revolution in telangana -2

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roUTH ASIA BULLETIN, Vol. IV No.2, Fall 1984.

REVOLUTIONIN TELENGANA (1946-1951)(Part Two)Akhil Gupta

The f ir st part of this article was largely descriptive. In it, I attempted to sketch the state of affairs that prevailed inHyderabad before the revolutionary rupture. That was followed by a narrative of th e even ts th at c onsti tu te d the movement andthe actions undertaken by the various parties involved. In this part, I try to a ssess the achievements of the movement and toseek the causes of it s initial success, it s subsequent defeat and of its origins. In doing so, I will consider some of the proposedtheories of revolut ion. Applying these theories to this particular example should help delineate their explanatory power in t ermsof both their strengths and weaknesses. Finally, I will indicate what I believe to be important gaps in this study, theoreticallacunae present as well in th e more general theories of revolution considered here.The detailed description of the armed struggle given so far has been but a necessary prelude to the questions that make sucha study relevant: What did the insurrection achieve? Why did it succeed? Why did it finally fail? Most difficult of all is thequest ion of origins : Why did th e Telengana movement begin? That is left to the concluding part of this paper . In answeringthese quest ions , I will t ake account of the assessmen ts made by some of the leaders of the movement as well as of some of themore general theories of revolutions.rne ACHIEVEMENTS OF THE MOVEMENTIn th e short run, th e im pact of th e movement wasconsiderable: th e land distribution scheme a lt ered t he l iv esof poor peasants in a fundamental way. Not only did land

provide a secure basis for life, it provided employment, andvery importantly, respect and credit (Sundarayya, 1972:116).The gram-rajyams (also cal led "vil lage soviets") w ere theeffective government in the 'liberated' areas , controlling alljur idical and administrative functions. At least among th eguerillas, caste-distinctions broke down and patriarchalauthority was questioned by women activists. New legislationwas introduced: th e ] agir Abolition Regulation of 1949handed over all [agir lands to t he s ta te ; and the HyderabadTenancy and Agricultural Lands Act of 1950 provided forextensive land reforms.76 These included th e righ t to buyland on easy terms to tenants who had been cultivating it forover six years, and the granting of a t en -y ea r l ea se to al ltenants.Over the long run however , the considerable gains made

during this period could not be sustained. We have a lreadyseen that a fte r th e Indian government took control, th epeasants manag ed to hold on to only waste lands or'traditional lands'. All 'excess' land, that is, l and seized fromth e big lan dlo rd s, had t o be returned. Very few of thetenants who could have legally claimed occupancy r ightsactually did: most of them were evic ted before the new lawstook effect. Of those "protected" tenants who remained ontheir land, only 55.5% were still on it a mere three yearsl at er , hav ing either been bought out, evicted or having"voluntarily surrendered" their rights. Sundarayya reports thatin 1972 - twenty years later - usury and indirect forced

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labor still exist in these areas. In some sense sense, thesituation got worse: land lords adopted self-cultivation withth e help of wage la bo r and refused to rent land out fotenurial cultivation. To evade the land-ce il ing act, theydistributed land among the family members, legally separatingit while maintaining effective control. However, th e worsfeatures of the old system - vetti and the illegal exaction o"g ift s" - decreased noticeably a long with th e abolition ojagirdari 77 (Sundarayya, 1972 :438; Pav ie r, 1981:176Dhanagare, 1974: 132).It is not clear what the long-term impact of the movemenwas on social relations. Certainly caste had r ea ff irmed i ts

traditional role in the legitimation of stratification; landlordseven adopted the tactic of dona ting land to certain castes ocommunities to weaken class alliances (Gray, 1970:119-135Sundarayya, 1972:438). But some effects have persisted - onesma 11 example of how inf luences are transmi tted even in theabsence of a 'written' cul ture can be given. A squad leadewho died in a police raid had a song written about him - "SaSai Gopal Reddy".78 More important is th e f ac t that severapeople named their children after him, a suf ficien t guaranteethat his exploits would be remembered by the next generation(Sundarayya, 1972:107).Any consideration of the achievements of th e Telengana

movement presupposes theoretical judgement on one cruciaquestion: is the movement best characterized as a ' revolt '' insurrect ion ' , ' rebel lion ', 'uprising' ( and s imi la r t erms) oras a 'revolution'? The i ssue is not merely academic - it hasvery important implications for practice.


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Taking one of the most influential recent defini tions as apo in t of departure (Skocpol, 1979:4):79Social revolutions are rapid, basic transformations ofa society's state and class structures; and they areaccompanied and in par t car ri ed through by classbased revolts from below.Skocpol emphasizes th e necessity of lithe coincidence of

societal structural change with class upheaval; and thecoincidence of political with social transformation. II Sheclearly excludes t ransformations where 'actual change ofstate and class structures" has not occurred (1979:5).Using this definition, wou ld the Telengana movement be

considered a revolution? Yes, because it did actual lytransform state and class structures, part ly through a classbased revolt from below. In th e liberated v il la ge s, a nal ternative form of rule was se t up and land - th e principlemeans of production - was redistributed. But such a situationpersisted only for a short time. So if we consider a longerperiod (or a greater geographical area - th e newly formednation-state) , no soc ia l r evo lu tion occurred. EmployingSkocpol's definition, then, we could conclude either a) that arevolution did occur, but it s impact was undone, or b) thatthe movement was not a revolution at all.One way out of this conceptual dilemma, suggested by Aya(1979:45) is to de fine revolutions prospectively instead of

retrospectively: by looking only at situations rather than byalso including outcomes.80 Though Aya (1979:45) limits hisprospective definit ion to "revolutionary situations of multiplesovereignty", it could be expanded to include a fundamentalredistribution of the ownership of the means of productionaccompanied by paral le l changes in the relat ions ofproduction 8 1 (class structures) as well as the institutionalmechanisms used in the extraction of surplus (for example,th e state's coercive and bureaucratic apparatus), all of whichis p artly th e result of a broad-based peasant uprising.Defined in this manner, the Telengana movement was clearlya revolutionary situation as contrasted with, for example, th eMutiny of 1857 (Metca lf , 1964).The overall impact of th e Telengana movemen t may besummarized in this way: it al ter ed th e balance of forces inth e ru ra l a re as in such a way that th e worst forms ofdomination were rendered illegitimate. It s long term effects,howev er , h av e b ee n slight as far as th e poor agrarianmajori ty is concerned. Why this combination of resultsobtained should be clear from th e next two sections.REASONS FOR THE MOVEMENT'S SUCCESSThe success of th e Telengana movement was due to a

conjunction of factors which can initially be div ided into fourgroups, two structural and two strategic. The f ir st of thesewas the economic and military pressures put on Hyderabad byth e newly independent Indian state. These pressures werearticulated along lines that lay isomorphic to at least some ofthe issues being raised within Telengana. Along with a wholehost of other f ac to rs , t hi s was respons ib le for generat ing thebroad base of support that was structurally necessary for th emovement to become a 'mass-based' revolution. On th e otherhand were th e th e tactically necessary conditions: th eorientation toward meeting the part icipants' immediate needs;and th e ability to organize and coordinate the various groupsinvolved.The Telengana movement's greatest successes came in th efirst half of 1948, when pressure on th e Nizam from th eoutside was the strongest. With independence, th e Nizam no

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longer enjoyed th e backing of the Bri tish, On t he o ther handin the face of collapsing negotiations, the Nehru Governmenimposed an economic and military blockade on HyderabadThere was a widespread belief that invasion was imminenExternal pressures served to force open preexisting internstructural weaknesses. The regim e in Hyderabad wacharacterized by a growing centralization of power. Thpower was concentrated in th e hands of th e Nizam and aeduca ted, mi l i t ant ly Muslim, urban bureaucratic clasimported from North India. The new administrators came inconflict with th e old nobil ity and rural aristocracy. At thsame time, their elitism antagonized the large majority of thMuslim community which, under th e leadership of the I ttehaddemanded th e devolution of autocratic rule and the set ting uof representative (Muslim) government (Elliott, 1974However, when t he I tt eh ad finally did achieve ef fec tivcontrol, at th e end of 1947, matters were a lre ady out of thHyderabad government's hands (Pavier, 1981:127-130).In th e move t owards g iv ing th e state a more Musli

character as well as in the imposition of Urdu, the Hyderabagovernment created and encouraged opposition to the regimThis opposition found support from th e Congress. For a shoperiod just before independence, the Congress and the CPeven worked together in Hyderabad, Though it s partnershwi th th e Congress was short-lived and though the Congrenever managed to ge t a foothold in th e ru ra l p olitic sTelengana, the CPI benefitted for taking up some of th e samissues that th e nationalist movement was raising in th e reof th e country. While expressing reservations about thcommunists'tactics the Congres s initially even encouragethem.Rel ig ion, l anguage and regional l oyal ti es , a long wit

several other factors - class, caste, cuI ture and geographyhelp e xp la in wha t a llia nc es were created and why thecohered. Taken together, they constitute the reasons ththe movement attracted such a broad base of suppor t. Eacof these factors is considered briefly below.It seems th at the participants in th e Te lengana s t ruggcame from different c lass es . All th e major leaders of th e C

were either themselves rich landowners or belonged to sucfamilies. On the other hand, most of th e other participantincluding th e Party's rank-and-file were either landlelaborers or poor peasants.Dhanagare sugges ts three reasons why an in terc l as

all iance c ame about : a) all sections of th e peasantry hagrievances against th e big landlords and, by inference, woubenefit from their removal; b) coming together was th e oneffective way to challenge the landlords' powe r; and c) sucan alliance functioned to serve th e interests of th e ricpeasant s who c on tr oll ed th e P ar ty . While th e first twpropositions seem incontrovertible, th e l as t one is problematfor at least three reasons. First, it seems that th e movemedid no always follow Par ty d ir ec ti ve , e sp ec ia ll y in thformative early s tages { th is much is admi t ted to even bParty historians - Sundarayya, 1972:52-54),82 Secondly,presume that l eaders can d ir ec t the ir fol lowers in orderfulfill their own personal ends is an enormous ovesimplification (Worsley, 1968). The duality of power - thsymmetric dependence of leaders on those whom they leadmakes it necessary to d emon st ra te th e p re se nc e of thstructural and legitimizing preconditions necessary for thexercise of power (Giddens, 1979).83 Finally, if we grathat CPI leaders were sincere in their belief in communideology and were thus not consciously acting in their clainterests (there is no evidence to the contrary), i t wou


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need to be shown that they were nevertheless doing sounconsciously. This would be a very difficult endeavor atbest and one that Dhanagare does not even attempt.As with class, so with caste: th e composition of themovement seems to have been truly heterogeneous (Pavier,1981: 184). This is surprising since cast divisions have alwaysyielded the weak links that can be used to crack groupswhose solidarity depends on common class interests. None ofth e authors tries to expla in this phenomenon: indeed, casteis largely ignored by most on the grounds that it was not animportant factor. The problem I will suggest, really lies inthe inability of thei r theore tica l framework to adequatelyaddress this issue. Certainly th e marxism of the CPI of th eforties and fifties had no substantial ana lys is to offer forcaste and religion.Songs and drama seem to have been the predominant modesof cultural expression - the means by which consc iousness ofthe movement spread among it s largely illiterate participants.These forms, as well as stories, dance and poems wereproduced spontaneously for th e most part. Some of thesehave already been mentioned b ut th e e vid enc e regardingei ther th e content or the context - the mise-en-scene - isslight. There is no re fe re nc e t o how t rad it iona l cu ltu ra lp ra ct ic es e it he r o bs tr uc te d o r encouraged the movement.The only examples given ar e those about t he f ore st peoplewho helped t he c ad re s by making them 'relatives' and whosaved one squad leader's life by dressing him up as apubescent girl.

The success of an i n su r rec ti on sp read over a widegeographical area depends crucially on communication andtransportation. In th e absence of sophis ticated te le-communications equipment and widespread literacy, the modeof communication was face-to-face and oral. Similarly, in theabsence o f mot or ed transportation, the primary method oftravel was by foot. It is not surprising then that the revoltfirst spread among th e densely populated plains: we haveseen how groups walk ing from v ill ag e to v illa ge quicklysp re ad th e revolutionary message. At th e same time, whenfaced with government forces the movement was able to dobetter in the forests. That was because knowledge of theterrain and the sympathy of local residents was an advantageover modern transportation and superior communication,neither of which was very effective in th e jungles. Similar ly,th e guerrillas had the upper hand during th e monsoons whilethe pol ic e r ei gn ed supreme in the summer months(Sundarayya, 1972:224). The reasons are not hard to guess:hard-bed roads were few and far between and country pathsprobably became untraversable by motored traffic after thefirst few rains. Military camps in th e countryside, whosestrength relied greatly on being able to quickly summonreinforcements, became more vulnerable - the guerrillas thushad a freer hand. In the forests though, th e monsoons wereno advantage: the squads had no shelter and th e rain wasparticularly heavy. Summer r es to re d t he a dv an ta ge ofsuperior transportation possessed by the police; at the sametime, th e squads in the fores ts were vulnerable because thearmy could monitor their sources of water.Group identity is formed as much by what i ts members havein common as by what separates them from other groups: bydifference as much as by identity. So far, we have consideredth e common interests that formed and mai nt ai ne d th ealliance; now, we will consider those common oppositions thats erved the same purpose. Chief among them were rel ig ion,language, and regional loyalties. 84 On these issues, th e goalsof the Telengana movement coincided with the nationalistmovement: they supported and fed into each other .

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Religious differences became an i ssue because the Nizam hadconcentrated power in the hands of Muslim noblemen . Whilemost deshmukhs were Hindus, the explo itat ion on jagir andsarf-e-khas lands would be directly linked with the Nizam andthe Muslim nobility. Furthermore, in seeking legitimation bygiv ing Hyderabad th e aura of an Islamic s ta te , t he Nizampolarized religious groups further. The rural areas werealready more than proportionally Hindu since a large fractionof the Muslims in the state li ved in Hyderabad City. Thusreligion further exacerbated the opposition and presumablys trengthened the all iance against the Nizam and his forces.This process was accelerated by th e atrocities of th eexclusively Muslim Razakars.

More strongly than .religion, language and regional loyaltieswere focal points of popular opposi tion. We have seen howthe imposition of Urdu and the suppression of Telugu resultedin the formation of the Andhra Jana Sangham. The dissolutionof Hyderabad State and its reconstitution along linguisticlines drew considerable support in Telengana. Both the CPIwith its campaign for 'Vishalandhra' and the Congress hadpolicies directed to this end. It is unclear whether languagebased discon ten t was predicated on demands for culturalautonomy or merely served to validate anti-Nizam feeling bygrounding it in an alternative plan. But there is no doubtthat th e dominance of Marathas in the urban areas and th epresence of Marwadi and Maratha moneylenders in th e ruralareas contributed to linguistic and regional chauvinism.

It was a sentiment that the Nehru Government could bothencourage and ta p into, gaining a measure of legitimacy'below' which allowed them to put greater pressure on theNizam from 'a bove'. Though underlining accession to theIndian Union may have been a very popular plank on theCPI's platform, it was eventually to turn against them, as weshall see in the next section.The Telengana movement r ec or de d s uc h spec tacu la r

successes because of enthusiastic participation. This in turnwas due partly to the immediate, visible payoff from doing so.The goals achieved included the abolition of vetti and illegalexaction; th e return of confiscated ' family lands'; either th ereduction or non-payment of rents - ending landlordism;ini tial ly , a morator ium on all debts and later the regulation ofinterest rates; distribution of 'surplus' land and waste-land;distribution of grain, agricultural implements and livestockseized from big landlords; higher wages for agriculturallaborers and parity of men's and women' s wages; burning ofofficial records (legal r ights over land and debt records werethus lost) ; non-payment of taxes like the excise tax on toddy;construction of canals and small tanks, provision of preventivemedicine and housing material; and a dual policy on th egovernment ' s grain levy, preventing big landlords fromevading it while encouraging everyone else no t to pay it(Sundarayya, 1972:58, 126; Dhanagare, 1974:127).Peasant uprisings , as we know, ar e not uncommon; Gough( 1974), fo r examples, h as r ecorded at least 77 major

insurrections (having at least several thousand participants)in the last tw o hundred years of Indian history. Butspontaneous uprisings cannot be sus ta ined for long wi thoutt he emergence of some kind of organizational framework ifthey ar e to develop into something more than flash uprisings.We have a lr eady seen th e various posit ions along which theCPI sought ideological justification; language, culture, andregional affiliations; an an ti -land lord , ant l -Nlz am, proaccession stance; and in meeting immediate needs. Similar ly,it organized both the gram-raj system of village governmentto replace the old system and the armed squads to perform


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th e necessary military tasks. It formulated rules of conductfor members that prevented reckless atrocity and needlessprovocation. For example, guerrillas were under instructionsnot to hurt non-participating old men, children, and women aswell as not to engage in looting.85This is not to say that th e movement followed some CPImaster plan because there was none. Often events happeneddespi te the CPI, not because of it . The f ir st land se i zureswere spontaneous acts; once committed, th e Party had nochoice but to de fend them. The f ledgling CPI in Telenganawa s perhaps shaped more by the turn of the events than itwas able to shape them.86 It could not always make th emajority of peasants (who were no t cadres) do what itwanted them to; secondly, even when act ions wer e carriedou t in accordance with intention, they could have effectswhich were not foreseen.In attempting to explain why the movement succeeded tothe ext en t t ha t it did, I want to suggest a complex causalitywhere several fac tors played a necessary part ye t no onefactor was sufficient. The analytical question of whyrevolutions succeed or fail is too often merged with thequestion of why revolutions begin in the first place. The twosets of issues ar e closely related insofar as they can beexplained by the same se t of structural determinants. Fo rne i ther case, howev er , a re structural explanations bythemselves sufficient. The question of origins, I will argue,poses problems of an entirely different, and more severe orderof complexity, than the question of success or fai lure .Skocpol (1979: 17 -18, 291) proposes to explain therevolutionary process by two factors. The first is the

"objectively conditioned and complex intermeshing of thevarious actions of t he d iv er se ly situated groups." Inpresenting such an "impersonal and nonsubjective viewpoint,"however, she does not rule out the second factor, th e role ofrevolutionary organizations and ideologies. These funct ion to"cement the solidarity of radical vanguards" and to "facilitateth e consolidation of new regimes". But "ideologicallyoriented leaderships. . have been greatly limited" (1979: 171)by th ose v ery s t ruc tura l conditions t ha t c re at ed th erevolutionary situation to begin with. The success or failureof revolutionary movements hinges on the results of thestate-building efforts of their leaders (Skocpol, 1979: 161-4).Skocpol's understanding of revolutionary process, I will

argue, is seriously deficient in two respects. First, inreducing practice to the "objectively conditioned. actionsof diversely situated groups", Skocpol herself runs up againstwhat Bourdieu (1977) has called "the objective l imit s ofobjectivism". Structure is seen by Skocpol, not in i tsd ialect ica l re la t ion with action, as both the medium andoutcome of practices (Giddens, 1979) , but as th e factordetermining or l imit ing action. In her (justifiable) reactionto voluntarism, Skocpol seeks solace in an extremestructuralism where a cti on s a re c onditio ne d bu t do no tcondition and where structure circumscribes practice but doesno t e na bl e i t. 87 Even if we accept, with Skocpol, thatactions are objectively conditioned, we still don'ot have 0 anexplanation for why these actions are undertaken In th e ~ l r s tplace. What it does explain is the form that these a c t ~ o n stake an d how they interact . 88 By contrast,. c o n s I ~ e rBourdieu (1977:3), who seeks to explain how practrces ar i sein this manner: 0the crit ical break with objectivist abstractIon

ensuing from inquiry into the c?n?i t ions ofpossibility, and thereby, into the. lirni tos of th eobjective and objectifying standpoint WhICh grasps

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practices from outside, as a fait accompli, instead ofconstructing their generative principle by situatingi tself within the very movement of the i raccompl ishment, has no other aim than to makepossible a science of th e d i al ec t ic a l r e la t ion sbetween th e objective structures to which th eobjectivist mode of knowledge gives access and th estructured dispositions within which those structuresare actualized and which tend to reproduce them.

The second major problem with Skocpol's analysis followsfrom th e first: she l eave s ou t t he probl em of legitimationaltogether. Revolutionary organizations and ideologies ar eascribed functions l ike cementing sol idar ity and facilitatingstate-building efforts bu t we ar e not told how they work.Problems of legitimation are inextricably involved with th ebreakup of the old regime (failure to continue to legitimizeo ld f orms of domination) and th e creation of new stateorganizations (the legitimation of new forms of domina tion) .Quite correctly, Skocpol (1979:25-26) wants to reject thoseviews that t rea t legitimacy as being synonymous withconsensus (Gurr and Johnson). She does this by opposinglegi t imacy to coercion as al terna tive forms of statedomination, arguing that neither view sat isfactor i lyincorporates th e autonomy of th e state. 89 Bu t is thisopposition valid? Legitimation and domination (coercive andotherwise) ar e not distinct mechanisms in the reproduction ofsocial s t ructure ; they are bound together with th e symbolicrealm, in the cons t itu tion of all social practices (Giddens,1979). In he r analysis of France, Russia and China, Skocpolconcludes that all these revolutions were more centralized,rationalized and mass-incorporating than the regimes theyreplaced. She asks why this happened but not how i t tookplace (Skocpol, 1979:161-173). Thus t he p ro ce ss by whichrevolutionary leader s l eg it imize their own power is neverraised.In ana lyzing the success of th e revolution in Telengana,

the structurally conditioned crisis in state authority and th eactions of th e different groups that came together to form themovement's broad-based alliance form bu t one side of th estory. That has to be counterbalanced by those strategic andimmediate short term aims that propelled the la rg ely poorparticipants into action and th e contingent nature of thefailure of the other. The course of the revolution may haveescaped th e specific intentions of anyone set of peopleinvolved; however that is no reason to conclude, as Skocpoldoes (1979: 17, quoting Wendell Phi ll ips approvingly), that"revolutions are not made; they come."Alavi (1 965) forwards four reasons to ac co un t for th e

success of th e Telengana movement: the rise of nationalistsentiment; th e demoralization of th e Nizam's corrupt andinefficient administration; th e broad-based demands of th emovement which brought middle peasants into the fold; and,the solidarity, independence and fighting-spirit of th e tribalpopulations where the movement spread. From th e first part,it should be clear that all but one- -t he midd le peasantthesis- -were relatively minor reasons. Middle peasants ar einitially th e most militant, Alavi says, b ec au se th ey ar erelatively independent of th e direct bonds that poor peasantshave with their patrons.90 Their posi ti on as as self-sufficientlandowners often brings them into confl ic t wit h r ich peasantsand landlords.91 Once poor peasants see th at th e power oftheir masters can be effectively challenged, however, theyenthusiastically jump into the fray and give th e revolution it sreal impetus. Applying A lavi's the sis to th e Telenganastruggle proves not to be a very fruitful exercise. I t is true


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that the organizational effor ts of the Andhra Mahasabha wereled by people who were not poor peasants. They were,however, not middle peasants either - it is c lear tha t almostall of them came from rich peasant backgrounds (Pavier,1981:187). Furthermore, there is no evidence to bel ieve thatthe spontaneous uprisings that started th e movement wereinitiated by middle peasants. Alavi's principal insight consistsin having isolated a potential source of structural dislocation.But it cannot be argued that it is either a necessary orsufficient (ahisrortcal) cause of revolution.In his famous study of revolution, Wolf (1969) locates somegroups and organizations as being central to the revolutionaryprocess. Peasants and the "intelligentsia-in-arms" (1969:296)fight together for their mutual benefit . Organizational structures are of three kinds: th e armed peasant band, themilitary organization and th e ideologically driven paramilitary party. The manne r in which army and partycombine is d if fer ent in var iou s r evolut ion s. D iff erent as wellare the means by which they incorporate the peasant rebels.In Telengana, the rebel s had no army distinct from t he paramilitary party organization nor was there a group that couldqualify as an "intelligentsia-in-arms". It would seem, then,that the success (failure of a movement does not necessarilydepend on the presence (absence) of these groups. Even i fthey ar e present, Wolf does not tell us why and under whatcircumstances would they succeed.In conclusion, structural ana ly se s prove not to be suf fi ci entexplanations of the success (failure) of revolut ionarymovements. In particular, they do not help us understandwhy people participate in such movements. Theories thatseek to account for popular participation are much moreconce rned wit h why movements begin than with th erevolutionary process itself. The shor tcomings of suchexplanations should now be clear. I am not, however,proposing an alternative to these explanations. Whetheralternative explanations are poss ible, and i f so what formthey should take, ar e issues that a re r ai se d in th e lastsection. Before we come to that, le t us examine why th erevolution in Telengana co ll apsed in th e manner alreadydescribed.REASONS FOR THE MOVEMENT'S FAILURE

Paradoxically, some of th e reasons for th e movement'sinitial success were later responsible for it s failure. Most ofthese latent problems emerged after the invasion ofHyderabad by the Indian Army. Apart from the obvious factorof physical force were th e following problems: the Congressmade inroads into the CPI's base of legitimacy; diverseinteres t groups who had come together in their commonopposition to th e Nizam now tugged th e united front indifferent directions; having to concentrate on short-termgoals, th e CPI failed to institute th e kind of long-termchanges that would have proved difficult to erase; and th epeasant movement was almost entirely con fi ned t o th eTelengana countryside, receiving little help either from urbanareas or from neighboring states.To say that the Telengana movement 'failed' is to convey asense of inadequacy in fulfilling certain goals. But the dominant reason why th e movement ' failed' was that it wassuccessfully suppressed. We have seen how the peasant armymanaged only limited success against the Nizam's troops. Inf ront of the Indian fo rces, th ey were pathet ical lyovermatched. Faced with almost certain extermination of thepla ins, the communist cadres ran into the forests. But they

were even less prepared to fight a secret, guerrilla war thana conventional one.It is in this light that we must assess Sundarayya's claim

th a t th e 'mistake' made by th e P arty was in confusing'partisan struggle' with a 'liberation struggle' (Sundarayya,1972: 120). He advocates the former strategy which wouldconsi st of armed resistance a imed at defend ing partial gains,for example, in protecting seized land. The latter wouldassume the form of an all-out war against the State. Fromth e evidence, it is clear that the military's strength was sooverwhelming that defending any kind of gains would havebeen very unlikely. In fact, f ights did take p lace over landthat the Congress wanted to return to it s ' legal' owners the deshmukhs. The re sul t was a foregone conclus ion: almostfrom th e start, the guerrillas were on th e run. It would behard to characterize their efforts as a 'liberation war' which implies an offensive as we ll as a de fens ive strategy - ifany th ing, t he battle they fough t was a defensive partisanstruggle. Similarly, Pavier claims that t he P ar ty made amistake in leaving th e plains and adopting Chinese-styleguerrilla warfare tactics (Pavier , 1981:184). He may be rightabout the decision on guerrilla war but on th e issue ofrunning to the fores ts , he ignores t he fac ts that he himselfmarshals earlier. They show that leaving th e plains became astrategy of necessity, not of choice.In th e forests, the guerrillas were hopelessly out of theirelement. An examinat ion of a CPI document , Present SecretOrganization and its Tasks, released on May 14, 1949, is quiterevealing (Sundarayya, 1972:528-551). The guerrillas werewarned that the military was arresting "persons with croppedhair, white clothes, those who smell of soap and coconut oil"(Sundarayya, 1972:530). They were instructed to wear thesame clothes as those worn by the local people ,unsuspiciously dirty (water was not easily available), notappear fore ign. Squads were chastised fo r leaving secretlocations in th e forest w it h v is ib le signs of having beeninhabited - food, pots, and fire-places were not covered up.Then there were simple mistakes: smoking cigarettes atnight; talking, singing, calling ou t loudly "Comrade!", andgreeting each o the r the with 're d salute' while marching;holding public discussions in th e daytime wi thout postingg uar ds ; not using assumed names; and even snoring whilesleeping.

Lack of military experience may have done the squads inbu t the process was aided by cracks in the CPI' s b ase ofsupport. The Congress managed to entrench itself among asignificant section of th e communists' followers. It could dothis because the CPI's anti-landlord, pro-accession, and proVishalandhra policies attracted diver se groups who wereunited in their opposition to th e Nizam, The Nizam thusbecame the perfect symbolic locus of popular disenchantment;however, it t hen became relatively s imple to diffuse suchdiscontent merely by overthrowing him. The CPI suffered forle tt in g it s campaign pay too much attention to personalityand short-term goals; when these goals were me t and th ei ssue of personality became irrelevant, it found itself strippedof the backing necessary to accomplish more substantialtasks.

Le t us first look at class divisions. There is some evidencet o i nd ic at e that a large proportion of wealthier peasantsdeserted th e uni ted f ront after th e Indian Governmenttakeover. To understand why this happened, it is worthwhileto consider how class relations changed with the newgove rnment . The col lapse of authority in Telengana no doubtowed much to the extreme concentration of power. The


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Congress could see that a stable balance of power in th erur al a reas involved a somewhat broader base. At the sametime, it was interested in securing an agricultural surplus tofeed industrial development and that meant yields had to beincreased. The solutio n was to promote capitalist agriculture(productive investment): the old style of landlordism (rentsqueezing) would have to go. The Congress was not opposedto the landlords themselves; we have seen that it broughtthem back in Telengana, What happened cou ld be termed asa 'revolution at t he to p' - the surplus-producing peasants hadgained at th e expense of th e l andlords wi thou t ent ir elydisplacing them from the highest rungs of the rural hierarchy.

But gaining more power was only one side 0' the richpeasants' attraction for th e Congress; in th e united front,they were slowly losing their dominant position. That wasdue both to higher wages and land distribution. One of th eParty's planks was higher wages for the l andless poor whoconst ituted i ts major fraction. Such demands, however, wentagainst thee wishes of weal thy peasants who depended onwage labor for most of the ir output. Secondly, when landdistribution picked up momentum, th e Par ty was pressured tosuccessively dec re as e the ceiling. The first limits onlandholdings only affected t he l ar ge landlords; soon however,smaller landlords and r ich peasants also began to lose land.Faced with a choice of entering an untried coalition that hadegalitarian aspirations or an implicit agreement with a stablecentral government where th ey ga ined more power t han theycurrently possessed, the rich peasants naturally chose th elatter.

Just as th e rich peasants did not " change sides as agroup",92 so neither did th e rest of th e rural populationconsistently support the CPl. The Congress adopted radicalrhetoric whi le pursuing reformist programs, a fact of littleimportance un ti l we consider that they controlled the media,most importantly th e radio. The new order also gainedlegitimacy by it s relative sophistication in concealing th eorigins of domination: whi le th e deshmukhs could be clearlyl inked to the Nizam, th e new rural rul ing-class drew it sauthority from abstract l egal and economic relations, havingno visible symbol to back them up.While th e CPI had tried to downplay the impor tance ofcaste and religion, the Congress had no such intention: th eI ndian Army stood by as the l-lindus regained their supremacyin a bloodbath. In composition and ideology, th e Congresswas largely Hindu though i t presented itself as a secularorganization. Similarly, one finds t ha t t rad it ional relationspatterned on caste differences were on ce again restored infull measure in the Telengana countryside. The Congress wasnot s eek ing to implement radically egalitarian programs. Itfound that broadening the base of the dominating classes andchanging th e means by which power relations wereregenerated were suff icient to be able to rule securely.Apart from class, caste, a nd religion, the Congress tookadvantage of the agi ta tion concern ing language and regional

autonomy. The communists had made l inguistic states apopular issue. So had t he Congres s but there was one bigdifference: th e Congress controlled t he cen tral governmentand t hey a lone had the power to do so. By stressing thisissue, the CPI played into the hands of the Indian State.

The Congres s t hus 'pulled' out a large chunk of the CPI' ssupport; at the same t ime, different groups within t he un it edfront 'pushed' it apart. Both movements were helped by theCPI's concentration on short-term goals at the expense oflong-range ones. it was finally th e failure of successfulspatial a nd t empo ra l extension that brought down themovement.

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We have seen how th e abolition of vetti and otherconcrete changes made in the short run prob lemat ized theusually reified nature of traditional practices. But havingchallenged the h is to rica lly given relations of dominationregenerated in the most innocent practices of everyday life,the movement went no further. There wa s no systematicat tempt made to alter th e normative structures of theparticipants' consciousness (Sundarayya, 1972: 510, for anexample). This is where the Telengana movement fai led mostacutely.

That th e cpr failed to attempt deep-seated changes inbelief-systems is not really surpr is ing when we consider theirpolitics. Their theoretical understanding was derived in largepart from the in te rna t ional communist movement: nosubstantial effort was made t o under st and th e Indiansituation. For example, there was no s igni ficant analysis ofcaste and religion. I t is no t enough to dismiss them asconstituting 'false consciousness': one must be able toexplain their obviously dominating role in everyday life. 93Such a theoretical understanding obviously has ramificationsfo r p olicy issues. The Andhra communi st s in fact fullyembraced the Maoist model of a rmed guerrilla warfare only torealize that conditions in Yenan in th e th ir tie s were verydifferent from Telengana in the fifties.

Such ideological shortcomings were exacerbated byorganizational ones. In a revolutionary situation, with poorcommunication and information flows, the CPI needed theability to decide and respond qu ick ly to local developments.That would have mean t th e decentralization of decisionmaking authority, relative au tonomy to pursue action, and aflexible organizational scheme. If anything, the Party didalmost exactly th e reverse: authority was centralized,'adventurist ' acts were denounced, and the organization ofthe squads as well as the personal lives of its members wasstrictly regulated.

I f th e CPI in Telengana could no t e xt end th e movementover time, i t could not extend it over space either. Evenwithin Telengana itself, the ' disturbance ' was concentratedmostly in Nalgonda and W arangal. There was l i t t lecooperation from neighboring districts and states. When th eIn dia n f orc es in va de d, t he gue rr il la army was clearlyconcentrated in too narrow a geographical base. The Partyinstructed it s cadres to spread the attack to new areas so asto disperse the Indian forces(Sundarayya, 1972:192). Bu t itwas too late to start organizing on a mass scale in newareas; besides, the Army was such an overwhelming presencethat it could have crushed th e movement wherever it started.We have already seen that there was little coordinationbetween urban and rural unrest: the Telengana movementreceived very little support from urban groups, especiallytheir theoretical ' leaders' , the working-class.

This b rings us to the crux of the problem. I f aninsurrection of the magnitude of Telengana wilted under Staterepression, how can we expect any peasant movemen t t osucceed?As in the previous section, I have again advanced an interconnecting matrix of causality to explain the degeneration ofthe Telengana movement from a ful l- scale peasant war toacts of terror ism against in div id uals. But u nlike th econjunction of reasons tha t e xp lain th e m ov em en t'sascendance, its downfall has one salient factor: th esuperiority of the State in th e means of violence.


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IN SEARCH OF ORIGINSThough th e question of origins is temporally and logicallyprior to that of revolut ionary process, th e order ofpresentation has been reversed in this paper. The reason fordoing so is simple. I do not have an adequate explanation toaccount for th e movement 's origins. How ca n existingtheories help in this regard? Looking at some of thesetheories, I conclude that they are partially useful but do notconstitute complete explanations. In this context, it isworthwhile to consider what wou ld count as a "completeex plan ation ". It is on that note that the pa pe r ends,indicating directions of further inquiry.Why do revolutions begin? Le t us start from necessarycauses. A revolution is first and foremost a reaction againstoppression: whatever e lse may contribute to it , some form ofexploitation has to be present. However, domination can onlybe sustained i f i t e it he r pote nt ia lly ca n or does involvecontrol over resources, including the most important resourceof all, human labor. The success of the Telengana Movementwas due to the failure of th e deshmukhs and th e Nizam'sforces to control labor and it s product. Domination, though,rarely has to be sustained by force: it is legi timi zed byvarious means. The purpose of legitimation is to universalizethe interes ts of th e ruling class to appear to be th e interestof society at l arge and to 'natural ize' these interests so thatthey appear to be permanent. The symbolic system used todo this is embedded in the recursive practices of everydaylife that arise from habit and tradition and are internalized inpopular consciousness.So much scarcely anyone w ill dispute. But as Scot t(1976:193) has put it so well, if "exploitation alone were anecessary and suff icient condi t ion of rebellion, much ofSoutheast Asia and th e Third World would surely be in asemi-permanent state of c ivi l war ".94 While most theories ofrevolution claim to be explaining the same state of affairs revolution - t hey rea lly focus on very different aspects andform explanations of very different kinds.Let us begin with the most influential of th e ' thi rd-generation' (Goldstone, 1980) theories: Theda Skocpol's

States and Socia l Revolut ions . Skocpol traces the beginningsof social revolutions to the "politico-military crises of stateand class domination. And only because of the possibilitiesthus created have revolutionary leaderships and rebelliousmasses contributed to the accomplishment of revolutionarytransformations" (Skocpol, 1979: 17, emphasis mine). Thelogically prior, ' fi na l' c au se , then, is the crisis in state andclass domination. This is a response to the state's inabilityto cope with new requirements suddenly thrust upon it(1979:32) by in ternat ional mili tary compet it ion witheconomically superior powers (1979: 23, 47, 50, 110, 154, 285,286).95 The state is unable to cope, in turn, because ofconstraints imposed by "exis ting class structures and politicalinst i tut ions" (1979:285), specifically a landed ruralaristocracy who can block the state's efforts to extract agrea ter (and increasing part) of the surplus from thepeasantry (1979:110). External pressures and in ternalinabilities together consti tute "sufficient distinctive causes ofsocial revolutionary situations" (1979: 154). Skocpol insiststhat this specific conjuncture of internal and external causesis not generalizable beyond th e cases sh e studies - France,Russia and China . Yet she maintains that a logically similarcausal structure helps explain the origin of social revolutionsin dependent, colonized countries. The "continuities ordisruptions of state machineries during crises" occasioned by

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th e (internationally prompted) breakdown of colonial contro(1979: 291) li e at the root of recent revolutions.The possibilities created by the s tructura l breakdown

th e old regime sometimes, bu t not alway s, lead to sociarevolutions. Tha t d ep en ds on in ternal instabilitiesspecifically on the appearance of widespread peasant revoldirected particularly against landlords. Peasant revol ts arfacilitated, Skocpol argues (1979:112-117), by institutionaarrangements in which peasant solidarity and autonomy arhigh. I f t he agr ar ia n system is based on independensmallholdings and if communitarian relations bind individufamilies in opposit ion to landlords, then a collapse in thst a te ' s repressive capaci t y leads to "widespread anirreversible revolts" (i979: 117).At it s most general level, Skocpol's t heo ry t urns ou t to bvacuous. To say t ha t " st at es col lapse because they arunable to cope with external pressures" is logically akin'explaining' heart fa ilures by saying that "a h ea rt a tta coccurs because th e heart is unable to pump blood", that ibecause it fails to perform it s function.

I f we apply Skocpol 's theory to Telengana, we would begby observing that the Indian state put pressure on HyderabaI n order to show that this caused t he col la ps e of thHyderabad State, however , we would have to first identify ath e possible actions that th e Nizam's government could havundertaken to meet these pressures. Then we would havedemonstrate why in fact such actions were not carried out,if t hey were, why they failed. Elliott (1974) goes some watowards a more complete funct ional explanation.96 Shargues that the Hyderabad government's inability to cope wdue to the failure of it s political institutions to adapt inmass-incorporating direction and due to the ineffectivenessit s elites to build suitable alliances either among themselv(horizontally) or with th e lower c lasses (ver t ica lly ). YElliott confines her discussion to political institutions. Shdoes not specify what th e pressures on Hyderabad were anand how they were enforced. Thus, there is no mentionth e Indian government's economic blockade. She does nd iscuss what, if anyth ing, the Hyderabad state could doprotect itself against th e kind of military invasion that dactua lly take place. And her discussion of th e state's failuto gain legitimacy does not consider symbolic processesall. Elliott 's analysis is incomplete, I t hink, because shequat es t he question: "Why was Hyderabad so vulnerableoutside influences?" with the other question that she ask''Were there no political institutions within Hyderabadbuttress it against these winds?" (1974:28).Skocpol's other major a rgument viz. that th e s ta te

collapse is logically (and per haps t empo ra ll y? ) p ri orturning a peasant rebellion into a revolution seems to havegreater degree of plausibility. It is not hard to a cc ep t t ht hos e two conditions were jointly necessary for t he cases sstudies. But in what sense do they constitute separable, alogically (if not temporal ly ) hierarchical steps? In Skocpomodel, t he soc ie ta l cris is initiating revolutionary changes ole due to conflicts in th e stratified realm of world affaiand elite politics. Le t us accept for a moment, despi te obetter judgement, the functional explanation offered fo r thcrisis. Why a state is unable to cope with external pressupresumes knowledge of why, and how, it is able to copethe a bs e ne e of such p re ss ur e, t ha t is , in 'normacircumstances. Skocpol, like other theorists of revolutiofails to ask this question. Because of thi s, she attributes thcollapse in state authority to it s conflict with, and losslegitimacy among, th e politically powerful elites (e.g. t


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landed aristocracy) but does not connect the i ssue of (loss of)legitimacy with that of surplus extraction (domination).Failure in the former tas k, s he says, results in political crisis;failure in th e latter, on th e other hand, results in peasantrevolt. A consideration of the ' no rmal' opera tion of th estate, I will argue, would have shown how intimately questions of legitimation are bound with the ext ract ion of surplusand th e control of resources. Ye t, without knowing how andwhy states cope, and thus why they fail to cope, it seems tobe altogether questionable to assert that their collapse is inan y sense prior to peasant revolts in the making ofrevolutions.

In contrast to Skocpol - who can be interpreted as sayingthat the development of capitalism is itself a consequence ofrevolut iona ry change (Co ll in s, 1980) - stan d the 'moraleconomists', for example Wolf (1969) and Scott (1976). BothWolf and Scott think that th e penetration of capitalistrelations is a major factor leading to peasant revolts. Wolfsees the dissolution of th e "integument of custom", th ecutting of t radi ti onal t ie s of dependence, reciprocity andsolidarity, and th e breakdown of the mechanisms fo ralleviating risk as the central causes of revolt. Yet herecognizes that "rebellion cannot star t from a situation ofcomplete impotence; th e powerless are easy v ic tims"(1969:290). Since th e poor peasant has "no tactical power",being totally dependent on his employer for his livelihood, itfalls on th e middle peasant an d the tact ical ly mobilepeasantry in peripheral areas to start an uprising. As it turnsout, middle peasants a re p reci se ly the group "most vulnerableto economic changes wrought by commercialism" (1969:292).In Scott 's view, th e l ik el ih ood o f p ea sa nt r ev ol t isincreased by simul taneous , unexpected shocks to th esubsistence arrangements of a large group of peasants. Theeffects of such shocks are ex acerb ate d by populationpressures, th e risks of production for th e market, and th eg rowing c la ims of th e state and are registered in th evariability of real income. When crops succeed or prices r iseand t he agr icul tu ra l economy booms, th e state and eliteclasses siphon off a greater amount of surplus value.However, in bad seasons or when t he r el at iv e p ri ce for theagricultural output falls, th e state does not adjust it s claimsdownward. Here Iies "the key to the insur rec tionarypotential of such regions" ( I 976: 199). However , revolt willno t occur if 'adaptations' exist which r educe the threat tosubsistence. Scott (1976:204) identifies four such strategies:"( 1) reliance on local forms of self-help; (2) reliance on thenonpeasant sector of t he e conomy ; (3) reliance on statesupported forms of patronage and exploitation; and (4)reliance on rel ig ious or oppositionist structures of protectionand assistance." Yet, he admits that these form solutionsonly "under very special circumstances" (1976:225). For it isno t th e alleviation of economic threats to subsistence thathas b locked rebel lion. Economic conditions have oftenworsened bu t so have t he nega ti ve consequences of riskingr ebel li on . The growing abi li ty and willingness of th e state touse terror is a powerful deterrent. ' 'Peasants' ', according toScott (1976:226), "l ive in a world that gives them little scopefor such fatal misjudgments."

In applying t he se t heo ri es to Telengana, on e majorobject ion is obvious. The revolut ion did no t followimmediately on the heels of capitalism. We have se en thatproduction for the world market began at least as early asth e beginning of the century . It is h ighly probable, as Banaj i(1977) has demonstra ted fo r the region adjacent toTelengana, that the process of capitalist penetration began

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even earlier. The important aspect of th e increasinglycapitalis t relations of production was i ts d if ferent ia l impacton different segments of the rural population. Wolf and Scottignore this insofar as they do not consider it an explanatoryvariable of any importance.97 Their vis ion of the peasantryas a mutually reciprocating and secure, though unequal wholetorn apart by market forces is altogether too romantic. Anyavailable description of the lower classes and bonded laborersin Telengana makes that clear. Thus, we cannot understandwhy revolutions begin by using Wolf and Scott's thesis aboutth e invasion of capitalism. Neither can we understand whorevolts from Wolf' s middle peasant and periphera l peasan ttheses. To be fair, Scott 's model is different and morenuanced than Wolf's. Though Scott sees capitalis t relations ofproduction as a sluiceway for already precarious subsistencemargins, he does no t consider them a direct cause ofrebel l ion , as Wolf does. Rather, he thinks that th econsequences of selling in capi ta l is t marke ts entail higherdownside risks because the state maintains downwardly rigiddemands on th e size of th e absolute sur plus. But why can t hestate or elites ge t away with adjusting tax demands upwardsbut not downwards? Scott gives no reasons: th e state 'slegitimacy to do so, he things, goes unquestioned. Here, in amanner similar to Wolf, Scott treats power as a possession inthe hands of elites, not as a relation between social classesthat is constantly shifting and essentially contested.

I f Skocpol fractures the dialectic of structure and act ion infavor of th e former (Dunn, 1982), it is in reaction to earliertheories that erred in th e opposite direction (Aya, 1979;freeman, 1972; Golds tone , 1980). On th e other hand, Wolfand Scott who do attempt to integrate structure and agencyfail to provide a robust framework, as th e example ofTelengana revea ls so clearly. I t s eems t ha t theorists ofrevolution need to confront an assumption implicit in theirpractice. 98 To what extent, if at all, is it possible toconstruct a general (I,e, robust) theory of revolutions?This question, hinted at earlier, is really about the condi tions that constitute adequate explanation. First , ananalytical distinction needs to be made between the causesfor th e origins of a revolution and it s process. Skocpol 'semphasis on revolutionary outcomes is important because itrai ses quest ions about how one would characterize the end ofa revolution (hence i ts outcome). There is just as much aproblem with quest ions about starting points. Then we needto consider who acts and why they do, that is, whatmotivates them.

It is the illusion of ' vo luntar ism' that in order tounderstand revolutions, it is sufficient for th e a na ly st todetermined why people should be willing to ac t in a rebe Il iousmanner. But that does not tell us what e nab les them to doso , as has been pointed out by Wolf, Aya and Skocpo l,Concepts like 'exploitation', 'relative deprivation' and 'systemdisequilibrium' are not the terms in whi ch most participantsjustify revolutionary actions to themselves and to each o ther(SCOtt, 1979).99 It is a lso true that th e reasons why certainoutcomes obtain may be different from what th e actors thinkthe reasons are. finally, the outcome may e sca pe theintentions of th e various actors because it depends on theirinter-action, not on their act ion alone. From this, Skocpol(1979) mistakenly concludes that the intentions of actor s a reirrelevant; Her neglect of human practice, I have argued,makes her se e revolutions as processes occur ring entir.elybehind peoples' backs. Skocpol wants to substitute thedouble hermeneutic of social theory (Giddens, 1982) - th eanalyst's interpretation of the pre-existing interpretation of


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social actors - with t he s ci en ti fi c ' truth' of th e scholar(I 979:18).Why revolut ions begin is not just a question of explainingthe timi ng of particular events, it is also a matter ofexplaining the location of those events . Th ere are two waysto p ro ce ed . One can use th e method of comparativehistorical analysis and/or th e method of counterfactualanalysis. 100 Take the example of Telengana , Using the firstmethod, one would compare Telengana with another movementsimilar in every respect and attempt to deduce common pointsof analysis: this is the positive case. The negat ive casewould try to explain why situations similar in every respectbut without the explana tory causes do not have revolutionaryconsequences. 101 By comparing Telengana with a similarregion, we want to explain why revolution occurred inTelengana and not elsewhere and why it happened in the late1940' s and no t at some other time. In counterfactualanalysis, on the other hand, the comparison is not with someother region but with an imagined state of the world wheret he hypot he si ze d causes are absent. I f th e originalconsequences still o bta in s, t he n we know that ourhypothesized causes are wrong.l2 Comparative historicaland counterfactual analyses are not mutually exclusive but itremains to be seen how th ey can be fruitfully combined.Whatever the methodology employed, t he cen tral analyticalproblem should be clear from all the crit icisms made so far.It can be stated quite simply. To understand why revolutionsbegin, we need to understand how relations of domination arereproduced (not 'continued') in everyday life. Only t hen canrevolutionary ruptures be explained - the breakdown of theroutinized and usually unproblematic reproduction of socialrelations. The means by which the structures of dominationar e reproduced are different, fo r example, in capitalistsociety than in a feudal system. I have argued that Skocpoldoes not adequately address the question of origins. I t isprecisely this fact that allows he r to treat as 'similar' casesthe bourgeois, liberal-democratic revolution of eighteenthcentury France, the statist, communist revolution of Russi a in1917 and the peasant based, mass-mobilizing guerrilla uprisingth a t consti tu ted th e Chinese Revolut ion (1979:40-43) .Though Skocpol warns that "one cannot mechanically extendth e specific causal arguments (made by her) into a 'generaltheory of revolutions'" (19 79:290 , emphas is mine ), shenevertheless maintains that "the basic principles of analysesused here should also prove f ru it fu l for comparativeanalyses of the causes and outcomes of other social revolutions" (1979:290, emphasis mine). I f by 'causes' we meanmaterial and formal causes, then it seems to me to bestretching the case. For i f fin al and ef fi ci en t c au ses a reinextricably connected to world-historical space-time,103 asI have argued, then it does not appear plausible to constructa 'general theory' of revolutions that would be just as valid,for example, in the capital is t mode of production as in th efeudal one. I t would seem that th e entire project ofconstructing a 'general theory' of revolutions needs soberreconsideration.NOTES76. The j agi rdars were given a 12.5 percent remission onland revenue in the first year a ft er th eir lands had beenseized (Pavier, 1981:176).77. This statement is not to be construed causally. I am notsaying that extortion decreased because of the abolition of[agtrdart,

78. "Sai" means "beloved" - the phrase has an incantatoquality.79. Compare this defini tion to the very similar one advancearlier by Huntington (quoted in Aya, 1979:47, origina l 196who defined revolution as a " rap id , fundamental, and viol edomestic change in th e dominant values and myths ofsociety , in i ts poli t ical institutions, social structurleadership, and government activity and policies." Skocpha s jet t isoned "values and my ths", alw ays problematbaggage, and has made class-based revolts part of hdefinit ion. This meets objections that Huntington's definitiocould not distinguish between mass-based movements anreigns of terror as in fascist regimes.80. In fact, Skocpol 's definit ion obviates any discussior eg arding the succe ss or failure of a revolution: socirevolutions, by definition, are revolutions t ha t a re successfu81. For a painstaking elaboration of the terms 'meansproduction' and 'relations of production', see Cohen (1978:279).82. Scott (1979) argues that it is more often the case thnot that leaders and participants have divergent interests abeliefs while sharing both a tactical line of action andvocabulary in which these (divergent) interes ts are expresse83. These conditions are too often forgotten - th e resultthe creat ion of heroic, and mostly mythical, figures. For tparticular case of Gandhi, see Gupta (1983).84. I have omitted opposit ion to landlords here - it willconsidered further on.85. How well these instructions were followed cannotdetermined.86. The events in Telengana profoundly affected the CPIthe national l evel as wel l. Di ff er ences on ques tion s of tactisplit the Party along lines that were to prefigure the breakof 1964 (into CPI and CPI[M]).87. Here I do no t even con side r t he fa r more damnicriticism th at ha s been made of th e subjective/objectid ic hotomy. S ee , for example, Rorty (1979:315-394) aBourdieu (1977:1-30).88 . Using th e Aristotelian def init ion, Skocpol 's entienterprise can be seen as an attempt at locating material aformal causes, not efficient and final ones. For an argumealong the same lines in a different context see Ruben (198189. Skocpol identifies the 'legitimacy versus coercion' dualwith 'nonmarxist versus marxist' views, despite th e workmarxists such as Habermas. See for example , his LegitimatiCrisis.~ E r i c Wolf (1969:290-292) ha s picked up th e samhypothesis and integrated it into a moral economy framewoHowever , he is careful to del imit it s explanatory ambit to tr ealm of "revolutionary potential", no t th e "revolutionaprocess".91. Alavi doesn 't say why these conflicts arise, what endothem with significance in the peasant' s world-view and whmakes middle peasants coalesce as a class 'for-itself'.92. DQV.Rao as quoted in Pavier (1981:148). There seemsbe some controversy about this point. Sundarayya claims thboth sma ll lan dlords and r ic h pea sant s 'defected' whD.V.Rao says that only the former really did.93. I am using 'dominating' in the same way as it is usedAlthusser and his disciples, that is , as dist inct fro'determining'94. Not to mention th e advanced capitalist world.95. "Wars and imper ia l intrusions," she writes (1972:28echoing Marx's famous statement on violence, "w ere tmidwives of th e revolutionary crises."


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96. For what might constitute adequate grounds fo r asatisfactory functional explanation, s ee Cancian (1968).97. Scott in particular thinks that t he sub si st en ce c ri se sresulting from production for the market and state dominationdo not fall systematical ly on any class. He says "suchvariations were in pa rt i nd iv idua l and r andom (Scot t,1976:196, emphasis mine).98. It might s eem that I am to o hasty in drawing thisconclusion from th e handful of theories that I have discussedso far. Yet my criticisms, I believe, hold for other theoriesas wel l.99. They probab ly do not consider their act ions"revolutionary" either. This is not to say t ha t th ey are no taware, for example, of exploitation.100. The first of these is used effectively by Skocpol (1979)despi te her positivism.101. Skocpol 's negative method (1979:36-37) comes close tobeing a counterfactual,102. For a debate on when counterfactuals a re l eg it imat e,s ee Barry (1980) and Elster (1980).103. For th e not ion of space-t ime, see Giddens (1981).BIBLIOGRAPHYAhmed, Syed (1956 ). Telengana Districts. Hyderabad:Hyderabad Geography Association.Alavi, Hamza (1956). "Peasant and th e Revolution", TheSocialist Register 1965, :241-277.Aya, Rod (1979). "Theo ri es o f Revolution Reconsidered,"Theory and Society, 8 (1):39-99.Balagopal, K (1983). "Telengana Movement Revisited."Economic and Political Weekly, (18): 709-712.Banaj i, Jairus (1977). "Capitalist Domination and the SmallPeasantry," Economic and Political Weekly, 12:(33 & 34)Special Number: 1375-1404.Barry, Brian (1980). "Superfox," Political Studies, 28 (1): 136143.Bourdieu, Pierre ~ 1 9 7 7 ( 1 9 7 2 ) 1 f , Outline of a Theory of Practicet r, Richard Nice. London: Cambridge University Press.Canc ia n , F ra n ce sc a (1968). "Functional Analysis,"International Encyclopedia of the Social Sciences, 6: 29-43 .Chaturvedi, B.N. (1956). A Descriptive Atlas of HyderabadState. Indian Press.Cohen, Gerald A. (1978). Karl Marx's Theory of History: ADefense. Princeton: Princeton University Press.Coll ins, Randall (1980). "Book Review: States and SocialRevolution by Theda Skocpol," Theory and Society, 9(4): 647651.Decennial Report on the Administration of H.E.H. the Nizam'sDominions 1322 to 1331 Fasli (1912 to 1922 A.D.) HyderabadDeccan: Government Central Press, 1930.Dhanagare D.N. (1974). "Socia l Origins of t he P ea sa ntInsurrection in Telengana", Contributions to Indian Sociology,Delhi: Vikas: 109-134.

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Dhanagare, D.N. (1982). "Telengana Movement Revlsi te d,"Economic and Political Weekly, 17 (51):2045-2046.Dunn, John (1982). "Understanding Revolutions,: Ethics, 92(2):299-315.Elliott, Carolyn M (1974). "Decline of a Patrimonial RegimeThe Telengana Rebel lion in India, 1946-1951," Journal oAsian Studies , 34 (1):27-47.Elster, J on (1980 ). "The Treatment of Counterfactuals,Political Studies, 28( 1): 144-147.Freeman, Michael (1972). "Review Article: Theories oRevolution," British Journal of Political Science, 2 (3): 339359.Giddens, Anthony (1979). Central Problems in Social TheoryBerkeley: University of California Press.Giddens, Anthony (1981). A Contemporary Crit ique oHistorical Materialism. Berkeley: Unlv, of California Press.

Giddens, Anthony (1982). Profiles and Critiques in SociaTheory. London: Macmillan.Godelier, Maurice (1972). Rationality and Irrationality iEconomics . New York: Monthly Review Press .Goldstone, Jack A. (1980). "Theories of Revolution: ThThird Generation," World Politics, 32 (3):425-453.Gough, Kathleen (1974). "Indian Peasant Uprisings", Economiand Political Weekly, 9 (32-34):1391-1412.Gour, Raj Bahadur (1973). "Hyderabad People's RevolAgainst Nizam's Autocracy: A Dia ry" in Glorious TelenganArmed Struggle. New Delhi : Communist Party of India.Gray, Hugh (19 68 ). "Andh ra Pradesh" in State Politics iIndia ed, Myron Weiner. Princeton: Princeton Univ. Press:398431).Gray, Hugh (1970). "The Landed Gentry of th e TelenganaAndhra Pradesh" in Elites in South Asia eds, Edmund Leacand S.N.Mukherjee. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press119-135.Gupta, Akhll (1983). "Attenborough's Truth: The Polit ics oGandhi", The Threepenny Review, 15 :22-23.Har ri son, S el ig S. (1956) . "Caste an d th e AndhrCommunists", The American Pol it ica l Science Review, 5(2): 378 -404.Haberrnas, Jurgen [1975(1973)]. Legit imat ion Crisis trThomas McCar thy. Boston: Beacon.Iyengar, S. Kesava (1951a). A Review of Hyderabad FinanceHyderabad-Deccan: Government Press.Iyengar , S. Kesava (1951b). Rural Economic Enquir ies in thHyderabad State 1949-51. Hyderabad-Deccan: Governmenof Hyderabad.


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Kautsky, John H. (1956). Moscow and the Communist Party ofIndia. Cambridge, Mass: The Technology Press , MIT.Khusro, Ali Mohammed (1958). Economic and Socia l Effects ofJ agirdari Aboli tion and Land Reforms in Hyderabad.Hyderabad: Osmania Univ, Press.Kosambi , D .O . (1946). "The Bourgeois ie Comes of Age inIndia", Science and Socie ty , 10 (4) :392-398.Lieten, G.K. (1977). "Indian Communists Look at IndianCommunism," Economic and Political Weekly, 12 (37): 16061611.Marx, Karl [1977( 1867)]. Capital, I. New York: VintageBooks.Masani, IVl.R. (1954). The Communist Party of India. London:Vershoyle.McMurtry, John (1978). The Structure of Marx's World-View.Princeton: Princeton University Press.Menon, V.P. (1956). The Story of t he Int eg ra tion of th eIndian States. Bombay: Orient Longmans.Metcalf, Thomas R. (1964). The Aftermath of Revolt.Princeton University Press.Moore, Barrington Jr . (1966). Social Origins of Dictatorshipand Democracy. Boston: Beacon.Munshi, Kanaiyalal M (1957). The End of an Era: HyderabadMemories. Bombay: Bharatiya Vidya Bhavan.Overst reet , Gene D. an d Mar sh al l Windmiller (1959).Communism in India. Berkeley: University of California Press.Paran jpe, B.S. (1973) . ''Medical Work in the Telengana ArmedStruggle" in Glorious Telengana Armed Struggle. New Delhi:Communist Party of India .Pavier, Barry (1974). "The Telengana Armed Struggle", TheEconomic and Political Weekly, 9 (32-34) : 1413-1420.Pavier, Barry (1981). The Telengana Movement 1944-51.New Delhi: Vikas,Popkin, Samuel L. (1979). The Rational Pea sant . Berke ley:University of California Press.Prasad, S.N. (1972). Operation Polo: The Pol ice Act ionAgains t Hyderabad 1948. Delhi: Govt. of India.Quereshi , Anwar Iqbal (1947). The Economic Deve lopment ofHyderabad, I. Bombay: Orient Longmans.Rajeswara Rao, Chandra [1979(1972)]. "The PostwarSi tua tion and Beginning of Armed Struggle" in PeasantStruggles in India ed . A.R. Desai. Bombay: Oxford Univ,Press: 517-531.Ram, Mohan (1973). "The sCommunist Movement in AndhraPradesh" in Rad ical Politics in South Asia ed. Paul R. Brassand Marcus F. Franda , Cambr idge , Mass: MIT Press : 281-321.

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Ram, Mohan (1969). Indian communism: Spli t Within a Spl it.New Delhi: Vlkas,Ram, Mohan (1973). "The Telengana Peasant Armed Struggle,1946-51", Economic and Political Weekly, 8 (23): 1025-1032.Reddy , Rav i, N. (1973). Heroic Telengana: Reminiscencesand Experi ences. New Delhi: Communist Party of India.Rorty, Richard (1979). Phi losophy and the Mirror of Nature.Princeton: Princeton Univ, Press.Ruben, David-Hill el (1981). "Review of 'Karl Marx 's Theoryof History!" British' Journal of Political Science , 11 (2): 227234.Scott, James C. (1976). The Moral Economy of the Peasant.New Haven: Yale University Pres.Scott, James C. (1979). "Revolution in the Revolution:Peasants and Commissars," Theory and Society, 7 (1 & 2):97134.Shea, Thomas. "Agrarian Unrest and Reform in South India",Far Eastern Survey, 23 :81-88.Skocpol, Theda (1979). States and Soc ia l Revolut ions .Cambridge: Cambridge Univ, Press.Smith, Wilfred, C. (1950). "Hyderabad: Muslim Tragedy",Middle East Jou rna l, 4 (1):27-51.Statistical Abstract, Andhra Pradesh, 1956. Hyderabad: Govt,of Andhra Pradesh , 1958.Sundarayya, Puchalpalli (1972). Telengana Peoples' Struggleand it s Lessons. Calcutta: Communist Party of India (M).Wolf, Eric R. (1969). Peasant Wars of the Twentieth Century.New York: Harper.Worsley, Peter (1968). The Trumpet Shall Sound, 2nd.edition.New York: Schocken Books.

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