land reform and agrarian change in india and pakistan since 1947 i

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Land reform and Agrarianchange in India and Pakistansince 1947: 1P. C. Joshi aa Professor of Economic Sociology, Institute ofEconomic Growth , University of Delhi ,Published online: 05 Feb 2008.

To cite this article: P. C. Joshi (1974) Land reform and Agrarian change in Indiaand Pakistan since 1947: 1, The Journal of Peasant Studies, 1:2, 164-185

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Land Reform and Agrarian Changein India and Pakistan since 1947: I

byP. C. Joshi*

Analysing the class character of land reform in Indiaand Pakistan the author makes a distinction betweenideology and programme. Judged by its ideology,land reform in India is sharply anti-landlord and pro-peasant and is thus a mobiliser of peasant supportfor the ruling elite. The programme of land reform,however, serves primarily the interests of an emergingintermediate class of under-proprietors and big peasants.This intermediate class makes a joint front with therural poor to curb the privileges of landlords. But itmakes a common cause with the landlords to thwartany prospect of agrarian radicalism turning into a pro-poor agrarian programme. In Pakistan the conflictbetween the old landlords and the emerging inter-mediate class is not as sharply articulated as in Indiaand land policy therefore had a more pronounced pro-landlord bias than was the case in India. In Pakistanat best it denotes the tension between the old moribundand a new dynamic landlord class.

Land Reform, Class Structure and the Power-elite: CommonFeatures between India and Pakistan

The analysis of land reform should occupy an important placein a survey of social trends in the Asian region.

The significance of land reform is obvious if one keeps in viewthe predominantly agrarian character of most Asian countries. Themajority of the population in Asia live in villages,1 whereland constitutes not only the main source of livelihood2 but alsothe basis of social stratification, power structure, family organi-sation and belief systems. Land reform which is intended topromote changes in land relations is bound to exercise a far-reaching influence not only on the pattern of agricultural trans-formation but of rural transformation as a whole.

It should be borne in mind that changes in land relations are* Professor of Economic Sociology, Institute of Economic Growth, University of DelhiThe author is grateful to several persons for their help in preparation of this paper:especially to Professor Ajit Biswas for his valuable comments on an earlier draft of thispaper; to Dr. Dharm Narain, Dr. C. H. Hanumantha Rao and Dr. Andre Beteille fordiscussions on a number of points; and to Dr. Suren Navlakha for help in preparing thefinal draft of this paper. This article first appeared In Studies in Asian Social Develop-ment. I. This article is divided into two parts. Part II will appear in the next issue of the Journal.

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LAND REFORM IN INDIA AND PAKISTAN 165

not only propellors of socio-economic change, but are alsoreciprocally influenced by changes in the economic, technological,social, political and idealogical spheres.3 Analysis of the impactof land reforms, therefore, has to be attempted with an awarenessof development in the total social situation. Further, countries inAsia exhibit many points of similarity as well as of divergence inrespect of land reform programmes and their impact on socio-economic change. These points of similarity and divergence canbe identified only by intensive country studies undertaken in acomparative framework.

In this paper an attempt has been made to present a generalview of land reforms and agrarian change from a comparativestandpoint in two Asian countries, viz., India and Pakistan. Thestudy relates to the period following the emergence of India andPakistan as two independent countries in 1947.

At the very outset it should be noted that agrarian change inIndia and Pakistan is only partly a spontaneous and natural processresulting from the interaction of diverse economic and non-economic forces. More importantly, it is the result of varioussocio-economic programmes, including land reform, introducedby ruling elites which took over the reins of political power onthe termination of British rule. A study of agrarian change, there-fore, is, to begin with, a study of elite-sponsored land reform.

It is important to note that commitment to land reform iscommon to the ruling elites both in India and Pakistan.4 In fact,it is safe to generalise that in the Asian region the commitmentto land reform is independent of the differences either in the socialcharacter of the ruling elites or in the form of political regimes.Diverse types of political elites and political regimes are all infavour of land reform.5 The compulsions or motivations underlyingthis commitment are also in some fundamental respect similar.6In the case of the Indian elite, the commitment to land reformdates back to a period when the leadership of the Indian NationalCongress was struggling to wrest power from British hands.Consequently, it was led by the logic of this struggle to makepromises for change in the agrarian system so as to win peasantsupport for the anti-imperialist struggle [Malaviya, 1954; Joshi,1967; All India Congress Committee, 1969]. There is not muchevidence of a similar commitment on the part of the leadershipof the All-India Muslim League in the pre-independence period,even though pressure for such a commitment was being exercisedby dynamic elements specially at the lower levels of the MuslimLeague organisation. This pressure increased with the transfor-mation of the League from "a coterie of landlords, retired seniorofficials and the lawyers" into a 'mass organisation'. [Tinker,1962: 104]. As a result, the League leadership could no longerignore popular urges and demands. These pressures crystallisedinto a commitment after the formation of Pakistan.7

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166 JOURNAL OF PEASANT STUDIES

Thus, the promise of land reform assumed the shape of a moredefinite agrarian programme with the appointment of the CongressAgrarian Reforms Committee in India in 1949 and of the AgrarianCommittee by the Pakistan Muslim League in the same year.Commitment to land reform by the elites both in India andPakistan, which was earlier a part of the strategy of winningpower, was now a part of the strategy for legitimisingpower [Tai, 1968: 63-66]. It was necessary that, for gainingpolitical legitimacy, the ruling elites should appear to be earnestabout remedying the hardships and sufferings of the peasants whoconstituted the largest section of the population in both countries.Without the promise of land reform it was not possible to expectmass peasant support for the newly established regimes. In thiscontext, attention should also be focused on the growing agrarianunrest in several parts of undivided India at the time of inde-pendence. This was reflected in widespread tenant-landlord con-flicts which threatened to undermine the very stability of thenewly established regimes in both India and Pakistan. The situa-tion provided another powerful compulsion for ruling elites to giveurgent attention to the question of agrarian reconstruction.8

Another motivating factor for urgent attention to the agrarianquestion was the critical situation created by the chronic stagna-tion of agriculture.9 This stagnation aggravated not only the prob-lem of feeding an increasing population but also thwarted thepossibilities of rapid industrial development. The ruling elites wereforced to recognise the close interdependence of agriculturalregeneration and agrarian reorganisation. The replacement of theunproductive landed gentry by a landowning class activelyinterested in farming appeared to be one of the most importantpre-conditions for agricultural progress.10

Yet another factor underlying the promise of land reform wasthe concern at the threat to political and social stability arisingfrom vast economic disparities between the haves and the have-nots. In countries of Asia where the overwhelming proportion ofpopulation was dependent on land for its livelihood, this disparityassumed the form of a vast economic and social distance betweenthe landlords and the tenants and between the landed and thelandless classes. The land system was one of the main promotersof economic and social injustice. Any advance towards a justeconomic and social order, therefore, appeared inconceivablewithout a reorganisation of the land system. The ruling eliteswere aware that the idea of equality was fast becoming a partof the consciousness of the exploited classes and, consequently,an economic and social order which tended to perpetuate ratherthan remove social injustice would not answer the needs of thetimes; it would not be tolerated by the masses. It would not onlypromote social tension but also give birth to violent movementsled by extremist political forces. These were the considerations

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which fay behind the emphasis placed by ruling elites on com-bining economic development with social justice. Land reformwas regarded as fundamental both for economic development andfor social justice. A perusal of chapters dealing with land reformin the Five Year Plan Reports of both India and Pakistan bringsout the identity of outlook in respect of the importance attachedto land reform.11

Lastly, mention should also be made of the international factorswhich, apart from internal compulsions, motivated the politicalelites in India and Pakistan as in many jother Asian countriestowards commitment to land reform. Most notable in this contextwas the impact of peasant revolutions occurring in various Asiancountries in the post-war period. International pressure was alsoexercised by various UN Agencies which time and again impressedupon governments in underdeveloped countries the necessity ofland reform. In fact, in the post-war world a land reform pro-gramme constituted one of the symbols of international respecta-bility.12

In short, the compulsions and motivations underlying thepromise of agrarian reform by ruling elites in India and Pakistanare fundamentally similar. It is important also to emphasise theresemblance in the broad scope of land reform in the twocountries. Thus, in both countries this general commitment toland reform finds concrete expression in the programme for,(1) the abolition of intermediary tenures, (2) tenancy reforms,(3) fixation of ceiling on agricultural holdings, and (4) reorganisa-tion of agriculture, including consolidation of holdings, preventionof fragmentation, development of service co-operatives andlimited promotion of co-operative farms. [Government of Pakistan,1957: 312; Government of India, Planning Commission, 1952:184-207].

This programme was intended to provide the basic frameworkof land reform in India and Pakistan. Before evaluating the poten-tialities of this framework for promoting desired changes in theagrarian structure, another common feature of the approach ofthe ruling elites in both countries should be highlighted.

The crux of the land problem in both India and Pakistan as inmany other Asian countries was the existence of land concen-tration in the hands of a minority of landlords who neithermanaged nor cultivated their lands; the other side of the samephenomenon was the dissociation from landownership of the vastmass of peasants who were the actual tillers of land over whichthey had limited or no proprietary rights [UNDEA, 1954: 19-24;Thorner, 1956; Bredo in Froehlich, 7967]- The fundamentalquestion of land policy was the question of removing this dis-crepancy between ownership of land and its actual cultivation.The ruling elites in both countries were of the view that tenancywas not compatible either with agricultural efficiency or with

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social justice. It should therefore be replaced by owner-cultivation.But owner-cultivation could be promoted in two different andopposite ways. It could be promoted by transforming the actualtillers into owner-cultivators by large-scale redistribution of land-lords' lands among small peasants and labourers. Alternatively, itcould be promoted by inducing the landlords themselves to under-take self-cultivation through hired labour instead of leasing outtheir lands to the tenants, as was the current practice. The firsttype of policy would have led to a kind of land reform programmeimplemented in countries like mainland China after the communistvictory and in Taiwan and Japan under American occupationduring the period following the second World War. The secondchoice would have led to a type of agrarian transformation broadlyresembling the English enclosures during the eighteenth centuryor Prussian Junkerism during the nineteenth century.13

It is important to note that the framework of policy adopted bvruling elites both in India and Pakistan favoured neither of thetwo courses of wholesale expropriation of landlordism in theinterest of peasant ownership or expropriation of tenant cultivatorsin the interest of large-scale cultivation by former landlords.Instead, the power-elite in both countries favoured a middlecourse of reconciling the interests of landlords with those of thetenants.14 In other words, it favoured a policy of curtailing (andnot eliminating) landlordism and of promoting conversion of non-cultivating landlords into cultivating landowners. So far as thepeasants were concerned, it favoured a policy of upgrading theupper layer of tenants and of giving some relief to the othertenants. Here was thus a policy of promoting a class of owner-cultivators from both the former landlord and the tenant classes.It was expected to provide the social framework for economicdevelopment and for social and political stability.

This was the basic orientation of land policy laid down in theFive Year Plans of both India and Pakistan. It must be emphasisedthat this policy framework was sufficiently elastic to permit botha relatively more radical or a more conservative, a more tenant-oriented or a more landlord-oriented, direction of agrarian reformprogramme as and when dictated by exigencies.

It may and should be asked why in predominantly peasantcountries like India and Pakistan the ruling elites did not favoura course of thorough-going agrarian transformation of the Japaneseor Taiwan type which held promise of maximum gain to thepeasantry. To raise this question is to raise the fundamental issueof the agrarian class structure and its determining influence onthe structure of the ruling elites in India and Pakistan. In effect,it is to raise the issue of the balance of political forces in boththese countries. A perceptive scholar of land reform in Asia,Hung-chao Tai, has suggested that the character of the landreform programme in developing countries is determined by

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the character of the power-elites, more specifically by 'therelation between the elites and the landed class' {Tai, 1965:66-69], He has classified power-elites into two broad types, viz.the 'separated' and the 'co-operative'. In the case of the formerthe 'separation' of the power-elites from the landed class enablesthem to act more vigorously against the powerful landed class andin favour of the tenantry. In the case of the 'co-operative' elites,however, the scope of such initiative against the landed interestsand in favour of the tenants is restricted. The check on freedomof action by power-elites thus results in compromise of tenantinterests and concessions to the landed class in the formulationand implementation of land policy. Co-operative elites, again, aresub-divided into two types, the 'dominant' and the 'conciliatory',the 'dominant' elites being less dependent on the landed classthan the 'conciliatory' elites. The latter are therefore much morestatus-quo-oriented than the former who make concessions to thelanded class but are not totally identified with it.

Hung-chao Tai has characterised the power-elites of bothIndia and Pakistan as 'co-operative' elites of the 'dominant' typewhich stand midway between the wholly 'separated' and thewholly 'conciliatory' types of elites. The land policy sponsoredby these elites also stands midway between the wholly radicaland the wholly conservative types of land policy. In other words,the separation of the elites from the landed class in India andPakistan had not proceeded to such an extent as to permit adrastic redistribution of land in favour of the landless classes.Nor were the power-elites in these countries identical with thelanded class. Thus, enjoying limited independence from the landedclass, the elites projected themselves as the promoters of acautious policy benefiting all sections of society including thetenants. The separation of the power-elites from the landed classis expressed in their resolve to curtail the land monopoly of thelandlord class and its social and political privileges; but theabsence of total separation is expressed in numerous com-promises and concessions to landlords and, above all, in therejection of the proposal for drastic redistribution of land.

Hung-chao Tai's analysis provides a partial but not an adequateexplanation for the middle-of-the-road character of land policy inIndia and Pakistan. Its inadequacy lies in the failure to identifythe class basis of land policy. The fundamental question left un-answered by Hung-chao Tai is which particlar economic class'sinterests does this policy represent? Underlying his analysisis the somewhat oversimplified view of an agrarian societywith sharp polarisation of the landed and the landlessclasses. In fact in India and Pakistan neither the landlords northe tenants constituted such monolithic groups. Further, betweenbig landlords on the one hand and the poor tenants and labourerson the other, there existed both in India and Pakistan intermediate

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strata of resident under-proprietors and superior tenants who alsosuffered under the old land system but who were relatively betteroff than the small tenants, tenants-at-will and agriculturallabourers. This intermediate class was opposed to the continuanceof the feudal land system but not to the principle of large land-ownership. It aspired to be free from the control of big landlordsand to join the privileged class of independent proprietors. Itsattitude towards the old landed class was, therefore, ambivalent.

This intermediate class made a joint front with the rural poorto oppose the feudal burdens imposed by the landlord class. Butit made common cause with the landlords to oppose any inter-pretation of land reform in terms of redistribution of land infavour of the rural poor. Here was the attitude of an emerginglanded class which was keen to oust the feudal landed class fromits position of unquestioned dominance. The existence of thisdynamic group provided the social or class motivation for theunique middle-of-the-road type of policy in India and Pakistan. Inother words, the conflict between the old landed class and thedynamic intermediate class found its reflection in the battle ofideas relating to alternative paths of agrarian reorganisation. Itshould also be emphasised that neither in the pre-independenceperiod nor after independence was there a clear demarcation orarticulation of the interests of the rural poor either at the level ofpolitical elite formation or at the intellectual level of crystallisationof an economic model based on the interests of the rural poor.

In respect of both India and Pakistan, however, a clear distinc-tion should be drawn between the ideology of land reform on theone hand and the programme of land reform on the other. Theideology of land reform is generally anti-landlord and representsan articulation of general peasant interests. The ruling elites speakof the interests of the entire peasantry. But the programme ofland reform serves primarily the interests of the superior tenantsand under proprietors rather than the interests of the rural poor.

It should be pointed out here that at the time of independencethe Indian power-elite emerged as a representative of the dynamicintermediate groups to a much greater extent than the power-elitein Pakistan which reflected the dominant position of the oldlanded class. The contrast between the two power-elites is fullycorroborated by the relatively more radical land reform proposalsof the Congress Agrarian Reforms Committee (1949) as com-pared to the recommendations of the Agrarian Committee of thePakistan Muslim League (1949). In fact, to use Hung-chao Tai'stypology again, the Pakistan Muslim League appears more as anelite of the 'conciliatory-co-operative' type rather than of the'dominant-co-operative' type.

The change in the character of the Pakistan power-elite fromthe 'conciliatory-co-operative' to the 'dominant-co-operative' typeoccurred with the military take-over and the installation of the

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Ayub Khan regime. This is a development spotlighted not onlyby Pakistan scholars on land reform but also by others outsidePakistan. In an important paper by a Pakistan scholar, MushtaqAhmad [7959] , this difference between the old and the newpower-elites has been fully emphasised. Ahmad's characterisationof the new elite as completely independent of the landlord classis no doubt exaggerated but the identification of divergencebetween the two elites is important [Ahmad, 1959: 32-33].K

Hung-chao Tai has also emphastsed the limited independenceof the Ayub Khan regime from the old landed class [Tai, 1968:67] .16 Similarly, Myrdal has also pointed out that "the upper classstatus of those who stepped into power was even more pro-nounced in Pakistan than in India and was weighted heavilytowards the landlord class," [Myrdal, 1968: 311] and that "thepolitics pursued in Pakistan during its first decade of indepen-dence was thoroughly inimical to social change. . ." {ibid: 315].In contrast to the earlier parliamentary regime, the new regime,following the military take-over, "publicly endorsed the wholegamut of modernisation ideals, including the need for planning,greater equality in distribution of wealth, the liquidation offeudalism. . ." [ibid: 327-28]. Further, it tried 'to work with com-mendable speed and relative freedom from the pressure of specialvested interests.' More importantly, "the problem of land reformin West Pakistan was also taken up promptly and its general lineswere decreed by January, 1959. As later carried out the reformwas anything but drastic or radical . . . But the parliamentaryregime had never tackled land reform at all, and, however mildthe present government's programme, it may serve as a beginningfor more effective reform in the future" [ibid: 329].

The emphasis placed by Hung-chao Tai and Myrdal on thelimited independence of the Ayub Khan regime from the land-lords is no doubt justified. But again the class basis and orienta-tion of the Ayub regime remains unexplained. In our view, the landpolicy of the Ayub regime was more oriented towards the dynamicintermediate groups of medium landlords and superior tenants insharp contrast to the policy of the earlier regimes which favouredthe big landlords. In short, the change of political regime inPakistan represented the shifting class basis of the power struc-ture from the big landlords to medium land-owners and superiortenants. It was the assertion at the political level of the classesintermediate between the big landlords on the one hand and therural poor on the other against the unquestioned political domin-ance of the big feudal landed class. In short, it represented theunfolding of the same political processes as in India, thoughwith a considerable time lag.

An attempt has so far been made to relate the middle-of-the-road character of land policy in India and Pakistan to the classcharacter of power-elites, more specifically to the contending

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pressures of the old landed class and the dynamic intermediategroups that came to the fore in the wake of independence.Another factor closely related to this interaction of the classstructure and the ruling elite structure is the overall balance ofpolitical forces in these countries. This is a point on which greatemphasis has been laid by many perceptive analysts of landreform in underdeveloped countries. Doreen Warriner has statedthat 'the balance of political power in each country will determinethe extent of reform' [Warriner, 1969: 15]. Similarly, from asurvey of land reform in Asia, Wolf Ladejinsky has drawn theconclusion that 'the content and implementation of agrarianreform are a reflection of a particular political balance of forcesin a country.' [Ladejinsky, 1964: 456].

Ladejinsky shows how in Taiwan and Japan "both forces whichwere indigenous and which were created as a result of the warfavoured a drastic agrarian reform and a redistribution of incomeand social and political power" [ibid-: 456]. Further, the balanceof political forces in these countries was clearly in favour ofreforms which "were not designed to satisfy the claims of bothcontending parties" [ibid.: 449] as in India and Pakistan. In fact,"the tenant was to gain at the expense of the landlord" [ibid.:449]. According to Ladejinsky, one of the crucial factors deter-mining the absence of a political balance favourable to reformsof the Japanese type in countries like India and Pakistan was theweakness of the peasantry as a political force. Thus, Ladejinskyexplains that

the peasants themselves while discontented have not developed amovement, whether in the form of tenant-unions like those of Japanbefore the reforms, or peasant political parties like those of EasternEurope after the First World War. . . . For the most part the peasantsbehaved as if any change in their condition depended upon somebodyelse. By their apathy they disproved the reasonable assumption that inan agricultural country a government must have peasant support. Thefact is that the national and state legislatures in Asia do not representthe interests of the peasantry; if they did, reform might have taken adifferent character altogether. The reality is that even when voting isfree the peasantry in Asia is not yet voting its own interests [1964:456; [emphasis added].

This weakness of the peasantry as a political force capable ofexerting adequate pressure on political parties and governmentsfor reforms in their favour is reported by scholars as a charac-teristic common to political systems of both democratic andauthoritarian types. Doreen Warriner's study of land reforms alsopresents a similar view [Warriner, 1969: 14]!

Doreen Warriner has also drawn attention to the lack ofgenuine support from other articulate classes in countries likeIndia and Pakistan for agrarian reform.18

The analysis offered by Ladejinsky and Warriner is partiallycorrect in so far as it throws light on the lack of political articu-lation or organisation of the rural poor in India and Pakistan. The

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weight attached to this factor in explaining the absence ofJapanese-type land reforms is also justified. But, this analysts isincomplete or perhaps even defective in so far as it is based onan oversimplified view of the class relations and the power struc-ture in these countries. This analysis does not take into accountthe existence of intermediate classes between the two extremesof the big landlords and the rural poor. Nor does it take accountof the resilient middle-of-the-road (as against the two extremesof the right-wing and the left-wing) political forces; this middleforce articulated and championed the interests of the intermediateclasses in the name of the general interests of all the oppressedclasses in the rural areas. As a result, this analysis presents agenerally negative rather than an objective view of land reformpolicy in India and Pakistan. Considered from the standpoint ofthe rural poor, land policy in both countries has, by and large,ended in fiasco. But considered from the standpoint of the inter-mediate classes, it was a positive success and a promoter ofchange from an economic and political system dominated byfeudal landlords to another dominated by the intermediateclasses.

Doreen Warriner is not entirely correct in her statement regard-ing the absence of agrarian unrest or peasant movements in Indiaand Pakistan. As indicated earlier, the rural scene at the time ofindependence was characterised by the general crisis of the oldagrarian system and widespread peasant discontent. This discon-tent did not, however, become trie basis of a peasant movementbased clearly on the interests of the rural poor. On the contrary,it was skilfully exploited by the political elites representing theinterests of the intermediate classes to make only such demandson the old landlord class as would yield maximum benefits for theintermediate classes rather than for the rural poor.

The class bias of the power-elites and the nature of powerbalance in India and Pakistan discussed above can thus be saidto be important factors determining the class content of agrarianreform programmes. The most important characteristics of theseprogrammes were: (1) they did not seek to attack land concen-tration but only to modify it, and (2) they sought to extendprotection not to all classes of tenants, but to certain specifiedsections belonging to the upper layers of the tenantry. This wasin marked contrast to the dominant approach to land reform inTaiwan and Japan which attacked land monopoly and gaveprimacy to the interests of the tillers of land. Another featuredistinguishing the approach in India and Pakistan from that ofJapan and Taiwan pertained to the methods and instruments ofenforcing reforms. The distinguishing features on the enforce-ment side were two-fold. In Japan and Taiwan

the reformers recognised not only that the cultivators had to be madeaware of the essence of the main provisions, but that they and only

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theyhad to be the true implementors of the reform if it were tosucceed. This attitude led to the creation of a practical enforcementagency, the local land commissions so far shunned by all the othercountries engaged in reform, save Taiwan [Ladejinsky, 1964: 457J.

In India and Pakistan, on the other hand, the enforcement of landreform was assigned to the normal administrative agencies of thegovernment without any time-bound programme and without anyobligation on their part to associate the peasants with the processof reform implementation.

The second distinguishing feature of land reform enforcementin Japan and Taiwan was the readiness of the ruling elites "touse all instruments of government to attain their goals" [Lade-i'msky, 1964: 459}. In fact " . . . landlords in these countries knewthat overt opposition would have met with drastic punishment"[ibid}. But the situation in India and Pakistan was different.Neither peasant mobilisation nor "government coercion whetherpractised or clearly threatened" occupied a significant place inthe strategy of reform enforcement in either India with a parlia-mentary democratic system or in Pakistan with a military regime.In fact, commitment to 'peaceful' change-over, without exerciseof coercion against the landed class, was common to the approachadopted by both regimes. Thus, notwithstanding the dissimilarityin the character of the political regimes, the liberal approachtowards the landed classes in both countries amply justifies thecharacterisation of both India and Pakistan, a la Myrdal, as 'softstates' [Myrdal, 1968: 66 and 895-9001. In short, in the courseof reform enforcement the state governments in India and Pakis-tan, unlike those in Taiwan and Japan, were not prepared to actdecisively for the enforcement of the rights of the weaker party(i.e., the peasants) against the machinations and pressure of thestronger party (i.e., the landlords). What made the situation worsefrom the point of view of the peasantry was that while the govern-ments in both countries were not prepared to use the instrumentsof authority for preventing the violation of land laws by the land-lords, they were prepared ruthlessly to use all the instruments ofcoercion and force for suppressing protest movements by thepeasantry whenever it tried to stand up for its rights. The 'softstate' for the landlords thus tended to act as a 'strong state'vis-a-vis the poor peasantry.

Taking an overall view, the approach of the power elites, bothin India and Pakistan, to the problem of land reform thus sufferedfrom serious inconsistencies. At the level of enunciating thegeneral principles, the power-elites emphasised the incompatibilityof the traditional landed class with the demands of economicdevelopment as well as those of social justice and politicalstability. At the level of concretising the actual reform pro-grammes, they adopted a policy of balancing the interests ofthe peasantry with those of the landed class. In laying down

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methods of enforcing land reforms, they showed a reluctance todecisively intervene in favour of the weak as against the strong.They showed a naive faith in 'peaceful' methods and 'peacefulchangeover'. This inconsistency between diagnosis of the landproblem on the one hand and the operational strategy for reformon the other is inherent in the approach of the ruling elites inboth countries. It is not difficult to discern this inconsistency inall major reports of official commissions and committees.Reference may be made in this respect to the U.P. ZamindariAbolition Committee Report [ 7948] for India and the Land ReformCommission Report 11959} for West Pakistan. The U.P. ZamindariAbolition Committee Report in its analytical parts builds up aformidable case against landlordism and concludes that "no solu-tion within the existing framework of the land system beingpossible, the landlord must go" [Vol. 1, 1948: 35]. Further itemphasises that ' . . . the system needs complete overhauling.Any attempt on our part to tinker with the problem and suggestchanges here and there in the superstructure is bound to fail"{ibid}. In the next part of the report dealing with recommenda-tions, however, it proposes 'modifications' rather than complete"overhauling' of the system. It recommends the retention of sir andkhudkasht lands by the landlords. It opposes not only redistribu-tion of these lands but also imposition of a ceiling on lands heldby landlords. In the opinion of the Committee, "the resultsachieved by redistribution of land would not be commensuratewith the discontent and hardships resulting from it. We, therefore,recommend that no limit be placed on the maximum area held incultivation either by a landlord or a tenant" [ibid: 389].

Similarly, the Report of the Land Reform Commission for WestPakistan presents a revealing analysis of the major defects of'large estates' from the point of view of both developmentalrequirements as well as social justice. It represents a case forceilings by emphasising the unproductive character of large hold-ings and the productive potentialities of redistribution in favourof small farmers [ibid: 12-15}. While making concrete recom-mendations, however, it proposes the fixation of ceilings on landholdings at such a high level as to reduce land redistribution, ineffect, to a symbolic gesture rather than a substantial measure.Having emphasised, in the analytical part of its report, the hard-ships and injustices to which the peasants have been exposedunder the domination of the landlord, the Commission recom-mends, in the operative part, that the process of change shouldbe 'smooth' and "should not involve for the landlord too abrupta break with the past, making it difficult for him to adjust to anew way of life which the change, in the form of a suddenreduction of income from land, will impose on him" [ibid.: 29-30}. This plea for caution on the part of elites both in India andPakistan has been interpreted by Warriner as a reflection of the'pressures to compromise' [Warriner, 1969: 14}.

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In short, there is a clear inconsistency between the ideology ofthe power-elites which proclaims the objective of 'land to thetiller*, and the programme which provides for land rights for onlythe upper section of the peasantry. Most analysts of land reformin India and Pakistan have either not taken note of this inconsis-tency or have dismissed this phenomenon as a reflection of sur-render to the landed class by the power elites. This inconsistencyassumes a definite meaning if one interprets it as a reflection ofthe dual role of the intermediate classes of rural society and ofthe power-elites championing the interests of these classes. Asindicated earlier, these classes try to rally the entire peasantrybehind them under the slogan of 'land to the tiller' in order tooust the old landed class from its dominant position in the landand power structures. Having broken the land and power monopolyof the old landed class, they try to dilute the 'land to the tiller'policy into an agrarian programme suited to their own limitedclass aims. The anti-landlord bias soon gives way to compromisewith the landlords for common opposition to any radical pro-gramme of 'land to the tiller' oriented to the interests of therural poor.

Land Reform, Class Structure and the Power-elite: Variationsbetween India and PakistanAn attempt has been made in the foregoing section to analyse thebroad similarities in approach to the land problem and landreform programmes in India and Pakistan. Also, some attempt hasbeen made to indicate the contrast in agrarian policy betweenIndia and Pakistan on the one hand and Japan and Taiwan on theother. In this section, we shall try to bring out the points ofdivergence between India and Pakistan within the framework ofa broadly uniform agrarian policy. We shall also try to indicatethe factors which explain the divergence in the policies of thetwo countries.

As mentioned earlier, the common feature of agrarian policy inIndia and Pakistan in the wake of their independence was theabsence of a clear-cut programme of 'land to the tiller' and ofabolition of non-cultivating landed interests altogether. Within thisidentical framework, however, there existed important points ofdivergence in the agrarian policies ot the two countries. Speakingin general terms, the tendency to compromise with feudal landedinterests was far more pronounced in Pakistan than in India. Thistendency was reflected in various provisions of the reformmeasures. Firstly, land legislation in India was much more sharplyaimed at curtailing land ownership by big landlords who hadconstituted the social and political allies of British rule. Asbetween the big landlords on the one hand and the medium andsmall landlords on the other, agrarian reform in India extendedprotection to the latter much more than to the former. Secondly, as

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between purely absentee and non-cultivating landlords on the onehand and cultivating landlords on the other, agrarian reform inIndia favoured the latter much more than the former. In otherwords, the Indian policy did not approve of the practice of leasingout of land to tenants by landlords; instead, it desired landlordsto become self-cultivators on their sir and khudkasht lands. Thecurbs on big land ownership were meant precisely to discourageresort to tenancy and to promote the transformation of non-cultivating landlords into cultivating landowners.

The emphasis in Indian agrarian policy on discouraging land-lords from resorting to tenancy is also confirmed by the stresslaid on 'personal cultivation' and by the definition of the term'personal cultivation' adopted by the policy-makers. According tothis definition, only such a landowner could claim to be engaged in'personal cultivation' as bore the risk of cultivation and undertooksupervision either himself or through another member of hisfamily or, if necessary, even through a paid manager. Accordingto the official definition, 'personal cultivation' did not involvepersonal manual labour, i.e., participation by the landowner inactual agricultural operations. In other words, cultivation throughlease arrangements or without any active role in risk-taking andsupervision by the landlord was a clear violation of the principleof 'personal cultivation' [Government of India, Planning Com-mission, 1956: 186].

In Pakistan, on the other hand, agrarian policy was less sharplyaimed at curtailing land ownership by big landlords and at dis-couraging tenancy. This becomes clear from the much higherlevels of ceiling on land ownership in West Pakistan (e.g., 500acres of irrigated land or 1,000 acres of unirrigated land in WestPakistan in contrast to the relatively low levels recommended inmost Indian state). This is also borne out by the statements ofpolicy-makers. For instance, the Land Reform Commission forWest Pakistan stated in very clear terms:

In recent years agrarian reforms have been undertaken in a number ofcountries with the object of breaking up the power of the old rulingoligarchy with its roots in big estates. Such consequence may follow insome measure if our recommendations in this report are implementedbut this is not one of the specific objectives for the achievement ofwhich we have been asked to propose measures. {West Pakistan LendReforms Commission. 19S9: 19].

That the policy-makers in Pakistan were reconciled to the resortto tenancy by landlords for cultivation of their lands is also indi-cated by another statement in the Report of the Land ReformCommission [ibid.: 1959: 58]:

Land as we have stated is held high in value by the rural society. Asa corollary, there is a great demand for the ownership of land. Anideal situation in our conditions would have been if the entire agricul-tural land could be operated through owner-farmers or peasant pro-

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prietors. Ideals, however, are seldom attainable and tenancy would,however, continue to be a dominant feature of the tenurial structure,despite the present attempt at the redistribution of the ownership ofland and of making access to the land more free [emphasis added.]

It is evident that policy-makers in Pakistan were much moreconcerned with regulating landlord-tenant relations than withabolishing tenancy. This is not to say that the actual impact ofagrarian reforms was much more beneficial to tenants as a wholein India than in Pakistan. In fact, in India, the pro-tenant pro-visions of agrarian reform were not supported by an adequateenforcement strategy. As a result, the landlords retaliated eitherby evicting tenants on a large scale or by converting open intodisguised {but illegal) tenancy arrangements. (The empiricalevidence on evictions is given later.) In Pakistan, on the otherhand, a more realistic attitude of not declaring a 'legislative'war against tenancy meant that the landlords were not provokedinto retaliatory action to as large an extent as in India. Tenancycontinued to be 'open' rather than 'underground' and evictionsalso did not occur on as large scale as in India. Having said this,it must be recognised that agrarian reform in India succeeded toa larger extent than in Pakistan in reducing the incidence of whollyabsentee, non-cultivating, big landlords.

Attention may now be focussed on the third important point ofdivergence between agrarian reforms in India and Pakistan. It isnoteworthy that, as between occupancy tenants on the one handand tenants-at-will, sharecroppers and agricultural labourers onthe other, land reforms in both India and Pakistan were biasedin favour of the former rather than the latter. But partly becauseof its relatively sharper edge against big landlords, partlybecause of the pro-big-tenant provisions of land-reforms and partlybecause of political and social changes, the total social situationin India proved much more favourable for the stabilisation of theupper layer of the peasants as independent peasant proprietors andtheir rise as the new dominant class in the emerging agrarianstructure. Land reforms were a contributory factor in bringingabout this shift of social and political power from old style landedgentry to the new class of medium landlords and rich peasants.These processes, though not entirely absent in Pakistan, were afar less pronounced feature of agrarian change in that country.

Lastly, the Indian elite contributed much more towards creatinga general climate for land reform and towards arousing the hopesand expectations of the rural poor than its counterpart inPakistan.

As Myrdal has emphasised, "in culture and aspiration thecountry's leaders (in Pakistan) were, and still are, separatedfrom the masses even more than in India, and there was amongthem little of that ideological identification with the interests ofthe masses which in India both Gandhi and the radical intellec-

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tuals in the Congress had nurtured' [Myrdal, 1968: 313]. It isthis factor which contributed at the ideological (though not at theprogrammatic) level to imparting a radical tone to Indian landreform policy. But this also provides part of the explanation whythe retaliatory action by landlords in anticipation of reforms wason a much larger scale in India than in Pakistan. Indian radicalismwhich remained confined to legislative enactments only servedto make the landlords more vigilant and skilful in forestallingreforms and in nullifying them through prior manipulation.

For an understanding of differences in the agrarian policies ofIndia and Pakistan, one has to consider several factors like thecharacter and composition of power-elites, the characteristics ofthe power-balance, and the compulsion and restraints of thepolitical system in the two countries.

India was more advanced industrially and educationally thanPakistan at the time of independence. The existence of moredeveloped industrial, commercial and professional groups and of amore broad-based middle class in India was an important factorwhich helped to neutralise the influence of the big landed gentryon political affairs, though to a much larger extent at the all-Indiathan in India sought an alliance with the emerging class of uppersociated from the landed class were relatively weaker in Pakistanthan in India [Myrdal, 1968: 309-12 and 339-41]. The urbanelite in India sought an alliance with the emerging class of upperstrata peasants and medium landowners rather than with thediscredited class of feudal landlords.

During the nationalist struggle the big landlords had openlysided with the British. It was therefore a class morally discreditedand, in fact, the abolition of this class was, as it were, 'one ofthe symbols of freedom from British rule' [Ladejinsky, 1964:453].

Much more favourable conditions existed in India, therefore, forgreater initiative against the big landed gentry than in Pakistan.Favourable factors of a similar nature also helped the shift ofpower from the big landlords to the upper layer of the peasantsin Indian villages.119 And here the relative openness of the Indianparliamentary system based on adult franchise and the right ofpolitical organisation and opposition was a favourable factor ofgreat importance. The emerging peasant groups with their roots inrural communities constituted 'vote banks' for the ruling urbanelites and, consequently, they possessed considerable bargainingpower. This political factor constituted a powerful compulsion forruling elites to impart a pro-big-peasant orientation to agrarianand developmental policies. It also constituted a powerful constrainton the growth of a pro-rural-poor orientation of reform pro-grammes.

Lastly, in explaining the relatively sharper anti-landlord edge ofagrarian reforms in India, one should also not lose sight of the

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role played by the leftist opposition and by the pockets of agrarianrevolt (e.g., in Telangana) during the early years of independenceIMalaviya in Desai, 1969; Gough, 1968-69}.

This is not to say that the change from an agrarian social struc-ture dominated by the big landed class towards a new agrariansystem dominated by meduim landlords and rich peasants is anexclusively Indian phenomenon. These trends are operative inPakistan as well, though much more tardily than in India. Evenin India the orientation of agrarian reform towards a new classstructure was not a uniform characteristic of all the regions. It wasmore pronounced in some regions than in others. Agrarian reformin Uttar Pradesh, for instance, represented the closest approxima-tion to the model of reform contemplated by the Indian rulingelite. In contrast, Bihar, Madhya Pradesh and Rajasthan typifiedanother model of reform thrown up by regional elites much lessdissociated from the traditional landed class.20

In Pakistan also, there existed significant differences in theorientation of agrarian reform as between East and West Pakistan.In the East, not only was agrarian reform introduced much earlierbut the emphasis of reform policy on curbing the socio-politicalprivileges and landrights of big landlords was more pronouncedthan in the West. As in the case of India, this anti-big-landlordorientation was facilitated by certain socio-political circumstances.Analysts of Pakistan land reform have drawn attention to the factthat most of the land in East Bengal was held by Hindu land-owners. As a result 'it was possible to obtain land reform soquickly in East Bengal after partition, as it provided the opportu-nity for the Muslim majority to free itself from the economiccontrol of the Hindu minority' [Bredo, 1961: 263]. In fact, asHung-chao Tai points out, 'in East Pakistan the reform law intro-duced in the aftermath of partition . . . was by and large ameasure of the new government to legalise what had already takenplace: the seizure and occupation of land of the fleeing Hinduzamindars by the Muslim peasants' [Tai, 1968: 65]. It mustalso be borne in mind that political awareness was moredeveloped among the peasants in Eastern than in the WesternPakistan [Myrdal, 1968: Vol I, 316]. These trends, however, weresought to be reversed by upper class Muslim refugees fromnorthern India who occupied commanding positions in the powerstructure and were acutely hostile to a break-up of large estates[ibid.. 3101.

The analysis of Indian and Pakistan land reform programmespresented so far may be summed up as follows:

(1) The social or class motivation for agrarian policy in India andPakistan was provided by the contending pressures of the erstwhilefeudal landlords on the one hand and the emerging class of mediumlandowners and superior tenants on the other.

(2) Within this common frame, the variations between India andPakistan were determined by the relatively greater pull of the old

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landed class in Pakistan and of the upper layer of the peasantry inIndia.

(3) In both countries, the rural poor were neither articulate nororganised enough at the political level to exercise influence on the landreform programmes in their favour.

(4) The impact of land reform has been positive for the intermediateclass which has been upgraded and pushed into a position of prominenceboth in the land and power structure. On the other hand it has by andlarge been instrumental in disturbing the old framework within whichthe rural poor had some security but it has failed to provide alternativeforms of security for them.

NOTES1 The percentage of rural to total population was as high as 89.9 for

Pakistan and 82.8 for India in 1950. Source: [US Department of Agricul-ture, 1965].

2 The percentage of population dependent on agriculture was 92 forPakistan and 70 for India in 1951. Source: [ibid.].

3 The influence of outside factors in shaping the social framework ofagriculture has been emphasised by Paul Baran as follows:

As a German writer once remarked, whether there will be meat in thekitchen is never decided in the kitchen. Nor is the fate of agricultureunder capitalism ever decided in agriculture. Economic, social andpolitical processes unfolding outside of agriculture . . . become withthe onset of capitalism prime movers of historical development. In theunderdeveloped countries predominantly agrarian this may beless obvious than in the advanced ones; it is, however, no less true.[Baran, 1958: 189 ] .

4 This can be seen from the great importance attached to land reform inthe Five Year Plan reports of both India and Pakistan. The First Five YearPlan of Pakistan stated: ['A readjustment of the rights in land] is themost urgently needed social and economic measure of reform. It is aprerequisite to rural and agricultural development. It will remove whatby any criteria is by far the largest source of inequalities and injusticesin our social order. This reform is the most important single measureneeded for the health and vigour of our society' [Emphasis added.][Government of Pakistan, 1957: Vol. 1, 4].India's First Five Year Plan ( 1 9 5 0 / 5 1 - 1 9 5 5 / 5 6 ) had much earlierassigned a fundamental role to land reform in the building up of a neweconomic and social order. 'The future of land ownership and cultivationconstitutes perhaps the most fundamental issue in national development.To a large extent the patterns of economic and social organisation willdepend upon the manner in which the land problem is resolved . . .From the social aspect which is no less important than the economic, apolicy for land may be considered adequate in the measure in which,now and in the coming years, it reduces disparities in wealth and income,eliminates exploitation, provides security for tenants and workers andfinally promises equality of status and opportunity to different sections ofthe rural population' [1952: 184].

5 This general support for land reform in Asian countries is confirmed bya United Nations analysis of replies by governments to a UN ques-tionnaire: 'An important contrast emerges from comparison of the state-ments from the countries of the world's temperate zones with those fromother regions. In the former, the general and sometimes explicit assump-tion is that no major measures of reform are needed . . . In the repliesfrom countries in other regions, the general view, either explicitor implied, is that major reforms of one kind or another are needed'[UNDEA, 1954: 48].

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6 For an analysis of motivations, see Doreen Warriner [1969: 3-231.7 Gunnar Myrdal writes: 'Before Pakistan became independent . . . there

was no programme for social and economic reform equivalent to that ofthe Indian National Congress . . . Although the Pakistani leaders did notattempt a sophisticated description of the kind of society they werebuilding and had not the intellectual stature of a Gandhi or Nehru, argu-ments that are labelled "socialist" in India were beginnnig to be heard,though in less forceful and less finished form' [7968: Vol. 1, 806].

8 The Report of the United Provinces Zamindari Abolitions Committee, [Vol.I, 1948: 358] made an explicit mention of agrarian discontent as a factorwhich made it necessary to expedite legislative action for agrarian reform:'The age-long simmering discontent occasionally bursting into acts ofopen defiance and sometimes of violence in our province and other partsof India has reached a critical stage. Whatever forbearance and self-restraint we find in the countryside among the tenants is due to the hopethat those who are running the State will undo the wrong done to them.Once that hope is gone the tenant will be driven to desperation. Thediscontent may develop into open revolt and our social security may bethreatened by the outbreak of violence. Our scheme of Zamindari abolitioncontemplates payment of compensation. If abolition is held over for afew years, abolition may mean expropriation without compensation and,quite possibly, bloodshed and violence . . . One can only hope that thelanded gentry is not blind to the writing on the wall'.

9 Recent studies have shown that, during the period extending over morethan half a century before independence, agricultural output in India wasgrowing at an average rate of less than a half of one per cent per annum,even more slowly than the rate of population growth which itself averagedat a mere 0.67 per cent per annum. In fact, foodgrains output increasedat a much slower rate of a mere 0.11 per cent per year. [Blyn, 1966].

10 Government of Pakistan [1956: Vol. II, 19-21, 115-137]. 'We believethat in the conditions of our country peasant proprietorship rather thanthe widespread tenancy or large scale individual holdings or co-operativefarming offers maximum possibilities of success for agricultural develop-ments' [ibid.: 20]. See also Government of Pakistan [1957: 309-10].Also, see the First and Second Five Year Plan Reports, Government ofIndia, New Delhi: 'Thus programmes for abolition of intermediary tenures,giving security to tenants and bringing tenants into direct relationshipwith the State with a view to conferring ownership upon them are stepswhich lead to the establishment of an agrarian economy based on peasantownership': [Government of India, Planning Commission, 1956: 179].

11 'The institution of landlordship, characterised by the large concentrationof wealth, property and power', says the First Five Year Plan of theGovernment of Pakistan [1957: 310] 'is basically incompatible with theaspirations which are surging in the heart of modern man. A change inthis institution is an urgent measure of reform. It constitutes the mostimportant problem of our country, transcending in magnitude and impli-cations every other problem, social or economic. Economic developmentwould rather be uninterrupted nor meaningful until this problem issolved'. Also see. India's First Five Year Plan [1952: 9-11 and 184-85].

12 United Nations activities in the sphere of land reform found concreteexpression in the resolution of the Economic and Social Council whichwas adopted on 28 July, 1965 and which recommended to Governments'to take measures for rapid implementation of land reform in the interestof landless and small peasants and agricultural hired labourers' [WorldLand Reform Conference, 1968].

13 On the various patterns of agrarian structural change in Western Europein the context of economic take-off, see Mogens Boserup [in Rostow,1963: 201-24].

14 For an anlysis of the middle-of-the-road character of Indian agrarian

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policy see Joshi [in Desai, 1969] and Thorner [1956 ] . The middle-of-the-road character of Pakistan agrarian policy becomes evident from acareful reading of the Report of the Land Reform Commission, WestPakistan. The following observation which gives the rationale for a policyof limited re-distribution of land typifies the middle-of-the-road approach:'Even if we were to recommend a much lower ceiling than what we havesuggested, the surplus land which would have become available forredistribution among landless tenants would have been too small to securefor each of them a subsistance farm unit. The ends of social justice, inthe sense of securing land for the entire landless population, thus beingalmost unattainable, what we thought prudent was to fix the ceiling ata level which will on the one hand eradicate the feudalisitc elementsfrom the existing tenurial structure, and on the other, by causing theminimum necessary disturbance of the social edifice, lead to a har-monious change-over and at the same time, by providing incentives atall levels, conduce to greater production [1959: 30].

15 Ahmad writes: 'Thus more than ten years after independence, not onlythe problem [of land reform] was unsolved but there was not even thehope of a solution. Dominated as the political parties of West Pakistanwere by the landed interests, no basic change in the structure of landtenure could be expected from them. The Republicans were hostile tothe very idea of reform and whatever might have been the professions ofthe Muslim League, in view of its performance in office, not muchcredence could be attached to its promises about the future. Only agovernment completely detached from class loyalties could carry througha programme of reform . . . The reform of the land system could,therefore, come only from a government that did not owe its authorityand influence to the agrarian aristocracy, and such a government cameinto being after the disbandment of the old regime on 7th October, 1958'[ibid.].

16 Tai writes: 'In West Pakistan, when Field Marshal Ayub Khan seizedpower in 1958 he was succeeding a regime that had been under thecontinuous domination of the landed class. With the strong backing ofthe army, Ayub Khan enjoys a measure of political independence that wasdenied to his predecessors. In line with his nation-building effort, heexpressed determination to bring about a reform programme. However,his programme with generous allowance to the land-holders, neitherreduced the iandlords' political influence much nor precluded their loyaltyto the new regime' [ibid.].

17 Miss Warriner writes: 'Landowners, rich and therefore politically powerful,organised in right-wing political parties, can exert strong influence onthe government and administration. Peasants and farm labourers aregenerally disfranchised by the land system itself; they vote, that is tosay, as the landowner tells them. And this is as true of India, with itsconstitutional and democratic form of government, as it is under dictator-ships [of the type obtaining in Pakistan]' [ibid.: 14].

18 Miss Warriner says: 'Public opinion in these countries is strikingly in-different to the question of reform, because it is urban opinion. Middleclass people are usually rather hostile, while industrial workers are toofew and too distinct an economic interest to make common cause withthe peasants . . . So there is no parallel to the situation in nineteenthand early twentieth century Europe, when liberal opinions in the townsfound response in the countryside from peasant movements themselvessupporting a national cause' [ibid.: 58].

19 This shift has been noted as a significant aspect of social change sinceindependence by many social scientists. See Srinivas [1967], Rosen[1966: 195-98], Hunter [1969: 227] and Beteille [1965: Chapters IVand V].

20 A similar assessment of UP Land reforms has been offered by Warrinerand Ladejinsky. The only state where tenancy conditions have improved

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as a result of the legislation is Uttar Pradesh' [Warriner, 1969: 766-67];and Ladejinsky [1965].For information on land registration in different states of India seeGovernment of India, Planning Commission, 1966].

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Programme, New Delhi.Baran, Paul, 1958, The Political Economy of Growth, New Delhi (Indian

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Bredo, Williams, 1961, 'Land Reform and Development in Pakistan' in W.Froehlich, ed., Land Tenure, Industrialisation and Social Stability, Mil-waukee, Wisconsin: Marquette University Press.

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land reform and agrarian change in india and pakistan since 1947 i

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