3.

Life in the Rural Areas

A. 1. B

2. a

3. C

4. a

5. d

B. 1. True 2. False

3. True 4. False

C. 1. Before the advent of the British, villages were self-sufficient units. Most of the things
needed by the villagers were produced in the village itself. The farmer owned the land and
he could not be evicted. He paid a small part of the produce to the ruler. If crops failed due
to floods or droughts, the ruler reduced the Land revenue or sometimes totally wrote it off.

2. The English East India Company was always in need of money. This was because of the
following reasons. It needed money to

• Purchase goods in India and export them.

• Run the administration.
• Maintain a large army.
• Fund the numerous wars that it fought.

The system of giving the right of revenue collection to the highest bidder failed
because zamindars started bidding for an amount much more than what the land
could actually produce. So they could never pay the amount they bade for to the
Company.

3. Most peasants during the British rule survived on small incomes. Failure of crops, high revenue
demand of the English East India Company and expensive social customs, such as marriages and
festivals, forced the peasants to either sell their land or borrow money from the moneylender.

4. Britain needed indigo to dye cloth. From the early nineteenth century, the Company began to
force peasants in Bengal to grow indigo on their fields. This was because of two reasons.

• The Industrial Revolution had started in England and she needed a regular supply of indigo
to dye the enormous quantities of cloth being produced by the local textile industry.

◆ England imported indigo from West Indies and North America. However, the indigo plantations in
these regions collapsed in the late eighteenth century. So the Company turned to India to meet this
need.
D. 1. The main features of the Permanent Settlement were as follows.

• The revenue to be collected from an area was permanently fixed. It could not be revised later.

◆ The zamindar had to pay the amount fixed within a stipulated time. If he was able to collect more
revenue from the land, he could keep the surplus amount. But if he could not pay the fixed amount,
he would lose his zamindari rights. The land then would be given to another zamindar.

2. The Mahalwari system was introduced in present-day western Uttar Pradesh, parts of Madhya
Pradesh and Punjab. In these areas,land was collectively owned by a group of villages, called
'mahals'. The headman of each 'mahal' was responsible for collecting revenue and paying it to the
Company. There could also be a periodic revision in the revenue demand. The Ryotwari system was
introduced in parts of Madras (now Chennai) and Bombay (now Mumbai) presidencies. Under the
Ryotwari system, the officials of the Company collected the revenue directly from the 'ryot' or
peasant. The farmer was the owner of the land as long as he paid the revenue, which was fixed
according to the fertility of the soil.

3. The land revenue settlements introduced by the Company affected the peasants adversely. Land
became a saleable commodity which could be bought, sold or mortgaged. The high revenue demand
trapped the peasants in a vicious cycle of debt and they found it difficult to come out of it. The
zamindars wanted to extract the maximum from the peasants. Neither they nor the Company did
anything to improve agriculture.

4. The indigo cultivators in Bengal rebelled in the mid-nineteenth century. They had the following
grievances.

◆ They were paid low prices for their produce.

◆ They were not allowed to sow any other crop.

◆ They were mistreated by the planters. Angered by their condition, the indigo cultivators rebelled.

The government set up an Indigo Commission to look into the grievances of the indigo farmers. All
this, however, was an eyewash. The planters shifted base from Bengal to Bihar. Exploitation of the
poor indigo farmers continued. In this sense, the movement was a failure.

5. Excess production of cash crops, such as indigo, exhausted the fertility of the soil. With time, the
production of food grains declined, resulting in an acute shortage of food supply. Thus, a situation
arose where farmers had money with them and yet they could not buy food grains.
6. a. The indigo planters signed contracts with indigo cultivators that they could sow only indigo.
Over time, the price paid to the cultivators reduced significantly. The indigo cultivators suffered
under such an exploitative situation. Resentment on the part of the cultivators was met with brute
force and untold atrocities by the planters.

b. No, by shifting the base of indigo plantation from Bengal to Bihar, the problem of indigo
cultivators could not be solved. Exploitation of indigo cultivators continued unabated. Mahatma
Gandhi fought for the cause of the indigo cultivators in Champaran, Bihar.