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CLASS 12TH HISTORY NOTES CHAPTER-09 COLONIALISM & THE

COUNTRY SIDE.
1. Impact of colonization on rural areas:
- Colonization often led to significant changes in the countryside, including the
introduction of new crops, livestock, and farming techniques.
- Colonizers often imposed their own land ownership systems, displacing indigenous
communities and altering traditional land-use patterns.
- The establishment of plantations and large-scale agricultural enterprises by colonizers
transformed the rural landscape and economy.

2. Agricultural practices in colonized regions:

- Colonizers introduced new crops such as sugarcane, tobacco, coffee, and cotton to
colonized regions, which became major cash crops for export.
- Slave labor or indentured labor was commonly used on plantations to cultivate these
cash crops, leading to exploitation and social inequality.
- Traditional agricultural practices of indigenous communities were often marginalized or
replaced by colonial systems, resulting in loss of biodiversity and environmental degradation.

 MOOT POINTS WITH INTRO TO THE CHAPTER

• At the end of 18th century, the most adverse effect of the colonial rule fell on the
economic condition of the peasants.
• As a result of the British occupation of India the Indian economy faced disastrous
consequences. To fulfil their vested interests, they shattered their tradition and
structure of Indian economy.
• Because of the decline of Indian industry, Indian weavers and craftswoman were
completely made jobless. The industries in Surat, Dhaka, Murshidaabad, etc
which were once flourishing were destroyed.
• Historians like Percival Spear, P.E. Robat and R.C. Dutt have praised permanent
settlement of land revenue, because
• Government Income became stable Administration became efficient British
rule got stable.
• Permanent settlement of Revenue was also criticised on the basis of— It did
not proved beneficial for Zamindars.
• It ingrained the interest of cultivators.
• Burden of taxes fell on other classes.
• Mahalwari system of land revenue was implemented in Punjab. The group of
villages were called ‘Mahal’. So the system was known as Mahalwari system.

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• The objective of the Fifth Report was to restrain and control the activities of East
India company in India.

The East India Company of England established its control in the countryside and
implemented its revenue policies. In this chapter, we will discuss what these policies
meant to people and how these changed the daily lives of people.

Bengal and the Zamindars:

• Colonial rule was first established in Bengal. In Bengal, East India Company tried
to reorder the rural society and establish new land rights and new revenue system.
• There was an auction held at Burdwan (present day Bardhaman) in 1797, which
was popularly known as Grand Public Event.
• Company fixed the revenue and each zamindar was supposed to pay. This fixing
of revenue was done under the Permanent Settlement and it become operational
from year 1793.
• The Zamindars who failed to pay the revenue, their estate was auctioned to
recover the revenue. But sometimes it was found that the purchasers at auction
were servants and agents of the zamindar himself, e.g. auction in Burdwan.

The Problem of Unpaid Revenue:

• The British officials fell that agriculture, trade and the revenue resources of the
state could be developed by encouraging investment in agriculture. This could be
done by securing rights of property and permanently fixing the rates of revenue
demand.
• Company felt that when revenue will be fixed, it will provide opportunity to
individual to invest in agriculture as a means of making profit and company will
also be assured of regular flow of revenue.
• After a prolonged debate amongst company officials, the permanent settlement
was made with the rajas and taluqdars of Bengal.
• Zamindars had several, sometimes even 400 villages under them.
• Zamindars collected rent from the different villages, paid the revenue to the
company, and retained the difference as his income.

Reasons for Non-Payment by Zamindars:

• A number of reasons were responsible for non-repayment of revenue by

zamindars which include that revenue demands were kept very high. It was
imposed at a time when prices of agricultural produce was very low, so peasants
found it difficult to pay.
• Zamindars were also treated by strict laws i.e. the Sunset Law’, which was
completely regardless of the harvest. According to this law, zamindars had to pay

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revenue by sunset of the specified date, otherwise zamindari was liable to be
auctioned.
• Besides these, permanent settlement and company reduced the power of
Zamindars. Sometimes ryots and village headman-jotedar deliberately delayed the
payments.

Limitations Imposed on Zamindars by the Company:

• Zamindars were important for the company but it also wanted to control and
regulate them, subdue their authority and restrict their autonomy.
• Thus, the zamindars’ troops were disbanded, customs duties abolished and their
‘cutcheries’ (courts) brought under the supervision of a collector appointed by the
company.
• Zamindars lost their power to organise local justice and local police.
• Over time zamindars were severely restricted and their powers were seized.

The Rise of The Jotedars in Villages:

• The group of prosperous farmers were popularly known as jotedars. Jotedars

were a class of rich peasants.
• They acquired vast areas of land, controlled trade, money lending and exercise
immense- power over the poorer cultivators. Their land was cultivated through
share cropper known as adhiyars or bargadars.
• Within village the power of jotedars was more effective than that of Zamindars.
They fiercely resisted the efforts of Jama to increase the Jama of village and
prevented zamindari official from executing their duties.
• Sometimes they also purchased the auctioned property of zamindar. Joiedar
played an important role in weakening of zamindari system.

The Resistance of the Zamindars:

• To prevent the weakening of their authority, zamindar took series of steps-like

fictitious sale or transferring of property to female- member of family, manipulated
the auctions, withhelding revenue deliberately, threating or intimidating the people
outside their zamindari, if they try to bought an estate.

The Fifth Report and its Impact on Zamindars:

• It was the fifth of a series of report on administration and activities of East India
Company in India. It was submitted to the British Parliament in 1813.
• British Parliament forced the company to produce regular report on the
administration of India and appointed committees to enquire into the affairs of the

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company. It became the basis of intense parliamentary debates on the nature of
East India Company’s rule in India.
• Fifth report has shaped our conception of what happened in rural Bengal during
that period and evidence contained in the 5th report are very important.

The Accounts of Buchanan:

• Francis Buchanan undertook detailed surveys of the areas under the jurisdiction of
the British East India Company.
• Buchanan journey was sponsored by the company and it was planned according
to its need. He had specific instruction about what he had to look for and what he
had to record.
• Buchanan observed the stones, rocks, different layers of soil, minerals, and stones
that were commercially valuable.
• Buchanan wrote about landscape and how these landscapes could be
transformed and made productive.
• His assessments were shaped by commercial interest of the company and
modern western notions of what constituted progress. He was critical of lifestyle of
forest dwellers.

Pastoral Areas of Bengal:

• With gradual passage of time, settled cultivation expanded and reached to the
area of shifting cultivation, swallowing up pasture and forest in the Rajmahal hills.
Shifting cultivation was done with the help of hoe, while settled cultivation was
done through plough.

In the Hills of Rajmahal:

• Francis Buchanan, a physician travelled through Rajmahal hills and he gave an

account about it.
• Originally in the Rajmahal hills Paharias lived. They lived on hunting, shifting
cultivation, food gathering and was intimately connected to forest.
• In last decade of 18th century British encouraged forest clearance and zamindar
and jotedar also started to turn uncultivated land into rice fields. As settled
agriculture expanded, the area under forest and pasture contracted. This
sharpened the conflict between Paharias and settled cultivators.
• Around 1780, Santhal came into these areas. They cleared the forest and
ploughed land.
• As the lower hills were takenover by the Santhal Settlers, the Paharias receded
interior into the Rajmahal hills.

The Santhals became Settlers:

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• Zamindars and Britishers after having failed to subdue the Paharias and transform
them into settled cultivators turned to Santhals. The Santhal appeared to be ideal
settlers, cleared the forest and ploughed land.
• After land was granted, population of Santhals increased exponentially and their
villages also increased in number.
• When the Santhal were settling, the Paharias resisted but were ultimately forced
to withdraw deeper into hills. It impoverished the Paharias in the long term.
• Santhals now lived a settled life, cultivated a range of commerical crops for market
and dealt with traders,’moneylenders. But state was taxing them heavily,
moneylenders (dikus) were charging high interest rate and taking over their land
when debts remained unpaid and zamindars were asserting control over their
land. Later due to problems, Santhal revolted in year 1855-1856, and to pacify
them, Britishers carved out new areas for the Santhals and imposed some special
laws within it.

The Revolt in Bombay Deccan:

• One of the way to explore what was happening in the area of Bombay Deccan is
to focus on the revolt of that area. Rebels expressed their anger and fury.
• Revolt provide information about life of peasant, event associated with revolt,
suppress or control of the revolt. Enquiries about the revolt produced result that
can be explored by Historians.
• Through the nineteenth century, peasants in various parts of India rose in revolt
against money lenders and grain dealers, e.g. the revolt occurred in 1875 in the
Deccan.
• A movement began at Supa Village in Poona in 1895, where ryots from
surrounding rural areas gathered and attacked the Shopkeepers and demanded
their bahi khatas (account book) and debt bonds. Ryots burnt the Khatas, looted
shop and in few instances burnt the house of Sahukars.
• Later revolt spread from Pune to Ahmednagar and even further terrified Sahukars
fled the village leaving behind their property and belonging.
• British officials controlled these revolts, they established police post in villages and
arrested people and convicted them.

A New Revenue System Started:

• In the 19th century, the British company was keen to expand its financial
resources in its annexed territories through other temporary revenue settlement
policies.
• This was so, because after 1810, the agricultural prices rose and enlarged the
income of the Bengal zamindars but not the company. This was due to the
Permanent Settlement policy in which the revenue demand was fixed and could
not be hiked. Therefore to expand its revenue source, company started to
introduce temporary settlement.

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• Policies of officials were also shaped by the economic theories they are familiar
with. In 1820’s, officials were under influence of Ricardian ideas. David Ricardo
was a celebrated Economist in England.
• Ricardian idea states that landowner should claim only to average rent and when
there is surplus, state should tax that surplus. He further says if tax will not be
levied cultivators will likely to turn into rentiers and surplus income will not be
productively invested in improvement of land.
• Ryotwari settlement was introduced in Bombay Deccan as a new revenue system.
In this system, revenue was directly settled with cultivator or ryot. Average income
from soil, revenue paying capacity of ryot was assessed and proportion of it was
fixed as share of the state. In this system, there was provision for resurvey of land
every 30 years.

Revenue Demand and Peasant Debt:

• Revenue demand was very high and when harvest were poor, it was impossible to
pay When peasant failed to pay revenue his crops were seized and fine was
imposed on the whole village. In 1830’s, prices fell sharply, famine struck and due
to this l/3rd of cat tle in deccan were killed and half of human population died. So
the problem became very severe, but the unpaid revenue mounted. In these
conditions many peasants deserted their village and migrated to new places.
• To get over a troubled period, to purchase things for arrange marriages and to
start agriculture, peasant needed money. So they borrowed money from
moneylender. But once loan was taken, they were unable to pay it back. As debt
mounted and loan remained unpaid, peasant dependence on moneylender
increased.
• By 1840’s, officials found that peasants were in alarming level of indebtness, so
they moderated the revenue demand slightly. By 1845, agricultural price
recovered steadily and peasants started expanding cultivation. But for the purpose
of expansion they needed money to buy seeds etc, so they again turned to
moneylender for money.

The Experience of Injustice of the Peasants:

• Peasants got deeper and deeper into debt and now they were utterly dependent
on moneylender for survival but now moneylenders were refusing their loan. Along
with this, there was customary rule that interest charged cannot be more than
principal amount of loan. But in colonial rule this law was broken and now ryots
started to see money lenders as devious and deceitful. They complained of
moneylenders manipulating laws and forging accounts.
• To tackle this problem, British in 1859 passed Limitation Law that stated that loan
bond would have validity for 3 years only.

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• It was meant to check accumulation of interest. But moneylenders now forced ryot
to sign a new bound every 3 years in which total unpaid balance of last loan was
entered as principal amount and interest was charged on it.
• In petitions to Deccan Riots commission, ryots
• stated how moneylenders were suppressing and oppressing them by refusing to
give receipts when loan were paid back, entered fictitious figures in bond and
forced them to sign and put thumb impression on bonds or document about which
they had no idea and they were not able to read. Money lenders also acquired the
harvest at low price and ultimately took over property of peasant. They have no
choice because to survive they needed
• loan but inoneylenders were not willing to give it without bonds.

The Deccan Riot’s Commission and its Report:

• The Government of Bombay set up a Commission to investigate a riot in Deccan.

The Commission held enquirers in district where riot spread, recorded statements
of ryots, sahukars and eyewitnesses, compiled data on revenue rate, interest rate
in different regions and collated reports sent by district collectors. Report of
Commission was tabled in British Parliament in 1878.
• This report reflected the official thinking of colonial government. It came to one of
the conclusion that peasants were angered by moneylenders, not by revenue
demand of the company. It shows that the colonial government was reluctant to
admit that popular discontent was against the governments action. Official reports
are the invaluable source of reconstruction of history but they need to juxtaposed
with other evidences also.

Cotton and its Global Condition:

• The American civil war broke in 1861. Due to war, cotton export to Britain
decreased very much. To reduce dependence on America, cotton cultivation was
promoted in India.
• Export merchants gave money to urban sahukars who in turn gave to rural
moneylenders to secure the produce. So now the peasant had access to money
easily and due to this, cotton production increased rapidly. But this brought
prosperity to rich peasants mostly and for small peasants it led to heavier debt. By
1862 over 90 percent of cotton imports into Britain were coming from India.
• When in 1865 civil war ended, export of cotton resumed, prices of cotton and
demand of cotton from India decreased. Thus merchants, sahukars and
moneylenders were not extending credit to peasants, instead they demanded
repayment of debts. At the same time revenue demand was also increased from
50 to 100 percent.

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