ON 15 December 2001, the landless peasants of three villages of Someshwar Valley in Almora district of Uttaranchal – Padaulia, Pokhri and Brahmpokhri – seized 80 acres (1,600 Nali) of land at the call of CPI(ML) and distributed it among themselves. On 17 and 18 December, landless peasants belonging to Naughar and Badyuda villages of the same valley organised and seized 20 acres (400 Nali) of land and distributed it themselves. These lands belonged to the category of benap land, which is called panchayati land elsewhere in the country. The government had brought this land under the control of forest department. In the history of the hill region of Uttarakhand, this was the first ever organised action of land seizure by the rural poor – the landless peasants. It was precisely for this reason that this incident became a matter of widespread discussion within the media, political circles and among the rural poor. Before this, Party had organised a convention of landless peasants at Someshwar on 27 February 2000, in which there was a good mobilisation of the landless labourers of the valley. But thereafter the process could not be carried forward. This incident of land seizure has brought forward the question of land as a political agenda of landless proletariat in Uttarakhand, the land of historic mass movements. As a consequence, the Congress was compelled to include, in its election manifesto, a promise to take out 20% of the area under afforestation for distribution among the landless peasants.
Prior to independence, there have been three great mass movements in the hill region of Uttarakhand. The first one was in 1911 opposing the British government’s decision to enlarge the area under the forest department, which would deny the hill people their right over the forests. The second one was against the coolie-corvee system in Kumoun and the third, the Praja Mandal movement against the King of Tehri. All the three movements witnessed militant mobilisation of a broad section of the peasantry. Whereas the first movement was targeted against British colonialism for the right over the land and forests, the latter two had an anti-feudal content. However, strangely though, there is no record of any anti-feudal or other class struggle of the peasantry in the hill region of Uttarakhand after independence.
If we cast a glance over agriculture, the main prop of the hill economy, we find that at the time of first land settlement conducted by the British in 1823, only 20% of the total land was under cultivation. During the next 179 years, whereas the land under cultivation has been increased considerably in all other parts of the country, in the hills of Uttarakhand it has been reduced to a mere 8% of the total land. This means that the area under cultivation here has been reduced by 60%! Today around 91% of the total land of the hills has been taken under forestry. Right from the British rulers, all successive governments of independent India have followed the policy of evicting the hill peasantry from their ancestral lands. As a consequence, as much as 90% of the rural population in the hills has been pushed to landlessness. One-fourth of the hill-inhabitants do not even have the land to construct their houses or cowsheds. Among them the dalits are in the most wretched condition.
Around forty years back, the state made large-scale encroachment over peasants’ land in the hill region. Agriculture and animal husbandry were the main sources of livelihood those days. As people had lost their traditional grazing and fodder procurement rights over those lands, out of the land that was left in their possession they earmarked a part for cattle grazing and growing fodder. When the latest land settlement took place here between 1958-65, only the land under cultivation was allotted in the name of the peasants while the land kept for the purpose of cattle grazing and fodder was termed as benap land and taken over by the government in a conspiracy against the hill peasantry. Thus the majority of peasants were evicted from a large part of their own land. However the land belonging to Malgujars and Chobdars, who used to collect rent, first for the princes and later for the British government, was left untouched. Not only did they retain all their land, they even managed to get some fertile fodder benap lands belonging to other peasants entered in their own names. Thereafter, the local evil gentry and some powerful persons grabbed a part of this benap land that was officially under state occupation. It goes without saying that dalits and poor peasants got nothing.
This latest land settlement converted dalits wholly into a class of landless. The main occupation of dalits in the hill region was rural artisanship, and they also tilled the lands belonging to the upper caste. For all this service they used to get grain at the harvest time. Hence they had very little use for land for the sake of self-cultivation. But they did need the land for cattle grazing and growing fodder. And it was this land that was termed benap and taken over by the state. With modern advancement in the rural life and with the government taking no interest in promoting traditional artisanship, the traditional occupation of dalits is endangered. Thus the dalits in the hills have no means of livelihood left.
Following Independence, when the Uttar Pradesh Zamindari Abolition (UPZA) Act was implemented, the right of enforcing ceiling as well as the management and distribution of barren and fallow land was allocated to Gram Panchayats throughout the state. But, within the same state, a different zamindari abolition act was enforced in the hills of Uttarakhand, in order to snatch away this right from the gram panchayats here. This act is called Kumoun Uttarakhand Zamindari Abolition (KUZA) Act. In Uttarakhand, the KUZA Act is in force since 1960. In this act, clauses 117 to 128 of UPZA Act have been removed, which conferred the right of managing and distributing land to the gram panchayats. It is strange that no political party or organisation, even the communist parties in Uttarakhand ever questioned this discrimination.
The hills of Uttarakhand have been witness to the immigration of people from all corners of the country, but migration away from hills in large numbers in search of jobs began only when the local people were alienated from their land and forests. The latest land settlement (1958-65) and the consequent alienation from the source of livelihood fuelled this migration. To check this, the state had the option of transforming the old production relations and introducing commercialisation in agriculture. For this it was necessary to consolidate the scattered landholdings of the hills. But the state shirked from this responsibility, it only used the hills as a reserve of cheap labour, raw materials and of jawans for the Army.
70 years back, the hill society was almost self-dependent, relying on outside support only for salt, clothing and metals. Even these things were imported through commodity exchange. But that economy could not get modernised and now its back has been broken. The policies introduced by the Centre and State governments have always been detrimental to this traditional self-dependent economy. And today, when this hill region has been granted full statehood, the Uttarakhand government continues to implement the same disastrous policies.
Today, when the new economic policies of liberalisation have caused reduction in employment, in the industrial sector and the government service sector, throughout the country, the new generation of the hills has been increasingly deprived of employment even outside the state. Rather, a section of those who had earlier migrated are returning to the hills. This situation has further increased the burden on the already crippled agriculture of the hills, and now even the problem of bare subsistence has become acute. Without extension of the area under cultivation, without compulsory consolidation of land and introduction of a new land reform act, replacing the KUZA Act, no development or employment for the rural poor can be ensured. All the promises made by parties like the BJP, the Congress and the UKD are false since they failed to address to these major problems.
This is the historic background which has given rise to the land seizure movement in Someshwar valley under the leadership of the CPI(ML). Looking at the vigorous debate that has started in its wake in political and media circles, one can make out that the rural proletariat in the hills is getting prepared with its own political agenda.
– Purushottam Sharma