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NCERT Solutions Class 8th History Chapter – 3 Ruling the Countryside
Chapter – 3
Ruling the Countryside
Notes
Britain turns to India – As the demand for Indigo grew in Europe, East India Company turned to India for its supply by extending the cultivated area under it. Many of the company officials found it so profitable that they left their jobs.
Demand of Indian Indigo – India had better weather conditions for the growth of the Indigo plant and the French and Italian manufacturers used Indian Indigo for dying the cloth. The cloth manufacturers favoured Indigo against the Wood plant.
Cultivation of Indigo – There were two popular systems in practice-Nij and Ryoti. In the Nij system, cultivators grew Indigo on their own land. In the Ryobi system, it was grown on rented land by hired labourers.
Problem with Nij cultivation – The problem with Nij was that the expansion of area was not possible. Scattered small plots wTere available. Mobility of labour was low. Growing season of Indigo clashed with that of rice cultivation season.
Indigo on the land of Ryotis – Planters extended loans and pressurized peasants or headmen to produce Indigo. The planters provided seeds and drill. These contracts never came to an end and the vicious cycle continued.
The Blue Rebellion – In March 1859, crippled by the circumstances and suffering, cultivators rose in revolt against indigo planters and their Indian agents. They were supported by zamindars and headmen.
Collapse of Indigo production – The rebellion left the government worried. It set up the Indigo Commission to inquire into the system of Indigo production. The Commission held the planters guilty and criticised them for their coercive methods. It declared that Indigo production was not profitable for Ryots.
The Company Becomes the Diwan – On 12 August 1765, the Mughal emperor appointed the East India Company as the Diwan of Bengal. The actual event most probably took place in Robert Clive’s tent, with a few Englishmen and Indians as witnesses. But in the painting above, the event is shown as a majestic occasion, taking place in a grand setting. The painter was commissioned by Clive to record the memorable events in Clive’s life. The grant of Diwani clearly was one such event in British imagination.
Revenue for the Company – The Company had become the Diwan, but it still saw itself primarily as a trader. It wanted a large revenue income but was unwilling to set up any regular system of assessment and collection. The effort was to increase the revenue as much as it could and buy fine cotton and silk cloth as cheaply as possible. Within five years, the value of goods bought by the Company in Bengal doubled. Before 1765, the Company had purchased goods in India by importing gold and silver from Britain. Now the revenue collected in Bengal could finance the purchase of goods for export.
The need to improve agriculture – If the economy was in ruins, could the Company be certain of its revenue income? Most Company officials began to feel that investment in land had to be encouraged and agriculture had to be improved.
The problem – The Permanent Settlement, however, created problems. Company officials soon discovered that the zamindars were in fact not investing in the improvement of land. The revenue that had been fixed was so high that the zamindars found it difficult to pay. Anyone who failed to pay the revenue lost his zamindari. Numerous zamindaris were sold off at auctions organised by the Company.
A new system is devised – By the early nineteenth century, many of the Company officials were convinced that the system of revenue had to be changed again. How could revenues be fixed permanently at a time when the Company needed more money to meet its expenses of administration and trade.
The Munro system – In the British territories in the South, there was a similar move away from the idea of Permanent Settlement. The new system that was devised came to be known as the ryotwar (or ryotwari ). It was tried on a small scale by Captain Alexander Read in some of the areas that were taken over by the Company after the wars with Tipu Sultan. Subsequently developed by Thomas Munro, this system was gradually extended all over south India.
All was not well – Within a few years after the new systems were imposed, it was clear that all was not well with them. Driven by the desire to increase the income from land, revenue officials fixed too high a revenue demand. Peasants were unable to pay, ryots fled the countryside, and villages became deserted in many regions. Optimistic officials had imagined that the new systems would transform the peasants into rich enterprising farmers. But this did not happen.
Crops for Europe – The British also realised that the countryside could not only yield revenue, it could also grow the crops that Europe required. By the late eighteenth century, the Company was trying its best to expand the cultivation of opium and indigo. In the century and a half that followed, the British persuaded or forced cultivators in various parts of India to produce other crops: jute in Bengal, tea in Assam, sugarcane in the United Provinces (now Uttar Pradesh), wheat in Punjab, cotton in Maharashtra and Punjab, rice in Madras.
Why the demand for Indian indigo – The indigo plant grows primarily in the tropics. By the thirteenth century, Indian indigo was being used by cloth manufacturers in Italy, France and Britain to dye cloth.
Britain turns to India – aced with the rising demand for indigo in Europe, the Company in India looked for ways to expand the area under indigo cultivation From the last decades of the eighteenth century, indigo cultivation in Bengal expanded rapidly and Bengal indigo came to dominate the world market. In 1788, only about 30 per cent of the indigo imported into Britain was from India. By 1810, the proportion had gone up to 95 per cent.
How was indigo cultivated – There were two main systems of indigo cultivation – nij and ryoti. Within the system of nij cultivation, the planter produced indigo in lands that he directly controlled. He either bought the land or rented it from other zamindars and produced indigo by directly employing hired labourers.
The problem with nij cultivation – The planters found it difficult to expand the area under nij cultivation. Indigo could be cultivated only on fertile lands, and these were all already densely populated. Only small plots scattered over the landscape could be acquired. Planters needed large areas in compact blocks to cultivate indigo in plantations. Where could they get such land from? They attempted to lease in the land around the indigo factory, and evict the peasants from the area. But this always led to conflicts and tension.
Indigo on the land of ryots – Under the ryoti system, the planters forced the ryots to sign a contract, an agreement (satta). At times they pressurised the village headmen to sign the contract on behalf of the ryots. Those who signed the contract got cash advances from the planters at low rates of interest to produce indigo. But the loan committed the ryot to cultivating indigo on at least 25 per cent of the area under his holding. The planter provided the seed and the drill, while the cultivators prepared the soil, sowed the seed and looked after the crop.
The “Blue Rebellion” and After – In March 1859, thousands of ryots in Bengal refused to grow indigo. As the rebellion spread, ryots refused to pay rents to the planters, and attacked indigo factories armed with swords and spears, bows and arrows. Women turned up to fight with pots, pans and kitchen implements. Those who worked for the planters were socially boycotted, and the gomasthas – agents of planters who came to collect rent were beaten up. Ryots swore they would no longer take advances to sow indigo nor be bullied by the planters’ lathiyals – the lathi-wielding strongmen maintained by the planters.
Countryside – Rural areas.
Permanent Settlement – Under this settlement it was decided that the rates of revenues once fixed would not be changed.
Mahal – In British revenue records Mahal is a revenue estate which may be a village or a group of villages.
Mahalwari Settlement – Under this system, the rates of revenues were to be revised periodically, not permanently fixed.
Ryobi – Cultivator.
Indigo – A plant that produces a rich blue colour.
Plantations – A large farm operated by a planter employing various forms of forced labour. Plantations are associated with the production of coffee, sugarcane, tobacco, tea and cotton.
Woad – A plant that produces violet and blue dyes.
Slave – A person who is owned by someone else, i.e., the slave owner. A slave enjoys no freedom and is compelled to work for the master.
