Bol Kisana, Halla Bol

On Thursday, August 20, the farmers of western Uttar Pradesh jammed New Delhi and held an impressive rally at Sansad Marg. They were agitating for the repeal of the Land Acquisition Act of 1894. The British imperialists, having claimed land and forests for the Raj under the Law of Eminent Domain, adopted this piece of legislation in order to acquire lands to be used for public good. Independent India did not remove this Act, the reason being economic development which the government wished to pursue. The Act ought to have been given up so that the government, or any public authority empowered by it, would buy land from its owners, generally the farmers, on market rates. But, public good, as defined by it, demanded otherwise. The government did not pursue equitable land reforms so that it could argue that it was not dispossessing the poor cultivators, but the landlords. However, quite a large number of small cultivators were dispossessed of their lands, while getting very little compensation. When Chandigarh was built to serve as the capital for the State of Punjab in which the present Haryana and Himachal Pradesh were included, the farmers resisted its construction because they were losing their landholdings which were their only source of livelihood. Similar situations existed elsewhere too. In a large number of cases, the State governments acquired lands not for any public good, but to help industrialists to start their industries. They robbed poor Peter to pay purpled Paul.

When the Delhi Development Authority started to acquire land and kept it vacant for years together for selling it later at high prices, the farmers started agitations in the Capital too. The Central Government, faced with agitations all over the country, revised in 1968 the sections of the Act which were concerned with compen-sations. But, as the prices of urban land rocketed, the farmers found that the DDA was getting sky high prices. They again started to agitate. Earlier, during the Emergency, Parliament had passed the Urban Ceiling Act, which was generally ignored later. That was another reason for the agitations of the farmers. After a series of rallies in Delhi, attended by the farmers of the neighbouring areas, the Act was amended again in 1984. The cultivators wanted not only higher prices, but to retain their lands and livelihood. Therefore, their simple demand was that the Act be repealed.

After the Government of India adopted the so-called economic reforms which favoured privatisation, it became easy to acquire land. The law was changed to redefine public good so as to include the private companies’ demands. The Government of UP, headed by BSP supremo Mayawati, launched a big land acquisition exercise. First. a Ganga Highway Project was conceived so that the bank of the river was accompanied by roads on either side. This would have displaced large numbers of farmers in the rich fertile lands in the neighbourhood of the mighty river, considered sacred by millions. Now, the State Government is acquiring the land from NOIDA, near Delhi, up to Agra, about 260 kilometres away. These lands are irrigated by the Yamuna river, and are formed by equally rich alluvial soil. The government desires to sell them to property dealers who will build posh residential colonies and malls. It is difficult to see the logic of this policy when one recalls that Uttar Pradesh is one of the BIMARU States where economic development is slow. The proportion of the people below poverty line is also quite high.

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IT is not realised that the cultivators are engaged in a losing vocation and are, therefore, burdened by debts. In the case of UP, their proportion is abut 60 per cent, while the All India figure a few years ago was 48 per cent. Losing the holdings which give them livelihood would be extremely hard for them. They would have to sell all their belongings to settle the debts. But, Mayawati and her colleagues are unrelenting. The government unleashed violence and repression on the agitating farmers in Aligarh. In other places also it adopted harsh measures. All this has compelled the kisans to resist the government’s plans with all their might. The kisans being displaced are generally medium landholders, growing wheat, rice and sugar-cane. Moreover, they are the hardy Jats, Yadavs and Gujjars who were known as martial communities. Western UP, along with Haryana and Punjab, has a long tradition of kisans agitations under the banner of the Bharatiya Kisan Union, once led by the famous Mahendra Singh Tikait. The Yadav community is strongly represented in Agra, Mathura and Aligarh. Therefore, the fight that Mayawati has picked up is against a strong peasantry.

The Samajwadi Party, the Rashtriya Janata Dal, the Janata Dal (U), the Janata Dal (S) and the two Lok Dals led by Ajit Singh and Om Prakash Chautala are the offsprings of the Socialist Party, which was a strong advocate of justice for farmers, but along with that, the Janata Party and Lok Dal. Socialists in UP had fought several battles for remunerative prices of sugar-cane and its products. Genda Singh became famous as Ganna Singh for this reason. Dr Lohia offered satyagraha against the betterment levy on farmers. Hence, the agitation has received spontaneous support of these parties.. Rahul Gandhi also lent his support to the agitation. He met the Prime Minister a couple of days before the Sansad Gherao of the farmers, and got the PM to promise that amendments to the Act would be made in the winter session of Parliament. But, the Central Government would not scrap the Act. Although it should do so in order that the farmers get market prices. They should not be treated as inferior to the industrialists whose products sell at market prices. There is a whole history of the deception played on the farmers because the government after government had decided to raise capital for industry by fleecing them. That is why the prices of their products are fixed by the Centre and, generally, they are not remunerative. Banks give them loans at higher rates of interest as compared to the loans given to industry. The farmers have to pay compound rates of interest while the industrialists pay simple rates of interest.

The Commission of Farmers, headed by Dr. M. S. Swaminathan, had found that over 40 per cent kisans had said that if they could opt for some other vocation, they would willingly do so. Farmer’s leaders point out that a medium farmer earns less than what a fourth class permanent employee gets as his salary and DA. The result is not only a burden of debt, but also failure to secure quality education for the children thereby putting them at great disadvantage in the job market and other careers. High rents, rising costs of inputs and unremunerative prices of the produce have made millions of petty farmers turn into landless workers. The anger of the kisans has been accumulating for generations. It has started to explode. The Halla Bol in Parliament Street signified it.

The author is one of the country’s leading socialist ideologues.