Peasant movement

Last updated December 24, 2023

A peasant movement is a social movement involved with the agricultural policy, which claims peasants rights.

Peasant movements have a long history that can be traced to the numerous peasant uprisings that occurred in various regions of the world throughout human history. Early peasant movements were usually the feudal and semi-feudal societies, and resulted in violent uprisings. More recent movements, fitting the definitions of social movements, are usually much less violent, and their demands are centered on better prices for agricultural produce, better wages and working conditions for the agricultural laborers, and increasing the agricultural production.

In Colonial India, the economic policies of European merchants and planters during the period Company rule adversely affected the peasant class, protecting the landlords and money lenders while they exploited the peasants. The peasants rose in revolt against economic on many occasions. The peasants in Bengal formed a trade union and revolted against the compulsion of cultivating indigo.

Anthony Pereira, a political scientist, has defined a peasant movement as a "social movement made up of peasants (small landholders or farm workers on large farms), usually inspired by the goal of improving the situation of peasants in a nation or territory".^[1]

Peasant movements by country or region

India

Several peasant movement in India arose during the colonial era, when economic policies by various British colonial administrations led to the decline of traditional handicraft industries. These policies lead to change of ownership in lands, land overcrowding, increased debt among the peasant classes of India. This led to peasant uprisings during the colonial period, and development of peasant movements in the post-colonial period.^[2] The Kisan (farmer) Sabha movement started in Bihar under the leadership of Swami Sahajanand Saraswati, who formed the Bihar Provincial Kisan Sabha (BPKS) in 1929 to mobilise peasant grievances against the zamindari attacks on their occupancy rights.^[3] In 1938,the crops in Eastern Khandesh were destroyed due to heavy rains. The peasants were ruined. In order to get the land revenue waived, Sane Guruji organized meetings and processions in many places and took out marches to the Collector's office. The peasants joined the revolutionary movement of 1942 in great numbers.^[4] Gradually the peasant movement intensified and spread across the rest of India. All these radical developments on the peasant front culminated in the formation of the All India Kisan Sabha (AIKS) at the Lucknow session of the Indian National Congress in April 1936 with Swami Sahajanand Saraswati elected as its first President.^[5] In the subsequent years, the movement was increasingly dominated by Socialists and Communists as it moved away from the Congress, by 1938 Haripura session of the Congress, under the presidency of Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose, the rift became evident, and by May 1942, the Communist Party of India, which was finally legalised by the then government in July 1942, had taken over AIKS, all across India including Bengal where its membership grew considerably.^[6]

D. D. Kosambi and R.S. Sharma, together with Daniel Thorner, brought peasants into the study of Indian history for the first time.^[7]

Korea

Poland

Polish peasant movement focused on improvements in the life of Polish peasants, and empowering them in politics. It was strong from mid-19th to mid-20th centuries. Despite relatively low support on national level, Polish People's Party maintains somewhat strong position in many local parliaments.

United States

The farmers' movement was, in American political history, the general name for a movement between 1867 and 1896. In this movement, there were three periods, popularly known as the Grange, Alliance and Populist movements.^[8]

Zimbabwe

The struggle for the Liberation of Zimbabwe is a theme that has been accorded fair autobiographical attention in Zimbabwe. Scholarly attention on the war was predicated on the need to understand how the "underdog" freedom fighters managed to paralyse the state-funded Rhodesian armed forces. In this light, the widely accepted view came to be that the "guerrillas" / freedom fighters established rapport with the peasants during the course of the war. Nevertheless, there is an anti-thesis between nationalist and revisionist scholarly interpretation on the matter. The nationalist historians advance a glorious interpretation of the role of peasants by arguing that there was a correlation between the guerrillas' Maoist ideology of relying on mass support to win a war and the peasants' grievances in the white colonial state. They justify this claim by rationalizing that the peasants had long developed a spirit of resentment prior to guerrilla infiltration in their areas, thus, when the guerrillas came, their ideas fell on fertile ground. Contrary to the glorious interpretation, revisionist historians have reasoned that it is misleading to suggest that the peasants always supported the guerrillas out of will since such a position ignores other critical issues such as guerrilla indiscipline, local struggles in the communities and guerrilla coercion as a means for mobilizing the masses. It is a fact to argue that the guerrilla war thrived on the masses’ co-operation.

Related Research Articles

The All India Kisan Sabha (AIKS), or All India Kisan Sabha , is the peasants front of Communist Party of India (Marxist), and works for farmers rights, peasants rights and anti-feudal movement in India.

All India Kisan Sabha, is the peasant or farmers' wing of the Communist Party of India, an important peasant movement formed by Sahajanand Saraswati in 1936.

The history of Bihar is one of the most varied in India. Bihar consists of three distinct regions, each has its own distinct history and culture. They are Magadha, Mithila and Bhojpur. Chirand, on the northern bank of the Ganga River, in Saran district, has an archaeological record dating from the Neolithic age. Regions of Bihar—such as Magadha, Mithila and Anga—are mentioned in religious texts and epics of ancient India. Mithila is believed to be the centre of Indian power in the Later Vedic period. Mithila first gained prominence after the establishment of the ancient Videha Kingdom. The kings of the Videha were called Janakas. A daughter of one of the Janaks of Mithila, Sita, is mentioned as consort of Lord Rama in the Hindu epic Ramayana. The kingdom later became incorporated into the Vajjika League which had its capital in the city of Vaishali, which is also in Mithila.

Sahajanand Saraswati was an ascetic, a nationalist and a peasant leader of India. Although born in United Provinces, his social and political activities focussed mostly on Bihar in the initial days, and gradually spread to the rest of India with the formation of the All India Kisan Sabha. He had set up an ashram at Bihta, near Patna, Bihar carried out most of his work in the later part of his life from there. He was an intellectual, prolific writer, social reformer and revolutionary.

Namasudra, earlier known as Chandal, is an Avarna Bengali Hindu community originating from eastern and central Bengal. The term Chandal or Chandala is usually considered as a slur. They were traditionally engaged in fishing and as boatmen, and later in cultivation. They lived outside the four-tier ritual varna system and thus were outcastes.

Sir Ponnambala Thiaga Rajan was the Chief Minister of Madras Presidency from 4 April 1936, to 24 August 1936. He was also the last President of the Justice Party. P. T. Rajan was born in a Thondaimandala mudaliar family in Uthamapalayam. His ancestors were from Kanchipuram. He attended The Leys School, Cambridge and later, Jesus College, Oxford. He graduated in history and law, and practiced as an advocate for some time before joining the Justice Party.

Neyamatpur is a village in Gaya district of Bihar, India. The village was a bastion of the Indian National Congress and Kisan Andolan during the British period. "Pandit" Yadunandan Sharma, at the instruction of Swami Sahajanand Saraswati established an ashram here in 1933.

Acharya Gogineni Ranga Nayukulu, also known as N. G. Ranga, was an Indian freedom fighter, classical liberal, parliamentarian and farmers' leader. He was the founding president of the Swatantra Party, and an exponent of the peasant philosophy. He received the Padma Vibhushan award for his contributions to the Peasant Movement. N.G. Ranga served in the Indian Parliament for six decades, from 1930 to 1991.

Mahishya, also spelled Mahisya, is a Bengali Hindu traditionally agrarian caste, and formed the largest caste in undivided Bengal. Mahisyas were, and are, extremely diverse Bengali caste counting among themselves all possible classes in terms of material conditions and ranks.

Tipu Shah was the second leader of the mystic Pagal Panthi Order in Mymensingh. He commanded the Order and the local peasantry in revolts against the British East India Company and managed to establish an independent state in Sherpur.

Bhumihars, also locally called Bhuinhar and Babhan, are a Hindu caste mainly found in Bihar, the Purvanchal region of Uttar Pradesh, Jharkhand, the Bundelkhand region of Madhya Pradesh, and Nepal.

The Bharatiya Kisan Sangh (BKS) is an Indian farmers' organization that is politically linked to the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh, and a member of the Sangh Parivar. BKS was founded by Dattopant Thengadi in 1978. As of 2000, Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh claimed BKS had a quarter million members, organized in 11,000 villages and 301 districts across the country. The organization is dominated by landed gentry.

Manav Dharma Sabha was one of the earliest socio-religious reform organization in Gujarat and British India. It was founded on 22 June 1844 in Surat by Durgaram Manchharam Mehta, Dadoba Pandurang Tarkhadkar and a few others. The goals of the Sabha were to expose the hypocritical arts present in Christian, Muslim and Hindu religions. It had a very short life span and ceased to exist as Dadoba left for Bombay in 1846 and Durgaram left for Rajkot in 1852.

Paramahansa Mandali was a secret socio-religious group, established in 1849, in Bombay and is closely related to Manav Dharma Sabha which was found in 1844 in Surat. It was started by Durgaram Mehtaji, Dadoba Pandurang and a group of his friends. Dadoba Pandurang assumed leadership of this organisation after he left Manav Dharma Sabha. He outlined his principles in Dharma Vivechan in 1848 for Manav Dharma Sabha and "Paramhansik Bramhyadharma" for Paramahansa Mandali. It acted as a secret society and is believed that the revelation of its existence in 1860 hastened its demise.

The history of Uttar Pradesh, a state in India, stretches back several millennia. The region shows the presence of human habitation dating back to between 85,000 and 73,000 years ago. Additionally, the region seems to have been domesticated as early as 6,000 BC.

The Bengal Legislative Assembly was the largest legislature in British India, serving as the lower chamber of the legislature of Bengal. It was established under the Government of India Act 1935. The assembly played an important role in the final decade of undivided Bengal. The Leader of the House was the Prime Minister of Bengal. The assembly's lifespan covered the anti-feudal movement of the Krishak Praja Party, the period of World War II, the Lahore Resolution, the Quit India movement, suggestions for a United Bengal and the partition of Bengal and partition of British India.

Bharatiya Kisan Union (BKU) is a farmer's representative organisation in India. It was founded by Chaudhary Charan Singh from the Punjab Khetibari Union which became its Punjab branch. The union is affiliated to the All India Kisan Sangharsh Coordination Committee and Via Campesina. The national headquarters of the union is located in Sisauli, Uttar Pradesh.

The All India United Kisan Sabha was a peasants organization in India. The AIUKS was founded around the late 1940s by Swami Sahajanand Saraswati. Sahajanand had broken away from the All India Kisan Sabha in 1945, being opposed to the increasing communist domination of the movement. To form the new AIUKS, Sahajanand gathered Congress Socialist Party members and other Indian National Congress left-wing elements.

Sir Purshottamdas Thakurdas (1879–1961),, was a Gujarati cotton trader, mill owner, businessman and industrialist from Mumbai, India. He was one of the signatory of Bombay Plan, which was set of proposals for the post-independence economy of India. He along with GD Birla established the Federation of Indian Chambers of Commerce & Industry in 1927 on the advice of Mahatma Gandhi. He was a member of the Hilton Young Commission. He was a member of the Acworth Committee. He headed the Foodgrain Policy Committee of 1947.

Communist movements in India refers to the various social and political movements lead by communists in India. Communism in India has existed since the 1920s. Some of the major events are listed below.

References

↑ Pereira, Anthony W 1997. The End of the Peasantry. Pittsburgh: University of Pittsburgh Press.
↑ Social movements types at Sociology Guide
↑ Bandyopādhyāya, Śekhara (2004). From Plassey to Partition: A History of Modern India. Orient Longman. p. 406. ISBN 978-81-250-2596-2.
↑ Bandyopādhyāya, Śekhara (2004). From Plassey to Partition: A History of Modern India. Orient Longman. p. 406. ISBN 978-81-250-2596-2.
↑ Bandyopādhyāya, Śekhara (2004). From Plassey to Partition: A History of Modern India. Orient Longman. p. 407. ISBN 978-81-250-2596-2.
↑ States, Parties, and Social Movements, by Jack A. Goldstone. Cambridge University Press, 2003. ISBN 0-521-01699-1. Page 192.
↑ Habib, Irfan (2007). Essays in Indian History (Seventh reprint ed.). Tulika. p. 381 (at p 109). ISBN 81-85229-62-7.
↑ Chisholm 1911, p. 181.