectments, sowcars frauds, forced labour and other feudal grievances the technique used by the Congress during Satyagraha days has been employed and further enriched by assimilating the experiences of the strike struggles of the industrial workers. The old collective traditions of the village have been used to advance the cause of struggle, e.g., collective sowing and harvesting in the bakasht struggle in Behar, a man per homestead delegated for the struggle in Mandvi and so on.

These partial struggles have by now been fought in every provinces, they herald a new chapter in the life of the Indian Kisan — no more a victim of fate but a maker of history. Not only the lone Kisan but his whole family, women and children have undergone the baptism of struggle. There have been whole villages that have participated to a man in these struggles; not one black sheep was there. Prison, lathi, bayonet, bullets, arson, rape, attachment of house-hold goods — all have been tried to break the Kisan struggle but in vain. The movement has already become sanctified with the blood of unknown martyrs, and the deeds of nameless heroes headed by one of the greatest sons of the soil, Swami Sahajanand.

These partial struggles have enriched our revolutionary movement and strengthen its core. They have made the Kisans crack battalions of our National army.

Offensive from the right

After the acceptance of Ministries by the Congress an offensive against the Kisan Sabha movement was launched by the Right-wing on the ground that the Kisan Marches were unnecessary and demonstrations against the Ministries and Kisan Sabhas rivals to the Congress. These arguments were not only palpably wrong but served as a smokescreen to be able to follow a constitutional policy to which the rising Kisan movement was proving the greatest hindrance. The upsurge of the Kisans meant extra-parliamentary pressure from a sector where the real mass basis of the Congress lay and it was irresistible by arguments for it demanded nothing more than the rapid implementing of the promises made to the Kisan in the Election Manifesto. It had therefore to be damned as anti-Congress! A poisonous propaganda was set afoot against the Kisan Sabha in every locality by the supporters of the Right. A split in the national forces seemed imminent; the battle raged for months. The Haripura resolution, (restating) that Kisans could form their Sabha and Congressmen help it if it did not carry out an anti-Congress policy, settled the issue as a national controversy, a nation-wide frontal offensive against the Kisan Sabha was given up, but pin-pricks in the localities have continued and also desperate efforts to isolate the Kisan Sabha from the local Congress.

Line of isolation

Tlie offensive from the Right coupled with, political and objective inability to defeat it by successfully implementing the policy of unity has led to the emergence of a sectarian trend within the movement. It finds expression in the following three slogans :

(2) We want unity but the Congress does not. Let the Congress come to us, we are willing. In the meanwhile, we carry on with our Kisan work.

(3) There can be no unity between the exploiters and the exploited. National Front is a chimera, toilers front alone is the real anti-imperialist front

These appear to be different but they are variants of one common line. They conceive of the Kisan as unrelated to the rest of the people. By idealising the Kisan, they isolate him from real life and the society in which he lives. These slogans appear Left but in reality they make the Kisan politically ineffective and confine his actual movement within the economic sphere alone. The major class division is between Imperialism on the one hand and the Indian people on the other, the greatest class struggle today is our national struggle, the main organ of our struggle in the National Congress. Any course that takes the Kisan away from this straight course separates him from the anti-imperialist struggle that is actually raging, divides and weakens the whole national movement. Such is not the line of unity but of disruption, of economism and not anti-imperialism.

… General political agitation is no longer enough, practical steps are needed to build the actual unity of the local Congress Committee and the Kisan Sabha.

It is this Congress-Kisan unity which will move the Congress itself forward. Unity will not force the Kisan movement to a lower stage but take the whole national movement to a higher stage. …

Organisational leadership

During the last year, when the movement assumed the character of a mass movement; all its problems became organisational and ceased being agitational. But lack of organisational leadership has been another failure of the movement. The movement has grown much faster than the leadership has been able to cope with and thus the movement has tended to be rudderless, spontaneous and elemental and the growth of the movement has not been truly reflected in the rising strength of the Kisan Sabhas. It is not that the Kisan leaders have not known what to do but the crux of the problem is that there has been too little of what was demanded by the needs of the movement.

The Provincial and All India Headquarters do not function as the General Staff, of a million strong mass organisation which moves millions and has yet to organise millions more. This is borne out by the uneven growth of membership. A few provinces contribute almost the entire membership, most struggling behind with a couple of thousands alone.

Local struggles break out, local comrades sink their all in them and [search] in vain for help from above. Some individual leading comrade may go to their rescue or he may not. There is no cadre of senior experienced comrades who would act as organisers and inspectors on behalf of the All-India or provincial organisation and concentrate the resources of the whole movement on the fighting front where the fortunes of the whole movement may be at stake.

Newer Kisan comrades are hardly given any training. They educate themselves as best as they can, learn whatever they can from their own immediate experience. Living and working as they do, they naturally lack ideological-political maturity and serve as an excellent base for sectarianism. This is a grave danger. There have been Schools but they have hardly touched the fringe of the problem. We need Schools and more Schools, for the workers of different grades, organised by the District Sabhas for the rank and file, by the Provincial Committees for the local organisers and by the AIKC for the provincial leaders.

The movement has acquired a status and faces problems that need a Department to carry on serious economic and political investigations and research work. As yet the excellent Bulletin devotedly edited by Comrade Yajnik is the only activity in this direction besides the various memorandums by the Provincial Sabhas drawn up, at the eleventh hour, on the proposals that have been on the legislative anvil. Collection of Fund earmarked for this purpose and delegation of a team of intellectuals exclusively for this purpose is an urgent necessity if the movement is not to be called upon to follow its historic course almost blind.

Once again the prime responsibility for the organisational shortcomings falls upon the Socialist and Communist leaderships who have failed to strain their utmost to supply the remedies, give necessary relative importance to different tasks and fulfil first tasks first. According to any standards that can be applied to them as Marxists, they too have worked almost blindly in the movement.

At Gaya

The Kisan movement can consolidate its present strength and march to greater strength only to the extent the Gaya session helps to evolve a practical political line for the movement, simple slogans are no more enough, and to the extent it tackles the major organisational issues facing it and which its own growth has created, mere agitators’ methods won’t help the movement any more. Unity of the Kisan front has been its pride, Gaya must preserve, broaden, strengthen it. …

IT IS THUS THAT THE INDIAN KISAN WILL REALISE HIS OWN DESTINY — A TRUE SON OF THE SOIL. SUBSERVIENT TO NONE, BROTHER OF ALL. FRONT-TRENCH FIGHTER FOR FREEDOM !

Source: National Front, 2 April, 1939