Book II, Chapter 7: Land Settlements in Bombay

CHAPTER VII

LAND SETTLEMENTS IN BOMBAY

THE first general Land Settlement of Bombay, commenced in 1836, has been described in an early chapter of this work. It was conducted with considerate judgment by Sir George Wingate; and as it was concluded for thirty years, it gave the cultivators much relief after the frequent and severe assessments of preceding years. But its essential defect was that the assessment was left entirely at the discretion of the Survey Officer; and cultivators were not protected against undue enhancements at future revisions.

Before the expiry of the first thirty years’ settlement, the question of a Permanent Settlement came up for the consideration of the Bombay Government. Colonel Baird Smith’s proposal of 1861 was forwarded by Lord Canning to the Governor of Bombay. The Governor, while rejecting the proposal, accepted the principle of basing the assessment on “a just and moderate proportion of the gross produce.”¹

PROPOSED PERMANENT SETTLEMENT.

“It is a maxim of the Natives of this country that the perfection of financial administration may be measured by the extent to which an equitable land tax is made to contribute to the support of the State, and that the excellency of a Government may be estimated by the absence of direct and indirect taxation.

“2. I have never doubted the truth of this opinion, seeing that the Native feels that, in return for the payment which he makes to the State, he acquires the right to occupy or possess his land, and that in that right he receives an equivalent which to his mind deprives his payment of the essential characteristics of a tax.

“3. This financial system is one of the most ancient institutions of this country, and is founded on the right of the State to a share in the produce of the land; a right which is proved not only by the universality of the practice, but by the fact that exemption from the obligation to pay is regarded as a much cherished privilege, which has either been forcibly acquired in olden times, or has been directly conferred by the State upon the possessor as a reward.

“4. It is frequently the case that the title of the holders or occupants of the land to enjoy the usufruct of the soil has become more or less complete, and their rights of occupancy more or less permanent, according to usage and a variety of circumstances. But exemption from payment of a share of the produce is nowhere the rule, but the exception; and I consider it would be generally impolitic, by fixing permanently at their present money value the demand of the State on the land, to transgress a principle of finance so sound and correct as the one I have adverted to, because it is the tendency of prices and wages to increase, consequently the expenses of administration must increase. If, therefore, the income of Government from the land be stationary, or nearly so, which, by fixing the assessment permanently, must be the case, recourse must be had to increased taxation, both direct and indirect.

“5. It will be perceived that in these observations I advert only to the fixity of settlement in respect to the money demand, and I desire it to be understood that I do not advocate any variation in the just and moderate proportion of the gross produce on which the present assessments are based. But, as the prices of produce are yearly increasing, I see no infringement of the original conditions of the settlement, nor will it be so felt by the ryot, if, on the expiration of this experimental settlement, the Government Land Tax should be readjusted according to those increased prices and to other circumstances, provided that no revision is made within such long period of time, or otherwise than on considerations of the most sound character, and upon well-established facts.

“6. This a thirty years’ settlement, such as has been introduced into a considerable portion of this Presidency, and is in progress throughout the rest of it, fulfils. The moderation with which the assessment has been fixed, has given the right of occupancy a high marketable value; and, under the settlement in some districts, the prosperity of the people has increased in a marked degree. But I do not concur with the late Colonel Baird Smith, that to intensify these results, which are similar to those described by him as having taken place under the settlement of the North-West Provinces, we should here have recourse to a Permanent Settlement of the Land Tax; and it appears to me that more is due to those other elements of our settlements which he enumerates, viz., ‘security of titles, moderation of assessment,’ and, above all, ’the recognition and careful record of rights,’ than to the mere ‘protracted fixity of the public demand.’

“7. For in this Presidency it had long been sought to perfect a Ryotwari system by acknowledging no others than the Government and the poor peasant, and imposing on the latter all the burdens that he could stagger under in support of the former. That system naturally proved detrimental to the lands and all their inhabitants, excepting here and there the usurer. The result was that which must infallibly ensue under any Government which itself lives from hand to mouth, keeps no surplus money for advances, and maintains no stores for use, when in hard times seed corn is needed. Constant remissions, and still further decline of villages, became the ordinary characteristics of provinces which had already undergone the harassing and depopulating effects of more than two centuries of wars and plunder. The authorities at length resolved on retrieving a position for agriculture. It would have been better, in my opinion, to have recognised some dormant tenures, and to have resuscitated others. But habit and the example set by predecessors, whose wars, recklessness, and oppressions had, generally speaking, exterminated the more respectable classes of landholders, served to keep out of view this best element of the success which depends on the possession of capital or of good credit. So they did the next best thing with a people who are not generally Mahomedan spendthrifts, but industrious Hindus. After a survey, they imposed a very moderate assessment. This is now in operation, and is to endure for a period of thirty years. It is obvious that this being the first attempt on this side of India, within the limits of British dominions, to apply to cultivation a method of extending and improving it, and to population an encouragement to immigrate and increase, it would be an utter disregard of the rights of the Government in Land Tax if the present settlement were to be viewed as the limit of our demand. All that is here wanted, short of the reconstruction of such classes as Zemindars and Meerasdars, with their worth and influence, is to allow such a duration of settlement (and thirty years is not amiss for the purpose) as will combine the objects of increasing at future periods the moderate and just demands of the Government, while reconciling the Ryot, for his own sake, to devote his industry and the utmost of his small means to the improvement of his long holding.

“8. It is, in my opinion, another good reason for not settling our Land Tax permanently, that there can be no doubt in any unprejudiced mind that the lands are not yet held, generally speaking, as they might without difficulty be declared to be held, on a title still more highly esteemed and cherished. However well satisfied the Ryot may be with the security of his right of his occupancy under the Revenue Survey Settlement, the term Meeras conveys to his mind a sense of ownership, which no assurance, that so long as he pays the Government revenue he will not be disturbed in the possession of his fields, can give him. This was recently illustrated to me in a forcible manner by an intelligent Patell, who, in answer to a question put to him, with a view of eliciting the estimation in which he relatively held his ‘Meeras’ and ‘Ghatkoolee land,’ replied: ‘The Meeras is mine; the Ghatkoolee is yours.’ And, again, as was emphatically said in my hearing, on another occasion, by a Native District Deputy Collector, and at the same time by an experienced Mamlutdar, ’they hold affectionately to meeras’—(meeras ko bohut dil lugta).

‘9. With reference also to the possibility of having hereafter permanently to impose new taxes, I object to the proposal for abandoning the right of Government to the improved value which increased prices should give to the right of the State to a share of the produce of the fertile soil worked at small cost in money and labour—a right which has been reserved to it from ancient times, and which has, until recently, enabled it practically to exempt the people of this country from the burdens of taxation which press so heavily on the communities of Europe.

‘10. I shall lament to see a departure from this wise system, nor do I see the necessity of the proposed measure, for the agricultural classes are, on all hands, admitted to be improving, and to be becoming gradually possessed of some capital; and those works of irrigation, which must mainly be the mainstay to protect them in seasons of drought, can only be undertaken on an organised system, which no present Permanent Settlement would ensure being ever executed, but which it is the duty of the Government to undertake whenever it has available resources.

‘11. No legislative enactments have been found necessary in this Presidency to give effect to the thirty years’ settlement now in operation, and none appears to be necessary.”

THE REVISED SETTLEMENT.

It will be seen from paragraph 5 of this Minute that the Government of Bombay was opposed to “the fixity of settlement in respect to the money demand,” but did not advocate “any variation in the just and moderate proportion of the gross produce on which the present assessments are based.” In principle, therefore, the Bombay Government was opposed to a Permanent Settlement of the land revenue reckoned in money, but was inclined in favour of a Permanent Settlement of the revenue reckoned in produce. As the prices of produce were then increasing, the Government looked forward to a proportionate increase in the land revenue at the next settlement.

It would have been a gain to the cultivators of Bombay if this principle, of an increase in the land revenue in proportion to the increase of prices, had been acted upon, when the time for the next settlement arrived four years later. But in vast operations, carried on by single officers, such principles are apt to be forgotten unless they are laid down by legislation and guarded by independent tribunals. The idea spreads among the under-paid and uneducated subordinates that the Government desires as high a revenue as can be screwed out of the cultivators; a temporary season of prosperity induces the superior officers to demand a large increase in revenue; and an undue enhancement is inevitable when the new rates are fixed without consulting the cultivators, and without appeals to Land Courts.

And this is what happened in course of the Revision Settlement commenced in 1866. The Civil War in America had interfered with the import of American cotton into Lancashire, and had largely stimulated cotton cultivation in Bombay. There was a sign of temporary prosperity which officials mistook as permanent. And the officers employed in survey and settlement effected a high and unreasonable increase in the Land Revenue demand.

The distinguished Indian patriot, Mr. Dadabhai Naoroji, gave timely warning in his evidence before a Committee of the House of Commons in 1873. He said that the signs of prosperity were hollow and ephemeral, and that the enormous increase in the land revenue was oppressive and unjustifiable. Complaints against the new assessment were also universal in the Deccan; but the warning was unheeded.

AGRARIAN DISTURBANCE.

The Nemesis came at last. After the conclusion of the Civil War, America once more began to export her cotton to England; cotton cultivation declined in India; prices and wages fell. Cultivators in the Deccan were unable to pay the new and enhanced revenue demanded; money-lenders refused to lend when the credit of cultivators was low, and the law in favour of creditors was restricted. Agrarian disturbances, such as have seldom been known under the British Rule, followed in 1875. Rioting was committed; shops and houses were burnt down; stocks were destroyed. A Commission was then appointed to inquire into the matter, and a civilian of Northern India sat with two civilians of Bombay to inquire into the causes of the disturbance. It is no discredit to the Bombay civilians to state that the ablest and the most independent report submitted was the Memorandum compiled by the Northern civilian, Auckland Colvin, afterwards Sir Auckland Colvin, Lieutenant-Governor of Northern India, and Finance Minister of India.

AUCKLAND COLVIN’S VIEWS.

Auckland Colvin pointed out in his Memorandum² the extent to which the revenue had been enhanced in the settlements recently concluded.

“The result would seem to be that, in the villages of the above five Talukas, of which the printed reports are before me, the increase in thirty years was as follows:—

“The real increase is considerably greater, because the collections of the first decade were considerably in excess of the collections of the first year of the old survey. Finally a statement furnished by Colonel Francis shows the percentage of increase between the assessment in the last year of the old Settlement and the first year of the new—a single year—to be as follows:—

“The highest percentage of increase in any district in the North-West Provinces between the first year of the old and the new Settlement (a period of thirty years) has hitherto been thirty-six; and this is in the exceptional, because recently reclaimed districts of Gorakhpur and Basti; the average for the Province is 16 per cent.”

“I think the above considerations justify me in placing the excessive enhancement of the revised settlements as third among the special causes which have combined to disturb the relations of debtor and creditor in the Poona district.”

The vast difference between the enhancements made in Northern India and those made in Bombay, as pointed out by Auckland Colvin, tells its own tale. But Colvin also described in some detail the defects of the Bombay system, and the inadequate checks imposed by the rules.

“Finally, as bearing on the relation of the enhanced assessments to the economic condition of the people, I venture to think that the Bombay administrative procedure, if I understand it rightly, is apt to press hardly on the Ryot. I should not have felt justified in advancing this opinion if I did not find myself supported by a recent expression of opinion by His Excellency the Governor in Council, which I will presently quote. The assessment seems to me to be based too purely on arithmetical data, and to be applied with too little regard to the conditions of the agricultural body who are expected to pay it. Now that the tenures have been defined and recorded, the Survey Department naturally looks to enhanced revenues as its raison d’être.”

“The officers again to whom the assessment is confided have nothing, and never at any time can have anything, to do with the administration of the Collectorates; the officers to whom the charge of Collectorates is confided have not, and never have had anything to do with survey or assessment. Hence we find the spectacle of Collectors, and Revenue Commissioners contending against the rates imposed by the Survey Department.”

“The Bombay Government, by laying down a maxim of enhancement, has recently tried to meet this anomaly, but has cut rather than solved the difficulty. So large an increase as 100 per cent on an individual holding, or of 66 per cent on a village, is still allowed without special sanction of Government.”

Views of the People.

It is necessary to make one more extract from a remarkably able document drawn up by the Poona Sarvajanika Sabha,—one of the best informed and most important Political Associations in India. The Poona Riots Commission quotes from Chapter 3 of the report of the Sabha, and the following passage shows how the Bombay assessments violated the very principles of land assessment laid down by the Court of Directors in 1856, and by the Secretary of State for India in 1864.

“The assessment should consist of a portion of the net profits of land, after deducting the expenses of cultivation, including the wages of the cultivator and his family, and the charges for the purchase and renewal of agricultural stock. It has been shown before that the present assessment of the Government, and the charge of the Khote profits in Konkan Districts absorb from one-half to one-third of the gross produce, which by all accounts means that the Government assessment is a rack-rent in the worst sense of the term. In the Desh districts also it has been shown that the Ryot is enabled to continue the cultivation of land from year to year, not because he receives any fraction of the proprietor’s rent, or true farmer’s profits, but chiefly, if not solely, because he earns the wages of himself and family in its cultivation. In fact there is no surplus produce left, after paying the cost of cultivation (including his wages and the charge for the renewal of agricultural stock) and the assessment of Government.”

ACTION OF THE GOVERNMENT.

These clear and convincing facts and arguments were urged in vain. They led to no substantial change in the method and procedure of settlements. They led to no remedial measures affording security to cultivators against undue enhancements. They led to no rules for the strict enforcement of the principles of the Land Tax laid down by the Court of Directors and the Secretary of State. The Government declined to frame such rules for its own servants as had been framed to restrict the powers of private landlords in Bengal. The Government sought to relieve the cultivators of the Deccan only by restraining money-lenders. That was the object of the Deccan Agriculturist’s Relief Act of 1879.

The Act enabled Courts to go behind the letter of the bond in the case of small debtors, to lay down what amount they should pay, and to grant them a discharge for the balance. To debtors owing larger sums it gave the full protection of an Insolvency Act. The Act further provided that agriculturists should not be arrested or imprisoned in execution of a decree for money; that their immovable property should not be attached or sold in execution of a decree unless it had been specifically mortgaged; and that even in such cases the Court might direct the lands to be cultivated by the debtor for a number of years on behalf of the creditor, after which the debt was discharged.

So far as the Survey and Settlement Officers were concerned, their powers were made even more absolute than before. In 1873 an appeal in an assessment suit was preferred in the High Court of Bombay, and the High Court decided the suit against the Settlement Officer. Immediately after, a bill was introduced in the Bombay Council to exclude the jurisdiction of the High Court and of all Civil Courts in matters relating to land assessments. The member in charge of the bill did not disguise its object, but explained it in these memorable words: “It is not expedient that the general policy of Government in relation to the Land Revenue should be questioned, or that the details of revenue assessments should be questioned, by Civil Courts.” The Bombay revenue Jurisdiction Act was accordingly passed in 1876, excluding the jurisdiction of Civil Courts in matters of assessment. The private citizen in India is permitted by the British Government, and by British Laws, to seek redress against the Government itself in impartial Courts of Justice. But the millions of the peasant proprietors of Bombay and of Madras, subject to an enhancement of the State-demand at each Revision Settlement, are debarred from seeking justice in Courts, or before any independent tribunal, against the blunders or the undue severity of the assessing officer.

Three years after the passing of this Act, the Bombay Land Revenue system was comprehensively treated and legalised in the Revenue Code of 1879. It was an excellent Code, and it clearly affirmed the cultivator’s rights of inheritance and transfer in respect of their holdings. But the Code gave no protection against undue enhancements, and no security against excessive assessments in violation of the principles laid down in 1856 and 1864.

SUMMARY OF LAND REFORMS IN INDIA.

We have in these five chapters briefly described the land administration of the different provinces of India during the first eighteen years of the Crown Administration. A great many real reforms were effected. Protection was given to the cultivators of Bengal, Oudh, and the Punjab, against unjust enhancement of rent by private landlords. The system of settlements in Northern India was improved, and assessments were made on the tangible basis of the rental of villages. Relief was given to Madras cultivators by the introduction of the thirty years’ settlement rule. Help was given to Bombay cultivators by the Agricultural Relief Act and by the Revenue Code, both passed in 1879. And in the Central Provinces, the recognition of proprietary rights in Malguzars, and the long term settlement begun in 1863, were a boon to the harassed population.

The cardinal defects from which agriculture still suffered may be summed up in a few words.

(1) Enhancements were not limited by definite and specific rules at Revision Settlements.

(2) Assessments were not made according to the Half Rental Rule, but often absorbed the whole rental in Madras and Bombay.

(3) No independent tribunals watched the enforcement of rules.

(4) Special cesses on land, in addition to the Land Revenue, violated the Half Rental Rule.