RD 2023 October 3

REVOLUTIONARY DEMOCRACY
Volume II, No. 2 (New Series) October, 2023
CONTENTS
Manipur Crises – Towards a Just and Peaceful Solution...... 3

Violence in Nuh Follows the Sustained Pattern of Anti
Muslim Pogroms in India, Karan Varma......................... 7
Exploding the Claim of Inclusive Development, A Critical
Review of the Indian Finance Minister’s Budget
(2023-24) Speech, K.B. Saxena, ..................................... 11
India: Broken Legacies of the Land and Forest Rights
Movement, Ashok Chowdhury, Teesta Setalvad.............. 36
The BRICS Meeting and the Inter-imperialist Struggles,
En Marcha........................................................................ 66
An Interview of Qemal Cicollari, General Secretary of the
Communist Party of Albania, Thales Caramante............ 68
Asiatic Mode of Production in South Asia: An Empirical
Study, Tripta Wahi........................................................... 88
About the Indian Comedian, D. Zaslavsky,
(Pravda, January 7th, 1946).............................................. 138
Record of the Meeting Between the Chairman of the
Council of Ministers of the USSR, I.V. Stalin, and
Members of the delegation of the Labour Party of
Great Britain, (7 August 1946)........................................ 140
Preparation of the Draft Third Programme of the
CPSU(b), 1947, Vijay Singh........................................... 148
Materials for the Draft Programme of the All-Union
Communist Party of Bolsheviks with Notes by
J. V. Stalin, 1947.............................................................. 154
Suggestions and Criticisms on the Draft Programme and
Policy Statement of the CPI, 1951................................... 184
On the Situation in and Functioning of the Communist
Party of India after the Publication of the Draft of the
Party Programme, 1951, CPSU (b.)................................. 208
Illustrations:
Front and Back Cover: Nuh Violence.
Inside back Cover: Banned poster Shama-e-Azadi ke Teen Parvane,
exhibited by Hindi Department , Hyderabad University in
international conference on 7th to 9th August 2023.
Inside Back Cover: Ernst Thaelman.
Editorial Board
Tahir Asghar, Ashim Roy, Vijay Singh, C.N. Subramaniam.
Editorial Address
K-67, First Floor, Jangpura Extension,
New Delhi-110014.
Web-site
www.revolutionarydemocracy.org
E-mail addresses
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editor_revdem@yahoo.com
Views expressed in signed articles are those of authors and

not necessarily of the Editorial Board.
Published Half-Yearly for Revolutionary Democracy by Vijay Singh from K-67, FF,
Jangpura Extension, New Delhi-110014, and printed by him at Progressive Printers,
A-21, Jhilmil Industrial Area, G.T. Road , Delhi-95.Editor: Vijay Singh.
MANIPUR CRISES – TOWARDS A JUST AND
PEACEFUL SOLUTION
1. Labouring people all over the country need to be aware of the de-
velopments in Manipur state and its long term implications for the move-
ments of the working people. As was to be expected the ruling classes
led by the BJP are fomenting fratricidal warfare in which they actively
support or constitute the leadership of both sides. The result is a process
of fascist inspired ethnic cleansing accompanied by arson, rape, killing
of ordinary working men and women, by infuriated mobs led by armed
‘militants’. This is a part of the pattern of neo liberal economic and po-
litical policies which incite anarchic identity based politics in place of
organised national or class interest based struggles.
2. The genuine problems faced by the people of Manipur, both the
majority Meiteis and the minority tribal people like the Kukis or Nagas
need to be understood historically. The majority community faces severe
problems arising from being confined to a geographically very limited
space; the lopsided concentration of ‘development’ i.e. of services (not
employment opportunities) in the valley resulting in the in-migration of
tribal people from the hills and beyond the national borders; legal restric-
tions on acquisition of tribal land in the hills by the non-tribal communi-
ties; sustained spread of drug addiction, based on opium produced in the
hills but peddled by drug mafia of all communities and so on. The result
is severe restriction of opportunities for mobility, employment, and a
perceived threat to the language, culture and traditions of the majority
community, and concern over the degeneration of unemployed and drug
addicted youth. The already stressed land situation has been aggravated
by the acquisition of land by the state for the so called ‘development
projects’ leading to eviction of people engaged in traditional land use.
3. The Kukis and other tribal people inhabiting the hilly regions face
an apparently different set of problems but which are in actual fact gener-
ated by the same processes of lopsided ‘development’ which seeks to im-
pose a regime of ‘zero employment development’ while simultaneously
depriving the people of their traditional livelihoods and reducing them
to the status of ‘informal’ workers in the so called ‘unorganised sectors’.
Volume II, No. 2 (New Series) October, 2023. 3

Indian Kukis are a part of a larger tribal ethnic group inhabiting the bor-
der regions between India, Myanmar and other neighbouring countries
and historically there has been a movement of population across the
porous borders. Declaring some of them as ‘foreigners’ or ‘infiltrators’
and subjecting them to harassment and criminalisation has been a long
standing problem not just of the Kukis but also of a large number of such
people who live astride international borders. Living in hilly areas with
difficult access, they have been deprived of modern services like tertiary
education, advanced medical facilities, roads, electricity and other civic
amenities. As noted above most of these have been concentrated in the
plains, which effectively means that those who want to avail of them
have to move to there. Since there has been no planned development of
sustainable productive potential of the hills, the hills people have been
left to their own resources to augment their incomes. In a large number
of cases this has taken the form of deforestation, poppy cultivation for
drug lords, trans-border arms smuggling to feed militant outfits, with
the connivance of armed forces on both sides. The Kukis are mostly
Christian and they have accessed English education and also the public
employment made possible by reservation for tribal people. This may
have had symbolic value but given the very limited public employment,
this does not mean much in real terms. In recent years the Indian state
and the state government have constantly been encroaching upon tribal
lands on one pretext or the other. The latest set of provocation has been
in the form of declaring large tracts of hill lands as reserve forests and
national parks and bringing them under the control of the state. Similarly
the action of the state to ‘identify’ foreign settlers and oust them. Another
provocation has been in the form of declaring parts of the tribal lands as
being sacred to the Meiteis and claiming control over them.
4. The Meiteis look upon the hill regions as potential areas for their
expansion and residence and seek removal of legal constraints to their
acquisition of land there and also access to privileged employment and
education which the legal ‘tribal’ status will give them. Understand-
ably this has alarmed the Kukis and other tribal people who stand to
lose both their land and also public employment. Further the assump-
tion of control of forest lands by the state which is seen to be controlled
by the Meiteis is also a source of anxiety. On the other hand the Meiteis
feel a sense of alienation and frustration within their own state, and
look at the Kukis as potential threat to their culture and religion and
also a conduit for illegal immigration of ‘foreigners’ and drug and arms
4 Revolutionary Democracy
peddlers. These perceptions have been fanned on both sides to create
fear psychosis and mutual distrust and animosity.
5. The BJP came to power in the state by independent negotiations
with the Meitei and Kuki leadership playing upon their anxieties and
demands and promising both of them support in their fight with the other.
The armed forces like the Assam Rifles and the Manipur Police have also
been playing partisan role overtly supporting one against the other.
6. Ours is not to enter the blame game of who started it all or which
party has suffered more or which side has been more brutal or violent.
Suffice it to say that the state institutions including courts of law have
played an active role in fomenting the crises and pushing people into this
fratricidal confrontation.
7. Labouring people need to approach such situations keeping in
mind three basic principles:
i. Right to Self-determination of peoples: We need to recognise that
the state of Manipur which inherited the history of the kingdom of Ma-
nipur is a composite state which brought together diverse people with
some guarantees to the hill-tribal people. Violation of those guarantees
will only help to break the political compact and lead to fragmentation.
When one community forces others to forgo their guarantees, the other
community can seek to go on its own. Such guarantees which become
historically obsolete may be eased out through mutually respectful dia-
logue.
ii. Planned development of productive forces and employment which
enable people to improve their economic and cultural life in an equitable
and sustainable manner.
iii. Spirit of internationalism and fraternity of labouring people and
abjuring violence in settling mutual differences.
8. Labouring people also need to keep in mind a historical truth that
regions and societies which take the path of rapid development and eco-
nomic transformation, especially the path of capitalist development need
to be prepared for in-migration of people with capital, skills, knowhow
and distressed people who come to sell cheap labour for basic livelihood
needs. Historically societies and regions that have undergone such trans-
formation have sites of intermingling of diverse peoples and cultures and
they cannot have both ‘development’ and ethnic purity. This historically
inevitable process would certainly give rise to tensions but need to be
resolved with insight and compassion.

9. Whenever labouring people are made target each other, it is im-
perative that class conscious leadership should identify the class inter-
ests that it serves and persuade the mass of the people from desisting
from violence against fellow working people and instead turn their wrath
against those who seek to divide and exploit them.
10. It is important for all democratic organisations, trade unions and
democratic cultural organisations to send peace keepers to such trouble
torn areas and conduct democratic political propaganda and also actively
prevent violence against common people.
15th July 2023

Revolutionary Democracy.
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VIOLENCE IN NUH FOLLOWS THE
SUSTAINED PATTERN OF ANTI MUSLIM
POGROMS IN INDIA
Karan Varma
The recent Nuh violence is a new addition in the long chain of anti Mus-
lim pogroms in India under the BJP government. The frequency in which
such incidents are happening and in areas which had no history of com-
munal tension is extremely alarming. A month before Nuh, in June, a
small town in the hilly state of Uttarakhand called Purola was witness
to a large-scale anti Muslim mobilization followed by violent attacks on
Muslim residents and shopkeepers.
Both Nuh and Purola violence have a similar pattern of sustained,
long term provocative mobilization (in the forms of organizing religious
processions or yatras, social media posts and others) by the Hindu mil-
itant groups followed by the attacks and calls of social and financial
boycott of the Muslims. The administration’s responses always, without
exceptions, remain that of punishing the victims by registering false cas-
es against them and bulldozing their houses and businesses instead of
taking to task the perpetrators.
On 31st July 2023 an annual religious procession was carried out
by the Bajrang Dal and Vishwa Hindu Parishad, two militant armed
wings of the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh, a semi fascist organization
which believes in supremacy of the Hindus over non Hindu citizens of
India. The Bharatiya Janta Party, which rules India and has governments
in several states currently, is its political wing.
The Brij Mandal Jalabhishek Yatra (procession) has a recent origin.
According to media reports, the Bajrang Dal and the VHP started the
yatra in 2021. In the yatra the members of these wings march bearing
firearms and swords and shouting anti Muslim slogans through Muslim
areas, such as Mewat, of the city. Every year the marchers sloganeer
against Muslims and insult them, in an attempt to provoke violence. Al-
though the Muslims of the city, just like the Muslims all over India, often
ignore such attempts of provocations, however this year a cow vigilante
Monu Manesar, who is wanted for the murder of two Muslim men, in

a video posted in his Facebook page announced that he was going to
join the yatra despite being a wanted man. He also urged Hindus to par-
ticipate in the yatra. Likewise another cow vigilante Bittu Bajrangi too
announced his joining.
This buildup was followed by the VHP general secretary Surendra
Jain Nalhar’s visit to Mahadev Mandir in Mewat and delivering an in-
cendiary speech against Muslims. According to the media reports, Jain
there declared, “we have to change the character of Mewat for Mewat
is not the land of cow killers, Hindu killers, ISI agents, Rohingya and
Bangladeshi infiltrators, or those who convert Hindus.”
These steady provocations led to skirmish between the marching
people and the Muslims of the city. In retaliation to the sloganeering and
threat of violence by the members of the Hindu outfits, a small section
of the city’s Muslim youth threw stones on the members of the Bajrang
Dal and the VHP. While there are no reports of anyone on the side of the
marchers getting hurt, the organizers of the march and their supporters
dug out excuses to enact the pre planned riots. Soon the violence also
spread in adjoining areas and beyond.
In the aftermath of the incident the members of the VHP and Ba-
jrang Dal, attacked the Muslims of the nearby cities such as Gurgaon,
Sohna, Palwal, Bahadurgarh, and Faridabad. The attackers also burnt
down a mosque in Gurgaon. Later on, the administration also shut down
the internet, effectively stopping the dissemination of news from the area
while simultaneously letting the Right wing media houses to run anti
Muslim propaganda. So far six people, including two policemen and a
22 year old Muslim cleric, have died in the violence while the situation
is still tense. And like in Purola, several Muslims have left their cities
following the open call for their boycott by the Hindu militant organi-
zations.
The violence in Nuh is also seen in the light of the upcoming legis-
lative elections in Rajasthan which is ruled by the Congress party. Being
the largest state in terms of area, the BJP wants to win it back.
While the police and the state administration have chosen to over-
look the role of the Hindu organizations in the Nuh violence, even though
there is no dearth of evidence suggesting their culpability, nevertheless
they have come down heavily on the Muslim population. According
to several media reports, more than 150 have been arrested for rioting,
mostly Muslims. The state administration has also razed to ground more
than 300 Muslim houses and businesses in Nuh. The destruction of the
Muslim houses and businesses has become a frequent pattern of how the
governments run by the BJP deal with incidents of violence. In states
ruled by the BJP such as Madhya Pradesh, Gujarat, Uttar Pradesh and
now Haryana, bulldozing of Muslim houses and shops is always the gov-
ernments’ response after every incident of communal violence. It has
become so brazen that even the courts, which have more often than not
chosen to remain indifferent, have started to question its constitution-
ality. After the demolition drive in Nuh, the Punjab and Haryana High
Court, under which Nuh falls, has asked the state government if it is “an
exercise of ethnic cleansing is being conducted by the State”. The High
Court further said that though the Muslim-Hindu population ratio in Nuh
is 80:20, the demolition proportion was 70:30.
While the state sanctioned and aided violence against India’s Mus-
lim minority has a long, uninterrupted history, under the decade long
RSS-BJP rule at the centre, it looks like it is reaching its climax. Every
arm of state is being utilized to thoroughly subdue and disfranchise the
Indian Muslims. In recent years, while attacks in form of physical vio-
lence and social boycotts and lynching of the Muslims by Hindu militant
groups have received the government’s tacit support, the government
on the other hand has brought many laws targeted at suppressing them.
In 2019 the BJP government at the centre passed the Citizenship
Amendment Act. The act calls for a nationwide National Register of Cit-
izens. Under this act, while the non Muslims of neighbouring countries
will be given citizenship, the onus of proving nationality has been kept
on Muslims. In a North Eastern state of Assam, many poor Muslims have
been disfranchised on one or another pretext, almost always arbitrarily.
This led to a movement against the act in 2019, one of the longest and
biggest movements in the history of India. Although the movement was
rolled back by its organizers due to Covid 19, nevertheless the govern-
ment arrested many of its leaders later on. Many prominent ones are still
languishing in various jails of India.
Many BJP ruled states now have rules to keep the meat shops
closed during the Hindu festivals. These shops are mainly run by the
Muslims. While big meat corporations are allowed to deliver at home
even during such days.
Likewise, around a dozen states in India now have laws against
so-called Love Jihad. For long the Hindu outfits have sought for banning
marriages between the Hindus and Muslims in the pretext of stopping
religious conversion. While such reported cases have never stood the
scrutiny in the courts, the states have been using the law to harass the
Muslim boys and families.
Along with these, many welfare schemes, such as scholarships for
the Muslim underprivileged students have been stopped. The BJP is also
attempting to bring in other laws which effectively deprive the young
Muslims of education, such as Karnataka’s anti Hijab law which forced
hundreds of Muslim girls to drop out of schools.
While such atrocities, state and state sanctioned, have become a
daily affair now, the silence of the parliamentary parties is deafening.
Fearing that speaking for the Muslims can dent their electoral perfor-
mance; these parties have turned their back on them. The Muslims for
now have no support whatsoever. In such a state what lies in the future
for the Muslims isn’t hard to imagine.
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EXPLODING THE CLAIM OF
INCLUSIVE DEVELOPMENT
A Critical Review
of the Indian Finance Minister’s Budget (2023-24) Speech
K.B. Saxena
Misdiagnosis of Slow Economic Recovery

This year’s budget presentation was awaited with a great deal of ex-
pectations for several reasons. It is the last full budget of the current
government before the general elections due next year and the first after
the two year pandemic decline, an economic slowdown, impending re-
cession and impact of the Russo-Ukrainian war. A great deal of interest
was focused on how the Government proposed to address the debili-
tating effect of these- increasing unemployment, increased poverty lev-
els, loss of income, sharply reduced women’s participation in the labour
force, falling educational attainments, crumbling health infrastructure
and increasing inequalities. To be sure, the slow growth of the economy
was not due to the pandemic, though it was exacerbated by it. It started
in 2016-17 with de-monetisation and continued all the way to 2019-20,
and then there was Covid-19. As a result, the overall economic growth
was 3.7% between 2016-17 and 2021-22, the lowest for any five years in
the last four decades, and the per capita income in real terms in 2020-21
was still below 2018-19 levels. (Himanshu, 2023) The decline of growth
to 4.3% in the second half of FY 2022-23 from 7% in the first advance
estimates, with industrial growth slipping to just 4.3% and high inflation,
extended this trend. (EPW, 2023) The structural reason for the slowdown
continues to be reduced demand both for consumption and investment.
(Himanshu, 2023)The lack of investment is largely linked to sluggish
growth in consumption, especially in rural areas where real wages have
stagnated and purchasing power has shrunk due to lack of income-earn-
ing opportunities. This is corroborated by sustained demand for MGN-
REGS. Contrary to expectations, the impact of the new personal income
tax regime on consumption has not materialised. Per capita private con-
sumption expenditure has gone up to just 5.9% over the last three years.

(EPW, 2023) Even the meagre recovery in the post-pandemic period is
investment led rather than consumptionled. Investment in the absence
of demand would only increase inventory, unused productive capacity,
unused infrastructure and unrecoverable loans. The government assumes
that slow growth is due to lack of sufficient investment and has taken
supply-side measures to give incentive to it by tax concessions, other
performance-linked incentives, easy credit and lower interest rates. This
resulted in the concentration of profits in large firms with a rising share
of capital and falling share of labour in the national economy. 433 firms
out of 4 lakh that filed tax returns reported profits in excess of Rs. 500
cr. In 2020-21, 517 companies accounted for 62.08% of total profits
of the corporate sector and 2075 firms cornered 77.41% of the profits.
This would have continued thereafter. The effective tax rate of these 517
companies was only around 19.14% which is much lower than that of
small-sized companies. This implies that lower tax rates are not a strong
factor for fresh private-sector investment in the manufacturing sector.
(Baxi, 2023) In fact, larger public sector companies (Central as well as
State) had a bigger share of overall investment, closer to 30%. Yet a
broad-based recovery in private-sector investment did not materialise.
Therefore, the expectation that public capital expenditure would draw in
private investment has been belied. In fact, the Gross Fixed Capital for-
mation (GFCT) to GDP in all years of NDA government has been lower
than the ratio of 32.6 in 2013-14. (Issac, 2023)
In these circumstances, the Budget should have targeted the slump in
rural demand to create sufficient purchasing power so as to boost private
consumption and stimulate growth. For this, an increase in social sector
expenditure was necessary. (Patnaik, 2023) But the Budget has precise-
ly done the opposite by shrinking public spending. Aggregate public
spending has fallen from 17.7% of the GDP in 2020-21 to 14.9% in Bud-
get estimates (BE) for 2023-24. This has been done by reducing revenue
spending, which is recurring expenditure, by 4 percentage points in the
last three budgets. This has been exacerbated by reduced exports and
imports by 8.8% and 8.2% respectively, deepening the contraction in the
economy (IE (ed), 2023). Reduced public expenditure has a strong neg-
ative effect on the States and low-income groups. This is evident from
lower public expenditures by States due to reduced transfer of resources
from the centre to the states, which have gone down by 1% of the GDP
over the last three budgets.
Cut Down in Schemes Benefitting the Poor
The sizes of the Central sector and centrally-sponsored schemes have
also been shrunk as have the Finance Commission grants to the States.
The reduced spending in the union budget in respect of subsidies has
come down from 3.6% of GDP in 2020 to 1.3% of GDP in BE of 2023-
24. (EPW, 2023) These subsidy cuts are 31% in food, 22% in fertilis-
er, and 75% in LPG (Liquefied Petroleum gas). In addition, interest
subsidies through 15 other schemes have been reduced cumulatively by
almost Rs. 1000 cr. Similarly, cumulative allocation for 14 other gov-
ernment-subsidy schemes has been reduced to Rs. 812 cr from Rs. 2958
in the revised estimates of 2022-23.(Bhagirath, Himanshu and Shagun,
2023).Every programme which directly benefits the poor has been given
less money than the last year, and where adjusted for inflation it will be
even less. This distress is compounded by the lack of any reduction in
GST and in the price of petrol, diesel or LPG. (Chidambaram, Feb19,
2023) This combined with persisting inflation and unemployment (urban
8.1%, rural 7.6%) has made the situation worse. This is further exacer-
bated by many big companies laying off employees, affecting the middle
classes too. The most cruel cut in allocation is in respect of MGNREGS,
to Rs. 60,000 cr from Rs. 1,89,400cr in 2022-23. In a slow-growing
economy with few income-earning opportunities for unskilled workers
and high levels of unemployment, MGNREGS serves as a life line for
millions of rural poor. Besides, in an economy where lack of consump-
tion demand slows it down and constrains investment, MGNREGS is the
most effective and productive way of augmenting purchasing power of
the rural poor and boosting demand. It is also a very robust method of
empowering poor rural women, whose participation reached 51% during
the last financial year. This is because women find it easy to access
work due to its availability within a reasonable distance from home; they
are safe from any harassment and exploitation and can be adjusted with
household chores and responsibilities. But the Government is virtually
killing the scheme (ENS, 2023) through reduced allocation, low wage
rates, (lower than both the market wage and minimum wage fixed by the
State governments), etc. Still worse is creating obstacles in provision
of work by mandatory marking of attendance by workers through the
National Mobile system App in effect from January 1, 2023. Workers
are also required to get two time-stamped and geo-tagged photographs
uploaded on the scheme’s portal. Further, the use of Aadhar Based Pay-
ment System (ABPS) has been made obligatoryfor depositing wages of
workers. Given that many rural poor may not be in a position to meet
this requirement, this move is intended to reduce demand by denial of
work on various grounds, which includes mismatch in the spelling of
their name on the job card and their Aadhar Card. By June 23 of this
year, the names of 61 lakh registered workers had been deleted for such
reasons. In the financial year 2022-23 there was a 244.3% rise in the
number of deleted workers. From 1.49 cr deletions in 2021-22 it climbed
to 5.13 cr in 2022-23. (Nair, 2023) This is reflected in fewer person days
of employment generated since January than in pre-Covid levels and
the number of households (1.67 cr) availing of the scheme in February,
2023 compared to 2.02 cr in February 2022, 2.28 cr in February 2021
and 1.87 cr in February, 2020 (Sharma, 2023). As a result, only 34 days
of work is being provided against the mandated 100 days. The Govern-
ment is interpreting this reduced number as an indicator that the growth
of the economy is providing better employment options and, therefore,
pandemic-induced stress is over and a reason for lower allocation. The
Government has also killed the ethos of the scheme by virtually mak-
ing it an infrastructure programme, mandatorily converging it with oth-
er programmes and centralising the release of ‘wages payment order’.
As it is, the annual allocation for MGNREGS over the years have been
inadequate, which leads to pending wage dues and material cost being
cleared from next year’s allocation. The extent of this deficit during
2022-23 may be 25,800 cr. This would leave only Rs. 35,000 cr for the
whole of 2023-24, leading to even fewer days of employment generated.
(Bhagirathi et al 2023) Even the Parliamentary Standing Committee has
expressed concern about reduced allocation. (Sharma, March 16, 2023)
Capital Expenditure Does Not Create Employment

The squeeze in allocations for subsidy schemes for the rural poor
serves two objectives of the aggressive neo-liberal thrust of the Gov-
ernment. One is fiscal consolidation by bringing the fiscal deficit down
from 6.4% to 5.9% and the second is to increase capital expenditure
from Rs. 7.5 lakh cores to Rs 10 lakh cores. The latter is touted as the
recipe for addressing the scourge of the high rate of unemployment that
has plagued the economy. A great deal of hype has been created about
the potential of capital expenditure for both growth and employment.
Both assumptions have little evidentiary base to support them. The
big-ticket infrastructure like roads, high ways, bridges, ports, airports
are capital intensive and do not create much employment after the con-
struction period, not for the segment of the population (unskilled labour)
which needs it most. The emphasis on renewable energy, solar farms and
wind farms would yield very few jobs. (Aiyer, 2023) In addition, capital
expenditure projects also have a long gestation period to achieve their
growth potential and employment creation. They do not provide any
relief to the poor who need work to earn income right now to survive.
Besides, demand constraint would inhibit initiative to use infrastructure
for investment in growth activities. The same amount spent on social
sectors would have directly benefitted the working people immediately.
(Patnaik, 2023) Multiplier effects of social sector spending directly or
indirectly increases the purchasing power of the working people much
greater than capital expenditure. The much-publicized big push for ru-
ral housing by 17.2% compared to 2022-23 (BE) would also not help
as the wage employment of the scheme is only 25%. The rest is the
material cost.(Sharma, 2023) Further, much of the capital expenditure
is incurred on import of capital goods forwhich the budget has lowered
custom duties. How can such a capital expenditure create employment
to any significant extent? (Patnaik, 2023) Fiscal prudence has also led to
the withdrawal of PMGKY (Prime Minister’s Garib Kalyan Yojna)as the
Government feels that the recovering economy needs no further affir-
mative action.This assumption has floundered in the wake of weak and
shallow recovery and global headwinds, which may lead to a recession
in global economy according to the IMF.
The Economic Survey has noted that 16.4% of the population is
multi-dimensionally poor and an additional 18.7% is classified as vul-
nerable to multi-dimensional poverty. These poor needed to be taken
out of this poverty trap by expanded welfare spending.(Suresh Babu,
2023) But the Budget has not only struck at the poor, it has taken no
notice of increased inequality which the pattern of growth has generated
(as per Oxfam Report) with 5% in India owning 60% of the country’s
total wealth while the bottom 50% owns just 3% of wealth and gets only
13% of national income(cited Chidambaram, Feb. 19, 2023). The bud-
get deepens it by anti-poor resource flow. It has not included any serious
revenue-raising measure while it has lowered the resource allocation for
poverty alleviation schemes. It has not even spared the agriculture sector
that supports the bulk of the rural poor. Besides cutting food subsidies
by Rs. 90,000 cr, fertiliser subsidies by Rs. 50,000 cr and terminating
the PMSKY free food grains scheme, the PM-Kisan allocations have
been reduced by 11.26%, Rashtriya KrishiVikasYojana by 31%,Krishi
SinchaiYojana by 17% and Krishi UnnatiYojana by 2% from last year
revised estimates. (Sharma, February 1, 2023) This falls in the face of
the claim in the Finance Minister’s Budget speech of inclusive develop-
ment of agriculture.
Loud Claim of Inclusive Agriculture

The Inclusive Development for agriculture has been visualised in
the Budget speech as 1) Digital Public infrastructure for funding farm-
er-centric solutions; 2) setting up of an Agriculture Accelerator Fund to
encourage start-ups by young entrepreneurs in rural areas; 3) enhancing
productivity of cotton crop through public-private partnerships; 4) Clean
Plant Programme to boost availability of disease-free, quality planting
material for horticulture crops; 5) Indian Institute of Millet Research to
be supported for sharing best practices with other countries; 6) increase
in Agriculture Credit target to 20 lakh crores with focus on livestock
and fisheries sector; 7) a new sub-scheme to enable fishermen, fish ven-
dors & macro-small enterprises to expend their market. Only two of
the above seven announcements (4 and 7) have specified some finan-
cial investment. In any case, these announcements do not touch upon
the core issues which have agitated the farmers - unviability of agricul-
ture with high input costs and low market realisation, chronic indebted-
ness, crop loss due to natural calamities, access to cheap credit so as to
avoid chromic indebtedness. The decline in allocation of some crucial
schemes is reportedly due to under-utilisationof the allocated amount
in the preceding year.The most important reason for this is that most
centrally-sponsored schemes now require 40% contribution from States
(as against 100% contribution by Union government before 2015-16).
The poorer states are unable to provide this share. Other reasons include
delays in the release of funds, inefficiencies in implementation, etc. This
is due to staff shortages, excessive workloads, low unit costs and limited
capacity of agriculture staff at the district, block and village levels. But
some schemes suffer from design and operational flaws such as PM-
FBM (Prime Minister’s Fasal Bima Yojana – crop insurance scheme),
which include low claims to premium ratio, inadequate grievance re-
dressal mechanisms, steep rise in premium rates etc. Seven states have
opted out of it. The scheme is also gender insensitive as only 13.7% of
total beneficiaries are women. (CBGA, 2023) Besides lacking in a vision
for agricultural growth (Kumar, 2023) there is nothing in these sectoral
interventions for marginalised sections, landless, tenants, small and mar-
ginal farmers and agricultural workers. An inclusive policy & budgetary
paradigm for marginalised sections of farmers needs to put emphasis
on alternative agriculture practices that promote dry land farming, crop
diversification and use of non-chemical methods and budgetary direction
to ensure an adequate provisioning of resources. A redesign of state bud-
gets is necessary to complement it. The outcome and outputs of existing
schemes do not cover vulnerable and marginalised sections, including
women. (CBGA, 2023)
De prioritization of Nutritional Support

The de-prioritisation of social sectors and lowering its allocation to
make for fiscal consolidation is not confined torural development and
agriculture. It extends to nutritional support for women and children.
India has slipped from rank 101 to 107 out of 123 countries in the Global
Hunger Index and there is widespread prevalence of anaemia in 57%
of women along with 36% of child stunting and 19% of child wasting.
(Chidambaram, Feb. 26, 2023) But the allocation for Saksham Anganwa-
di, the umbrella scheme for erstwhile nutrition schemes remains almost
unchanged. There is no enhancement of remuneration for Anganwadis
workers, helpers, Asha workers, who provide child-nutrition services.
The allocation for school meals programme (PM-POSHAN) has been
lowered compared to 2022-23. Samarthya scheme which provides for
maternity benefit and other women empowerment facilities has also been
reduced. The allocations for old age, widow and disabled pensions have
remained stagnant (Sinha, Dipa, 2023).
Bias against Minorities

The very first paragraph of the Budget speech envisions inclusive
development to reach all citizens and regions, especially youth, women,
and farmers besides SCs/STs/OBCs. There is a conspicuous omission of
minorities in this formulation, which is indicative of the ruling party’s
deeply entrenched bias against Muslims and Christians. This is not an
unintended omission but is reinforced by subsequent budget provisions
for them, the most glaring of which is the reduction in the budget pro-
vision for the Ministry for Minorities by an unprecedented38% and dis-
continuance of pre-matric scholarship for class I-VIII and also Maulana
Azad scholarships for higher education.

Economic Empowerment of Women
The Budget speech in Para 13 also talks of economic empowerment
of women by the next stage development of 81 lakh Self Help Groups
(SHGs) through formation of large producer enterprises or collectives
to be helped with supply of raw material, better design, quality and
branding and marketing of their products for up-scaling of their opera-
tion to serve the large consumer markets as with the start-ups growing
into firms. The Government by taking the route of entrepreneurship and
self-employment is shirking its duty to create appropriate labour-inten-
sive wage employment consistent with the social limitations of women.
The Periodic Labour Force Participation Survey indicates that labour
force participation rates for women improved from 18% to 25%. But
this increase is in unpaid home employment and low wage agriculture.
What women need is wage employment which adjusts with their social
obligation of domestic work. The easiest and most effective way to pro-
vide it isto increase MGNREGA employment with enhanced wage rates
along with the National Livelihood Mission Programme to increase their
employability through appropriate skill development and placement.
Both these programmes have been short-changed. Women’s self-help
groups are engaged in a low level of economic activities for catering to
the local market, which cannot even assure sufficient income to alleviate
the poverty of their members even with support provided to them. It is
too ambitious to envisage their up scaling to produce for the global mar-
ket. It is the surest way of courting failure. The crumbling start-ups is
hardly the model to emulate.
Old Recipe for Traditional Artisans

For traditional artisans and crafts people (Vishwakarmas), the Fi-
nance Minister announced a scheme to enable them to improve the qual-
ity, scale, reach of their products, integrating them with MSME value
chain with skill training, green technologies, linkage with global mar-
kets, digital payments and social security to benefit marginalised groups.
These objectives have been pursued for a long time with little impact on
the condition of crafts people, except for a minuscule number. The crafts
people are faced with a lack of demand,non-availability of raw mate-
rials, absence of market linkages and cheaper machine-made products
flooding the market. The demand for hand-crafted products is largely
confined to the middle class and affluent sections. The demand base has
to be expanded to create a market within the country before other steps
announced above succeed in improving the economic condition of the
groups.
Dismantling of Affirmative Action

Para 14 of the Budget speech lists seven priorities which would guide
the activities of the Government. On the top is inclusive Development;
Para 15 loudly claims that the philosophy of ‘Sabka Saath,Sabka Vi-
kas’(participation of all and development of all) has facilitated it. This
claim fails the test of scrutiny with the level of poverty, unemployment,
food insecurity and malnutrition along with increasing inequality and
continuing discrimination against marginalised sections. The Affirma-
tive Action in favour of SCs/STs pursued since independence is being
dismantled gradually.With economic reforms pursued since 1990,em-
ployment in government establishments and public sector undertakings
has shrunk. This has been effected through various ways, such as va-
cancies not filled, existing posts being combined to reduce the number
of employees, some posts being abolished, existing vacancies getting
filled up on ad hoc basis through contract appointments where no res-
ervation applies. The total number of employees in the government
has been reduced from 32.6 lakh pre-reform to 26.30 lakh post-reform.
The new public sector policy envisages not more than 4 public sector
undertakings; the rest would be privatised. In addition, reservation in
government jobs is being reduced in various ways. The lateral entry into
central government positions is one mechanism where no reservation
applies. The judiciary has also struck against reservation. The Allahabad
High Court order shifted the provision of reservation from university to
a department level. This has drastically reduced the number of posts
for Dalitsand Adivasis because in small departments with few posts it
becomes difficult to divide posts into reserved and unreserved category.
As a result, in 11 Central Universities, only 2.5 vacancies were reserved
for SC/STs and 8 for OBCs. The Government decided not to contest the
case in the Supreme Court, which indicates its apathy if not hostility to
reservation. The Government has also struck against a conceptual basis
of reservation by earmarking 10% of posts exclusively for poor from
non-backward categories (read upper castes). The Supreme Court de-
clared that reservation in promotion to higher posts was not a fundamen-
tal right. The dismantling of affirmative action is not confined to reser-
vation. Even access to education is targeted by reduction in allocation for
post matric scholarships by failing to adhere to need-based allocation.
The structural change in Sub-Plan concept which assured that a specified
percentage of resources flow to these groups is yet another dimension of
this trend. The restructured model does not ensure that money allocated
for ‘welfare’ of SCs/STs is directly spent on SCs/STs. The accrual of
benefits to SCs/STs from this fund is only notional as the physical reach
of the benefit from it to the SCs/STs is not monitored.
Discrimination and Violence Against Marginalised Groups

The continued discrimination against SC/ST candidates in the labour
market, as noted by Oxfam in its India Discrimination Report 2022, is
notably high and has gone up marginally as their level of education and
other measurable endowments have improved over time. Caste discrim-
ination is still ‘highly significant’. Gender based discrimination is found
to be extremely high in all categories of employment, rural and urban.
The increase in unemployment in cases of urban areas is alarming for all
socio-religious groups. Casual employment suffered the most. This led
to increase in self-employment, particularly among SCs/STs. In access
to agricultural credit, the average amount of credit received by SCs/STs
is about half of what the forward community receives. Discrimination
exists in both commercial and cooperative banks, but is higher in com-
mercial banks. (Oxfam, 2022)
Violence against marginalised groups shows an increasing trend,
despite the strengthening of criminal laws concerning their protection
against it. The registered cases under the Prevention of Atrocities Act
for SCs increased from 42,793 in 2018 to 50,291 in 2020 and for STs
from 6528 to 8278 but with a conviction rate of only 26.86%. Despite
this dismal performance, the allocation for the scheme relating to imple-
mentation of the Act has been reduced by 12%. Crimes against children
increased from 1,28,531 registered cases in 2020 to 149,404 cases in
2021 (from 28.9% to 33.6%), but the conviction rate is a very low figure
of 14%. Crime against women increased phenomenally from 3,38,954
registered cases in 2016 to 4,28,278 cases in 2021. Rape cases increased
from 39068 cases in 2016, reduced to 28153 in 2021, but rose to 31878
cases in 2021 (a rise of 18%). The conviction rate is around 26%. The
criminal laws in respect of all these four groups have been strengthened
but show no impact on improving conviction rate or lowering the inci-
dence of crime, as they are confronted with formidable obstacles – shod-
dy/biased investigation, ineffective presentation in the court, threat to
and intimidation of victims by the accused persons, poverty and lack of
resources to pursue the case, absence of social support. Yet the scheme
ofMinistry of Women and Child Development which provides support
services / emergency help to women in distress / victims of violence
called Sambal has seen no enhancement in the budget provision from the
previous year’s. Similarly, the scheme for protection of children called
Mission Vatsalya also provides no increase in the budget provision com-
pared to the preceding year’s BE. Both schemes also suffered from un-
der-utilisation of the last year’s allocation, indicating bottlenecks in im-
plementation not sorted out. The National Child Labour Project which
engaged in rehabilitation of child-bonded labour rescued from employ-
ers in fact has suffered a 2/3 cut in allocation despite full utilisation of
last year’s allocation. Mission Shakti for Protection and empowerment
of women has also faced a cut of Rs. 40.15 cr due to under-utilisation of
last year’s allocation. All ministries dealing with marginalised sections
except the Ministry of Tribal Affairs have received less than a 5% in-
crease in their allocation: Women and Child Development – 2.2%, Social
Justice and Empowerment- 4.3%, Persons with Disability- 1.01% which,
when adjusted against inflation, would be a decline in allocation. The
26.7% increase in allocation of Ministry of Tribal Affairs is on account
of recruitment of teachers and staffs in Eklavya Schools in identified
blocks in tribal areas announced some time ago to operationalize them
and does not enhance coverage of existing schemes.So palpable is the
hostility of the present Government towards Muslims that the Ministry
for Minorities has received the highest cut of 38% in its allocation, along
with scrapping of two scholarship schemes – Pre-matric Scholarship for
Minorities and Maulana Azad Education Foundation, despite the robust
demand. Even the remaining schemes have witnessed a sharp reduction
in allocation. The Ministry dealing with Persons with Disabilities has
fared no better than Ministries dealing with other marginalised groups.
The scheme, which has a large demand (disability pension), has received
no increase in allocation despite 100% utilisation of last year’s budget.
The scheme for implementation of the revised disability law has received
a cut of nearly 60% in allocation. Of the remaining three schemes, two
have received less than 5% increase;only the scheme on scholarship has
had its allocation increased by Rs. 50 cr., but when viewed against RE
of last year, only 10 cr. Can this evidence support the claim of inclusive
development?

Mechanical De-Sludging of Septic Tanks and Sewers
Para 56 of the Budget speech has made a welcome announcement
that de-sludgingof septic tanks and sewers would be done mechanically.
This would hopefully prevent deaths due to manual cleaning by scaven-
gers, though the scheme is silent on rehabilitation of manual scavengers
resulting from the scheme and payment of compensation to those who
have lost lives (around 1005)in the process of manual cleaning. Not
all of them have been paid the compensation mandated by the Supreme
Court. But the manual scavenging, far from being eliminated, is likely to
increase. The scheme announced in the budget does not cover rural areas
where underground tanks of toilets are not cleared by landowners and the
task is handled by manual scavengers. This issue has not received any
attention. While the scheme in the budget has a positive side that it may
avoid fatalities in sanitation work due to no contact with human faecal
matter and only skilled workers would perform this task, the fundamen-
tal flaw in the scheme is that it treats the issue of sewage cleaning as a
technological issue rather than a social one. Thescheme will not alter
the stigma associated with task of cleaning waste. Besides, the scheme
does not talk about providing decent alternative jobs to sanitation work-
ers and prioritisation of the rehabilitation to all such sanitation workers,
who are likely to be rendered unemployed on account of mechanisation
of sewer and septic tank cleaning and removal of caste-related stigma
associated with sanitation labour. (EPW, 2023) It is necessary to delink
dehumanizing labour from this obnoxious form of work as such (Guru,
2023). But the track record of the Government on rehabilitation of manu-
al scavengers liberated from the obnoxious practice is hardly reassuring,
as there is a huge backlog of those freed from manual scavenging but not
rehabilitated due to a sharp gap between their number identified official-
ly and those who have been identified by non-government surveys. The
Government claims that all officially identified manual scavengers have
been rehabilitated. This issue has not been sorted out and for the last two
years no money has been spent on the scheme. As a result, non-reha-
bilitated manual scavengers, as per non-official agencies, have become
invisible. This issue needs to be resolved without delay. Social audit of
the scheme is also necessary to investigate whether those claimed to
have been rehabilitated have taken to alternative occupations or they or
another member of their family have gone back to manual scavenging?
Undermining Right-Based Entitlements
The most potent evidence against the claim of inclusive development
is the systematic undermining of right-based entitlements won after a lot
of struggle. The case of MGNREGA has been cited above to show how
the entitlement is being curbed and diluted to suppress demand and its
basic character of work on demand locally is being changed. The For-
est Rights Act has been subverted by diluting its provisions, exempting
their application in certain projects with a view to speedy acquisition
of land, large scale rejection of claims recommended by Forest Rights
Committee, only a miniscule area being allowed of the claim submit-
ted, restrictions on the use of land where claims are accepted, diversion
of forest for non-forest purposes without prior consultation with Gram
Sabha etc. The Food Security Act is being undermined by not updating
the entitled population for getting benefits provided by the Act, Anto-
dya Ann Yojana cards cancelled due to deaths of migrants are not being
replaced with cards for new beneficiaries. As a result of withdrawal of
free 5 kg additional grain per month under PM Garib KalyanYojana, the
entitled households would now have to purchase additional requirement
of food grains at market prices bearing the inflationary pressure. ICDS
has not been universalised despite Supreme Court direction. The mater-
nity benefit under NFSA (National Food Security Act) has been reduced
to Rs. 5000 and its eligibility has been restricted to only the birth of the
first living child. The Right to Education Act has been side-lined by
superimposing the New Education Policy and starving the school educa-
tion of the needed resources to implement the commitment of providing
elementary education contained in the Act. Only 10% of public schools
comply with the norms of school infrastructure laid down in the Act. A
number of government schools have been closed down in several States,
which would lead to an increase in drop outs. There is lack of any ini-
tiative and resources allocation for early childhood education, despite
its emphasis in New Educational Policy, and no efforts for expansion of
secondary education despite the increasing gap between elementary and
secondary education.
Mission on Particularly Vulnerable Tribes

In para 57 of the Budget Speech, a new scheme has been announced,
namely, Prime Minister Particularly Vulnerable Tribal Groups(PVTG)
Development Mission, to provide their families and habitation with ba-
sic facilities such as safe housing, clean drinking water and sanitation,
improved access to education, health and nutrition, road and telecom
connectivity, and sustainable livelihood opportunities for which Rs.
15000 cr would be made available over the next three years. But the
allocation for the development of PVTGs in the allocation of Ministry of
Tribal Affairs has increased only marginally over the preceding year. The
importance given to PVTGs (75 in number) is welcome as the condition
of many them is precarious, having been displaced from their forest hab-
itat and dependence on its resources for their sustenance. They are all
pre-agricultural tribes – food gatherers and hunters – and are not used
to sedentary life that is characteristic of tribes engaged in settled agri-
culture. Their traditional occupations have been lost with no alternative
appropriate livelihood provided. They are under extreme stress to sur-
vive and suffer from acute food shortage and malnutrition as a result of
which their life span has been shortened. They have also been victims of
exploitation by surrounding communities. It is extremely challenging to
design community rehabilitation and sustainable development schemes
suited to their skill base and physical capacity. Many projects for their
upliftment attempted in the past have failed to improve their condition.
Trained and experienced anthropologists would need to be associated
with any scheme / schemes that may be designed for them and imple-
mented. Such a scheme/ schemes would require handholding by such
trained and empathetic anthropologists over a long period of time.
Eklavya Residential Schools

Para 38 of the Budget Speech informs that the Central Government
will recruit 38,800 teachers and support staff for 740 Eklavya Residential
Schools serving 3.5 lakh tribal students. The establishment of Eklavya
Residential schools was announced in 1978-98 and 640 schools were
sanctioned by July 2021, of which 367 are functional. The Standing
Committee report raised concerns about delay in operationalization of
schools due to routine issues - delay in tendering process, land transfer
and selection of construction agency as a result of which their comple-
tion date has been extended to 2025. What is important in this connec-
tion is that residential tribal schools in most places are badly managed,
suffer from poor infrastructure and teaching and worse, from the attitu-
dinal bias of the teachers who manage them. Language and culture di-
vide the teachers and students, which affects the quality of teaching and
relations between them. There is no attempt to associate parents with
management of schools to bridge the divide besides conscientization and
training of teachers. Hopefully, these issues would be taken care of in
Eklavya Schools. It should be ensured that teachers & staff are over-
whelmingly recruited from the local tribal communities as far as feasible
to eliminate the attitudinal bias and empathetically handling of students.
Mission to Eliminate Sickle Cell Anemia

Another budget announcement (Para 28 of the speech) which has
relevance for tribals is to set up a mission to eliminate sickle cell anemia
by 2047. This Mission will entail awareness creation, universal screen-
ing of 7 crore people in the age-group of 0-40 years in affected tribal
areas. The disease is particularly widespread among the tribal popula-
tion where about 1 in 86 births is affected.While the announcement is
welcome, there is no earmarked resource allocation for it. The imple-
mentation of the programme would require community health workers
along with NGOs working in the field supporting the programme and
local PHC level facilities to be strengthened.
The Poor Languishing in Jail

Yet another item relevant to the poor and marginalised section men-
tioned in the Budget speech is about the number of persons who are
granted bail or eligible for it in criminal cases but who continue to be in
prison as they are unable to afford the penalty of bail amount. The Bud-
get speech (Para 42) provides the assurance that the required financial
support will be provided. As per information based on Crime Records
Bureau, 66% of the prisoners under trial are from marginalised sections
– SCs / STs/Muslims. Forty-eight percent of them have been in prison
for over 5 years without charge sheet being filed or trial begun. Delhi
and J&K top the list.(Roy, 2022) Quite a few of them are accused in
petty offences. But they are too poor to afford a lawyer to seek bail or
afford the bail amount when released on bail. The most humane solution
to the problem is to release them on the assurance of the local panchayat
/ community organisation rather than making financial provision for the
bail amount. Among the prisoners are also those who have been in jail
without any trial for a period equivalent to or more than period of impris-
onment prescribed in law for the crime they are accused of committing if
convicted. Such persons should be released straight away. The screen-
ing should be done at the District / High Court level depending upon the
nature of the crime for which they have been incarcerated.

Continued Neglect of School Education
‘Inclusive Development’, ‘reaching the last mile’ and ‘unleashing the
potential of youth power’are listed among the seven top priorities that
would guide the 2023-24 budget. This requires meaningful planning and
investment in education and social sector development. But the overall
share of education in the total union budget has declined in comparison
to pre-covid years (CBGA, 2023) though the Department of School Ed-
ucation and Department of Higher Education have been given a marginal
increase of 8% from BE of last year but lags far behind the demand for
six per cent of GDP as total public spending by both the Centre and the
States. (Ray, 2023) States fare far better with 2.7% of GSDP allocated
to education compared to 0.37% of GDP allocated by the Central gov-
ernment. Besides, discriminatory allocation of resources to elite schools
– Kendriya Vidyalya, Eklavya model schools, Navodya Vidyalyas, and
now the newly announced model PM Shri Schools for Rising India (ex-
emplar schools) with Rs. 18,000 cr for its implementation strikes at the
root of inclusion. Around 26% of the school education budget has been
allocated to these model schools, while they cater to only 20 lakh stu-
dents. (CBGA, 2023) Likewise, in the field of higher education, a larger
share of the budget has been allocated to 20 Indian institutes of technol-
ogy while the numerous other institutions of higher learning are starved
of funds even for routine management. This elitist bias in educational
structure ensures that the bulk of the schools and colleges where the poor
and the marginalised study would be condemned to function at below
optimal level in terms of lack of human and financial resources and in-
frastructure to create an inclusive learning environment (CBGA, 2023).
The National Achievement Survey, 2021 and Annual Status of Edu-
cation Report (Rural) show that there is a progressive decline in learn-
ing outcomes of students across all grades in almost all subjects. ASER
report 2022 points to sharp drop in reading ability. Improvement in
this situation will depend upon students’ access to and participation in
quality of learning imparted by schools. To achieve the goal of NEP,
universal access to quality education from pre-primary to higher sec-
ondary by 2030, a programme called National Initiative for Proficien-
cy in Reading with Understanding and Numeracy (NIPUN) Bharat was
launched in 2021 under Samagra Shiksha Abhiyanwith a target that ev-
ery child should attain Foundational Literacy and Numeracy of Grade
3 by 2026-27. To attain this objective, adequate investment for setting
up basic infrastructure, recruitment and training of professionally qual-
ified teachers and monitoring of implementation is required. (CBGA,
2023) Between 2019-20 and 2021-22 the number of schools declined by
20,000 and number of pre-primary level schools declined by 7000. In
15 states, there is a vacancy of 5.6 lakh teachers at the elementary level.
The Budget envisions improved training of teachers, innovative pedago-
gy, curriculum transaction, continuous professional development, ICT
and revamping of District Institutes of Education and Training (CBGA,
2013). This commitment is nowhere seen in the budget allocation as
SMSA (Samagra Shiksha Abhiyan), whichcovers11.6 lakh schools, 15.6
crore students and 57 lakh teachers from pre-primary to senior second-
ary level. While Ministry of Education has suffered from underfunding
of SMSA from its inception, ironically, what is allocated is not being
fully utilised by the States. One bottleneck is delayed release of fund
from the Centre. The under-allocation and under-utilisation make the
targeted goal unachievable. The Government’s recent announcement of
outcome-based financing in select schemes if applied to SMSA would
have a further negative impact on implementation. (CBGA, 2023) The
solution requires both the centre and States to sit together and sort out
the bottlenecks.
Discontinuation of Scholarships
Given the huge class and caste divide in access to education, schol-
arships are a progressive intervention to facilitate inclusive education.
But the Government on the other hand has discontinued the pre-matric
scholarships for students of class i-viii belonging to SCs/STs, minorities
and others. This has been justified on the ground that the Right to Ed-
ucation Act, 2009, mandates free and compulsory elementary education
to all children in the 6-14 age groups. What is ignored is that even free
education involves some expenditure which poor households may not
be able to meet, given the uncertainly of employment and low level of
wages. As per the National Sample Survey, 2017-18, average out-of-
pocket expenditure for primary education in government institutions was
Rs. 1253 per child per annum and for upper primary level, it was Rs.
2181. The decision of the Government is likely to lead to drop out of
such children and their joining the labour market. Even in respect of post
matric scholarships for SCs/STs, the allocations during the past 3-4 years
have been very low though improved since last year. The low allocation
during this period would have resulted in disruption of the education of
those who were receiving it and affecting their prospects of employabil-
ity. Besides inadequate and irregular funding, scholarship schemes face
numerous bottlenecks in delivery ranging from complicated application
procedures, inadequate unit cost, failure to revise eligibility criteria and
unit cost to factor in inflation, delay in central release of funds and late
submission of utilisation certificates from States. Though demand driv-
en, the number of students receiving the scholarship are lower than those
applying for them. Thus, even this component of Affirmative Action is
being undermined.
Relentless Push of Technology: Digital Divide

The most striking assault on inclusive development is the Govern-
ment’s relentless and aggressive pushing of digitisation in all crucial sec-
tors. In a society which is characterised by a huge divide in terms of edu-
cational attainment and knowledge acquisition based on caste, ethnicity,
religion and gender, this would intensify the exclusion of the poor and
the marginalised. The huge inequalities of infrastructure in schools ex-
acerbate this divide. Only 60% schools in India have functional electric-
ity connection varying from 25% in Manipur to 100% in Delhi, Punjab,
Tamil Nadu computer facilities is available only in 47% of schools and
internet connectivity in 33.9% of them. On the digitisation front, the per-
centage of government schools with functional desktops is only 16.5%
with a wide variation of 100% in Delhi to 6% in MP. Only 1.2% govern-
ment schools have digital libraries while 5.1% private unaided schools
have them. The percentage of government schools with functional ICT
labs standat 14%. Only 40.13% teachers across public /private manage-
ments are trained in teaching through computer. (CBGA, 2023)
To bridge this divide, flagship schemes like Bharat Net, Telecom De-
velopment Plan and Aspirational District scheme have been introduced.
As a result, internet subscribers in rural areas have increased to 95.76
million but nearly 24% of them have no access to digital devices. Ac-
tion to set up a virtual university has been initiated along with various
interventions to address the digital divide.But the overall allocation to
the Digital India Learning Programme has not witnessed any increase in
the budget but a decline of 0.23% compared to the last year’s BE. This
year’s budget speech adds another component of digital infrastructure
i.e., to set up a National Digital Library for children and adolescents to
facilitate availability of books across geographies, languages and levels
and device agnosticaccessibility but with no budget head or financial
allocation. The Budget speech has transferred the responsibility for set-
ting up physical libraries at the Panchayat and ward level and provide
infrastructure to access National Digital Library resources to the States
but with no resource support provided to them. As a result, the scheme is
unlikely to get operationalized, particularly in States with a low resourc-
es base. But in a country where there is no public library system and
the majority of Indians left out of reading for generations, the need and
priority is for setting up, revving and modernising public libraries and a
movement for a free library movement. The indifference to this need is
evident from the fact that a draft National Library Policy 1986 has still
not been finalised for action. (Rao, 2023) The relentless push of so-
phisticated technology across domains will act as yet another instrument
(more potent than caste religion, ethnicity and gender) of exclusion.
Youth Power
Youth in the age group of 16-40 constitute the most significant sec-
tion of the labour force which is most frustrated due to lack of decent
employment opportunities. This is reflected in hordes of them apply-
ing for miniscule lower level jobs in the government. Job creation is
a priority to address this issue. The Budget speech addresses this re-
quirement by launching a scheme for skill development with on-the-
job training, industry partnership and aligning training courses with it
and inclusion of new age courses such as coding, artificial Intelligence,
robotics, mechatronics, IOT, 3D Printing, drones and soft skills. This
will be operationalized with stipend support to 47 lakh youth under
National Apprenticeship Promotion Scheme and a Unified Skill India
Digital Platform for linking with employers and facilitating access to
entrepreneurship schemes and enabling demand-based formal skilling.
The Government has been implementing skill development and appren-
ticeship schemes for many years. The announcement in the budget is a
significant scaling of this scheme. However, there has been enrolment
of merely 21.7% lakh persons between FY 2017 and 2023 (Ray, 2023)
and in terms of absorption of such youth in formal jobs, there is not much
to show. The implementation of existing scheme suffers from delays in
fund disbursement, mismatch between the number of people trained in
a particular vocation and the potential of their absorption into the labour
market, (CBGA, 2023) poor placement rate, low quality jobs, temporary
placements and lack of gender focus. A comprehensive social audit is
necessary about the effectiveness of thescheme, design of the courses,
competence of training institutions, quality of training imparted and
linkages with industry. The new announcement therefore, is unlikely
to create any hope among the youth about a meaningful intervention to
facilitate their employment, more so in a slowing economy with compa-
nies reluctant to hire.
Strengthening Health Services

The Budget speech made four announcements in the health sector:
1) setting up of 157 new nursing colleges adjacent to 157 medical col-
leges established since 2014, 2) facilities in ICMR laboratories to be
made available for research for faculty of medical Colleges and private
sector R&D schemes, 3) a new programme to promote research and in-
novation in pharmaceuticals, 4) multi-disciplinary courses for medical
devices will be supported in existing institutions. While no details and
financial provisions for these programmes are indicated, the initiatives
do not touch upon the core problems faced by the common persons / the
poor in accessing public health services.
The pandemic glaringly exposed the shortcomings of the public
health system. The crumbling infrastructure, shortage of human resourc-
es, overcrowding, low resource allocation are among its major problems.
The budget allocation for 2023-24 (BE) for health is a mere increase of
4% over BE of 2022-23 and a large part of this increase is for the Ayush
segment. National Health Policy (2017) and the 15th Finance Commis-
sion recommended that public expenditure on health (Centre and State
combined) should reach 2.5% of GDP by 2025. But the allocation for
health as a percentage of union budgets has remained stagnant at around
2% during the last few years (CBGA, 2023). This year’s allocation is
even less than the actual allocation during 2019-20.The allocation by
States for health was higher than that of the Union Government. In
2022-23, the union health budget as a percentage of GDP was 0.3% but
the state budget was 10.1% of SGDP in 2022-23 (BE). The combined
allocation of Centre and States was 2.1%. (Economic Survey, 2022-23).
Within the schematic structure of Ministry of Health, National Health
Mission, the flagship programme has witnessed a decline from 41.6% in
2022-23 (BE) to 39.7% in 2023-24 (BE). The scheme also suffered from
differences in the amount approved, released and spent, which indicated
that there were bottlenecks in the utilisation of allocation which were not
sorted out. The budget also reduced allocation for Ayushman Bharat, the
flagship state health insurance scheme with a sharp cut of 34% and for
NHM by 1% from last year’s estimates.
But more than the resource allocation, the persistent problem faced
by Public Health System is shortage of human resources at various lev-
els – 25% in ANMs, 74.1% in Health Assistants, 31.5% in allopathic
doctors at the PHC (Primary Health Centres) level, 79.3% specialists
at CHC (Community Health Centres) level. In urban PHCs, there is
shortfall of 35.5% of ANMs and 5% of doctors, while in urban CHCs,
there is shortfall of 46.9% specialists. In terms of infrastructure, rural
areas suffer from 25% shortfall in sub-centres, 31% shortfall in PHCs
and 36% shortfall in CHCs. In urban areas, there is shortfall of 39%
PHCS. In tribal areas, there is shortfall of 27.6% sub-centres, 30.7%
PHCs and 28% CHCs (Rural Health Statistics, 2021-22 cited by CBGA,
2023). The Finance Commission recommended Rs. 70,051 cr in grants
for strengthening of primary health care infrastructure in rural and urban
areas. But the budget for 2023-24 has allocated only Rs 1385 cr for this
purpose. This is too inadequate to meet the huge gap in infrastructure
and provisioning of services that exists.
Stifling of Rural Development

The rural development sector requires priority to make up for the
losses in income and employment suffered during the pandemic, to boost
the levels of consumption and to accelerate fast-track economic recov-
ery. The Union Budget has done the opposite. The Budget allocation for
Department of Rural Development declined sharply from 5.6% of the
total budgetary expenditure in 2020-21 to 4.2% in 2021-22 to 4.3% in
2022-23 and 3.5% in 2023-24 (BE). As a percentage of GDP, the decline
is from 0.99% in 2020-21 to 0.68, 0.66 and0.52 during the respective
periods. This drastic reduction was reflected in the allocation for MGN-
REGS which is 46% lower than 2020-21 levels. The Deendyal Antyo-
dyaYojana (National Rural Livelihood Missions) which supports Self
Help Groups to set up village enterprises to increase their incomes. The
allocation for this Programme has increased marginally from RE provi-
sion of Rs 2022-23 which, when inflation is taken out account, would
be a decline and therefore unlikely to register any increase in coverage.
Besides low allocation, SHG (Self Help Groups) enterprises suffer from
low productivity, are mainly involved in agriculture and have low ab-
sorption of technology and are unlikely to contribute to poverty alloca-
tion. (CBGA, 2023)
The Rural Housing (Pradhan Mantri AwasYojana – Grameen - Ru-
ral) is the only scheme to have been allotted a 12.5% increase over RE
budget of 2022-23. The latter witnessed an increase of 142% from the
BE allocation of the year with the expectation that this infrastructural
investment would have a higher multiplier effect in raising the levels of
employment and income. But the employment content of the scheme is
25% or even less as family labour is used in many cases. The scheme
also suffers from poor quality of construction and wrongful exclusion
and inclusion of beneficiaries in the implementation of the scheme. Ad-
ditionally, identification of beneficiaries in the scheme is based on so-
cio-economic and caste census (SECC) 2011 which was updated with
Awas Survey carried out between January 2018 and March 2019 to up-
date the number of beneficiaries who were left out of SECC. The en-
hanced allocation is only to provide for added beneficiaries based on this
survey. (CBGA, 2023)
Pradhan Mantri Gramin SadakYojana (PMGSY) has the potential to
create rural employment like MGNREGS. But its budget provision will
remain at Rs 19,000 cr for every year up to March 2025 to complete
on-going projects. The under-utilisation of funds in the last few years
is a cause for concern. CAG(Comptroller and Auditor General), in its
various reports 2016-2017-2021 has pointed outthat 4496 projects were
running into delays of one month to 11 years due to land disputes, pau-
city of funds and lack of clearance as well as deficiencies in data updat-
ing, monitoring and accounting system (CBGA, 2023), which requires
addressing implementation bottlenecks.
Conclusion
The above narrative brings out that the tall claims made in the Bud-
get speech of the Finance Minister about inclusive development do not
stand the test of scrutiny. Despite the growth in the centre’s tax collec-
tion, which reached buoyancy of 1.72% in 2021-22 though declined to
less than 1%in FY 2022-23 and 2023-24 (BE), the union government’s
expenditure as a proportion of the country’s GDP has declined to 14.9%
compared to 15.3% in 2022-23 (Revised Estimates), though in absolute
terms it is projected to increase by Rs. 3.16 lakh crore. But a large part
of even this small increase is directed towards increase in capital expen-
diture of Rs. 10 lakh crore – a growth of 37% compared to 2022-23 (RE)
by sharply reducing revenue expenditure from 4.2% in 2022-23 (RE) to
2.9% 2023-24 (BE). It has pursued fiscal consolidation by reducing the
fiscal deficit from 6.4% in 2022-23 (RE) and 6.7% in 2021-22 (A) to
5.9% of GDP. (Magazine, 2023) An additional fiscal stimulus through
revenue expenditure was not incorporated in the belief of post-pandemic
revival of the Indian economy. This fiscal consolidation is sought to be
achieved through reduced social sector spending for 15 ministries, which
broadly constitute the social sector from 33.5% of the Union Budget in
2020-2021 to 21.2% in 2023-24 (BE). Non-interest & non-subsidy cur-
rent expenditure is being compressed by a sizable 1% of GDP in 2022-
23 and a further 0.5% next year. (CBGA, 2023)The situation would
be worse because States which account for a larger part of expenditure
on the social sector are likely to face a resource crunch on account of
discontinuation of the GST compensation and reduced transfer of just
31% of gross tax revenue compared to 37% in 2018-19, as revenue from
cesses are not shared with states and a considerable portion of GST com-
pensation cess has been used to repay the GST Council for loan given to
the States during the pandemic. (Subramanian et al, 2023)Even increas-
ing the limit of borrowing by State governments by 3.5% is accompanied
by a restriction that this money would be spent on implementing power
sector reforms. The Central government has scaled down its sharein vari-
ous centrally sponsored schemes which would reduce state spending due
to inability to contribute a higher share. The Central government is also
politically influencing reimbursement of central funds for works execut-
ed in respect to centrally-sponsored schemes such as MNREGS in W.
Bengal through biased investigation reports by its officials, thereby in-
creasing the financial burden of state governments to meet this liability.
This would further constrain the ability of such States to undertake social
sector development. With downgrading of the prospects of growth of
the economy from the one projected in the Budget and continuing high
inflation with no significant growth in real wages at all in India level in
the last 8 years, (Dreze, 2023)and no attempt to tax the rich to garner
resources for public spending, the poor and the marginalised face bleak
prospects for dignified survival. Their economic neglect is compound-
ed by undermining of their right-based entitlements and abridgment of
labour rights and gradually dismantling of affirmative action. Pursuit of
fiscal consolidation, in face of this distressing scenario, is a joke on them
and explodes the oft-repeated and hugely advertised claim of Sabka
Saath Sabka Vikas. (Participation and Development of all)
References:
Aanchal Magazine (2023), ‘Sticking to Fiscal Consolidation Path’,
The Indian Express, Feb 2, 2023

Ayer, SwaminathanAnklesaria(2023), ‘Shift from MGNREGA,’
The Economic Times, February 2,2023
Bakshi, Ishan (2023), ‘Budget’s Unclean State,
The Indian Express, February 8, 2023
Bhagirath, Himanshu, N and Shagun (2023), ‘No Elixir for Rural India’,
Down to Earth, 16-18 February, 2023
Centre for Budget and Governance Accountability (2023), ‘Walking the Tight
rope: An Analysis of Union Budget, 2023-34
Chauhan, Trishali and Christophe Jafferlot (2023), ‘Men Without Women’,
The Indian Express, March 13, 2023
Chidambaram, P (2023), ‘Amri tKaalQuestion’,
Chidambaram, P (2023), ‘Budget (3) Abandoning the Poor’,
Dreze, Jean (2023), ‘Wages are the Worry, not just unemployment’,
The Indian Express, April 13, 2023
Economic and Political Weekly (2023), ‘The Budget Ignores the Demand
Constraints’, Editorial, February 11, 2023, Vol LIV No. 6
Express News service (2023), ‘Govt has unleashed attack on MGNREGS:
activists’, The Indian Express, March 15, 2023
Government of India, Ministry of Finance (2023), Economic Survey, 2022-23
Guru, Gopal (2023), ‘An insight into Mahola’, Economic and Political Weekly
(Editorial) Vol. LVIII No. 6, February 11, 2023
Himanshu (2023), ‘No Road to Rural Recovery’,
The Indian Express (2023), ‘DIM Outlook’, Editorial,
February – March 20, 2023
Isaac, T M Thomas (2023), ‘A Budget for the few’,
Nair, Shobhna (2023), ‘A missing letter means no work’,
The Hindu, July 2, 2023.
Oxfam (2022), ‘India Discrimination Report 2022’
Patnaik, Prabhat (2023), ‘Budget 2023-24’ Ignoring the Economy’s Basic
Problems,’ People’s Democracy, January 30 – February 5, 2023
Ram Kumar, R (2023), ‘A Budget Without a Vision for Agriculture,’
The Hindu, Feb. 2, 2023
Rao, Purnima (2023), ‘The Right to Read’, The Indian Express, June 22, 2023
Ray, Sarthak (2023), ‘Homeopathic Dose for Human Capital’,
Financial Express, February 2, 2023
Roy, Rohini (2022), ‘Under trial Prisoners in India: Why 66% from Marginalised
Castes?’ Quint, December 24, 2022
Sharma, Har Kishan(2023), ‘House Panel Flags cut in NREGS budget, says
scheme last resort of succour for rural poor’,
The Indian Express, March 16, 2023
Sharma, Hari Krishna (2023), ‘As number beneficiaries dip PM – Kisan alloca-
tions lowest in 5 years at 60,000crore’, ‘Demand Still High, but NREGS
Kitty Shrinks to pre-Covid Level,’ The Indian Express, February 2, 2023
Sinha, Dipa (2023), ‘The Social Sector has been short-changed once again’,
The Hindu, February 2, 2023
Sitharaman, Nirmala (2023), ‘Budget 2023-24 speech of Minster of Finance’,
February 1, 2023
Subramanian, Arvind and Josh Felman (2023), ‘India’s Fiscal Dilemma’,
Suresh Babu, M (2023), ‘A balance between capital outlays and fiscal prudence’,
The Hindu, February 2, 2023

INDIA: BROKEN LEGACIES OF THE LAND
AND FOREST RIGHTS MOVEMENT
Ashok Chowdhury
Teesta Setalvad
Kabhi o din bhiaayega jab hum swarajdekhenge

Jabapni hi zameenhogiaurapnaaasmahoga
Uruj e kamyabi par kabhihindostahoga
A day shall come when we will have self-rule

The land will be ours and so will be the sky
One day India will be at the peak of success)
(Shaheed Ram Prasad Bismil)
To understand India’s agrarian structure and society is to comprehend

the extent and depth of the disenfranchisement of vast segments of the
country’s population from control, ownership and decision-making pro-
cesses over the land they till. While as many as 70% of India’s people
are engaged in production processes around natural resources i.e. land,
water, forests and minerals and as much as 66% of agricultural produce
is cultivated by these very landless, marginal cultivators, the fact that
they, the actual producers have no ownership of the land, renders them
open to primitive levels of exploitation. For this exploitation to not just
end but for a genuine democratisation of economic, social and political
resources to take place, key is the re-distribution of land.
Freeing a large section of the Indian people from captive labour and
landlessness and returning control over the production processes is also
crucial to ending starvation, unemployment and displacement in the
country. Agricultural production activities are controlled by landlords/
farmers, capitalists, traders and the government bureaucracy today. Ba-
sically, there are four aspects related to agricultural production, namely
land, labour, credit and technology and unless control of these shifts dra-
matically, real change cannot occur.
“The history of all hitherto existing society is the history of class
struggles” Karl Marx
India’s transformation into an equitable society is incomplete, its pro-

ductive forces remain tied down, due to which there has been a systemic
increase in starvation and unemployment within the labour force which,
instead of controlling land and the forces of production is today forced
to migrate. The total area of the country is about 33 crore hectares, and
about one fourth (24%) of this land area (7.5 crore hectares) is forest
land, which remains mainly under the control of the government through
the forest department, a creature within the bureaucracy legitimised by
British rule and weaponised then and since. About 20 crores of India’s
population (comprising scheduled tribes, scheduled castes, backward
castes and nomadic cattle herders) are today dependent on forest land
and forest produce but have been historically deprived of their rights
over forest resources – hence, the issue of forest rights is closely linked
to the issue of land rights.
This essay will primarily focus on the chequered history of India’s
land reform movement and demonstrate how this effort has been ren-
dered incomplete by an absence of political will epitomised in the class
and caste composition of India’s rulers under democratic rule.
Before Colonial Rule

Indian economy prior to the establishment of the British rule was
largely agrarian with a significant artisanal sector (weaving, smithy, car-
pentry etc) linked to agrarian economy. There was no economic or social
equality due to the prevalence of caste system and an exploitative state
structure which extracted agrarian surplus. Despite widespread existence
of cash nexus much of the rural economic exchanges were based on bar-
ter.
There were extensive forests and the entire system of forest man-
agement, like conservation, forest produce, land and water manage-
ment, was under indigenous communities through rules and norms
determined collectively. Some space then was available for traditional
social equality and justice within tribal societies (Adivasis ,traditional
indigenous forest dwellers). They treated their forests as their heritage,
passed down by their ancestors. The Adivasi community was normal-
ly enjoyed autonomy and independence even though the neighbouring
kingdoms often encroached upon their territories. Even the non-tribal
villages had village forests to cater to their everyday needs and these
forests were looked after by the labouring class and women folk of the
village.1
The Pre-British Indian rural economy was being integrated into Mu-
ghal state and commercial networks but still retained considerable auton-
omy and self-sufficiency and forest communities had relative autonomy.2
The Arrival of East India Company, A Systemic Change

European trading companies, especially the English East India Co.,
lured by India’s agriculture, forest wealth and skilled handicrafts, started
activities in the 17th century. As the Mughal empire declined, the English
East India Company established its military and political supremacy
over much of the subcontinent.
Traditionally there was a very limited notion of absolute private
property in land, and hierarchy of rights and claims over produce of a
piece of land being the norm. This the British considered not conducive
to commercialisation of Indian agriculture and maximisation of produc-
tion and land revenue. They wanted to convert land into absolute private
property, and an exchangeable commodity.3 This gave rise to a new type
of landownership. The Company introduced new forms of land relations,
under which the cultivating peasants were landless, leasing in land from
large landlords and had to pay a heavy land rent and also land revenue to
the state.4 This was the first step towards both disempowerment and im-
poverishment of the Indian peasantry: peasants were unable to pay tax-
es due to insufficient cash, and their condition deteriorated. They were
forced to borrow from moneylenders and thus fell into indebtedness. The
new landlords started controlling the land and the production processes
while most peasant cultivators suffered enforced alienation from their
lands. These new landowners did not live in the villages, hence they
were called “absentee landlords”. Simultaneously, contractors and land-
owners started interfering within forest areas also. For the first time in
centuries, during colonial rule, agriculture and forest land moved out
of the control of the producers and into the hands of a few influential
people, who were in direct contact with the “Company Bahadur”. These
were also the first steps towards the rapacious extraction of produce
from land and forests for commercial gain while ordinary citizens were
pushed towards destitution, eventually becoming victims of starvation,
famine, environmental destruction and displacement.5
By 1840/50, the British, sourced and used raw material from forests
for British industry and to enrich British coffers.6 The process required
ease of transportation and export to the ports and led to the building of
the railway in 1855.7 This intensified the colonial land acquisition; to lay
sleepers for these railway tracks and for other industrial purposes, the
precious Himalayan and sub-Himalayan forest and other large forests of
the country were also cut down.
Company Consumes India’s Forests

India’s ‘Forest Department’8 was established to aid the colonial
power’s systemic access and plunder of forests. Forests were not only
exploited but rich mixed forests were replaced with single species plan-
tations.9 Faced with multiple organised Adivasi rebellions from the start
of the mid-1700s, laws were thereafter enacted to legitimise this control
and plunder. Just as it used three kinds of land revenue systems to alter
(read snatch) control over agrarian lands, to exercise its right of ‘emi-
nent domain’ over the Indian forest resources, the British government set
up the Forest Department in Britain in 1864 and passed the first Indian
Forest Law the same year. This law effectively made the Department the
legal owner of the land that had been held for centuries by the Adivasis
and Forest Dwellers. Mass Enforced Displacement resulted. Soon after
this, in 1894, the British also introduced the Land Acquisition Act. In or-
der to use the forest resources to augment their treasury and to strengthen
monopoly over the forests, the British authorities thereafter passed the
Indian Forest Law in 1927. Under this law, forests were divided into
three categories: reserve forests, protected forests, sanctuaries etc. All
traditional rights of the communities who lived in and near the forests
–India’s indigenous people – were struck down and instead, their rights
over the forest resources were treated as concessions, i.e. now, these peo-
ple were dependent on the Forest officials for their day-to-day require-
ments. This law had nothing to do with the conservation of forests.10
It in a sense criminalised the very lives of India’s Adivasis and Forest
Dwellers.
Taungya System and Bonded Labour

Under colonial rule, India’s natural forest cover shrank rapidly and
the British, while responsible for the depletion, needed more wood for
fighting the First World War. They needed to augment India’s deplet-
ed forest cover, therefore they introduced the ‘Taungya system’, which
linked forestry to traditional shifting cultivation with a commercialised
model borrowed from Burma. Landless peasants from the plains were
lured with offer of land to cultivate. Taungya workers/cultivators were
the captive labour of the department, given an acre each for shifting cul-
tivation of trees and crops to be moved out after five years; they were not
paid for this labour; instead, were supposed to sustain themselves from
the crops grown. They were also supposed to take care of the pine and
teak plantations of the forest departments on the same land. Taungya for-
est village settlements came up in the Terai and Shivalik regions of the
Himalayas. Bonded labourers, affected by the zamindari system, peas-
ant cultivators dispossessed from their lands, Dalits/Backward Castes
and Muslims were lured with the promise of land and settled on forest
land where they were employed in the work of tree plantation. Thou-
sands of Taungya villages mushroomed from Assam to Uttar Pradesh.
These Taungya villages had no official recognition and were deprived of
civic rights like education, health, housing and drinking water facilities
etc. Even after Independence, the governments of independent India ig-
nored the constitutional rights of these villages until 1976 when the slow
process of re-enfranchisement began.11 Similarly, a number of pastoral
communities in the forests, who travel seasonally with their animals, re-
ceived space and recognition for the first time only after the enactment of
the Forest Rights Act, 2006.12 Hundreds of thousands of people who had
disappeared from the map of India have only now gained recognition.
For them statutory recognition of rights took a long time in coming, even
in Independent India.
Despite India attaining Independence in 1947 and becoming a sover-
eign democratic republic in 1950, it was only in 2006 that a land rights
law for India’s forest workers, adivasis and forest-dwelling communities
was passed and only in 2013 that the British introduced Land Acquisi-
tion Law was amended! Post 2014, there has been a systemic reversal of
both under the BJP government.
First Challenge to Colonial Rule: Adivasi (Tribal)

and Peasant Revolts
The adivasis or tribal people of India, along with cultivators and
peasants13 were the first to rebel against this plunder of resources by the
British. This history imbibed deep within popular movements and cul-
tures is still uncelebrated within India’s caste and class-ridden citizenry,
not finding any critical mention in India’s textbooks that deal with social
sciences.
From the Chuar rebellion (1769-1805) in Jharkand, in resource-rich
central India,14 to the Sauria Paharia (1784) and Ho Rebellions (1820-
21);15 the peasant, Sanyasi Rebellion just after the Battle of Plassey, in
the latter half of the 18th century (1770 onwards);16 the Indigo Farmers
Uprising in 1821;17 the Kol Uprising (1829-48) in Bengal in 1831,18 the
Santhal Hool Rebellion (1855-56) in east India19; the Second Indigo Re-
bellion (1859) against the Dadani system in Bengal;20 the Pabna Uprising
(1873-74) in East Bengal;21 the Deccan ‘Riots’ (1875-1879) by farmers
against moneylenders;22 this is only a few among the anti colonial revolts
by peasants and tribal people. Thereafter in modern day Assam (Kam-
rup, Dirang) the non-payment of Land Tax Rebellion (1893-1894);23 the
Adivasi revolt, in the Chhota Nagpur region (1895-1900) after which the
British Parliament was compelled to introduce a law granting autonomy
to the Chhota Nagpur Adivasi communities.24 Naga Rebellion (areas in
the North East, 1879); Koya Rebellion led by Tamman Dora in Malkan-
giri, Orissa, 1880); Rampa Agitation (led by Alluri Sitarama Raju along
the banks of the Godavari river (in the region of Andhra Pradesh, Oris-
sa); Pakhtoon Rebellion (North West Frontier Province, 1897); Chenchu
Uprising (Karnataka, 1898) etc. Almost every decade saw a revolt erupt
in different parts of India.
It is India’s Adivasis and peasants who were the first to protest against
the loot and plunder of our natural resources by the British colonial re-
gime. Women played an important role in these Adivasi rebellions, and
worked side by side with their male colleagues in every area. The artic-
ulation behind these movements was for political and economic sover-
eignty (self-rule). The decisive movement was the revolt led by Birsa
Munda. While the “mainstream national movement” passed a resolution
asking for political sovereignty only 17 years later, theirs was the first
struggle for Indian Independence. It is a history that still remains to be
thoroughly documented and celebrated.25
Statutes Passed Under Pressure from Adivasi& Peasant Movements

While on the one hand the British used the law to control resources
and land and weaponise the forest department, the British Parliament
was also compelled, under pressure from these organised rebellions, to
enact laws restoring autonomy to tribal areas. The 1908 Chhota Nagpur
Tenancy Act, (CNTA) under which forest and village land records of Ch-
hota Nagpur (Ranchi and its surrounding areas) were maintained under
the Munda Manaki or Panchayat not the District Collector was the first
milestone in the history of forest and land rights movement, thereafter
leading to another historic enactment, the Santhal Pargana Tenancy Act.
This law was passed in 1912 and later amended in 1949. Third, in 1931,
the British applied the Van Panchayat Rules or the Forest Council Manu-
al, under which the ancestral rights of the community were recognised.26
Thus in early 20th century the British hold over its dominion was
faltering and the colonial power was becoming more repressive. If the
British were compelled to pass two laws restoring some autonomy to
Adivasi and forest dwellers in 1908 and 1912, these steps were near nul-
lified by the enactment of the overarching 1927 Indian Forest Act that
restricted, even criminalised their traditional access to forests and forest
produce. Similarly, other draconian laws such as the 1915 Defence of
India Act and the 1919 Rowlatt Act that infringed seriously on civil and
political liberties of Indians turned out to be pivotal in spreading discon-
tent against colonial rule.
Resistance continued to build, however. Of the many inspiring ex-
amples is the Pagri Sambhal Jatta (Mind your turban) movement in
the Punjab in 1907, which was led by the Gadar party leader, Sardar
Ajit Singh (paternal uncle of Bhagat Singh).27 Similarly, there was also
a movement in Champaran, Bihar in 1917, to protest against the Brit-
ish Administration compelling the cultivators –again – to grow Indigo,
and this movement came to be known as the Champaran Satyagraha.
In Awadhin 1920, under the leadership of Madari Pasi and Sahdev and
the Bardoli Satyagrah in Gujarat in 1927, etc. there were two other im-
portant agitations against the British administration and the zamindari
system. The Awadh Peasants’ agitation was in a sense unique because it
was fought under the leadership of both Dalits and backward castes and
around this time, a women’s organisation, the Awadhi Kisani Sangathan,
was also formed. ‘Land to the Tiller’ was among the powerful slogans
that emerged from these resistances.
As discussions arose within Indian political circles after the First
World War about the political nature and course of India after Indepen-
dence, internal schisms and contradictions also surfaced. At the 1931
Round Table Conference in London where discussions were initiated
with the British regarding the transfer of power to Indians, i.e. politi-
cal freedom, Dr.Bhim Rao Ambedkar also raised the ticklish issue of
the freedom of exploited classes from within –that is, freedom from the
higher castes. He also raised the issue of the social and economic inde-
pendence of the Indian exploited castes from the dominant elites. His
demands arose out of his leadership of India’s vast working and toil-
ing millions, large sections of whom were especially disenfranchised
because of a brutal and iniquitous caste system.28 While widely known
for Dalit identity-based struggles like the Mahad Satyagraha, Ambed-
kar’s leadership and alignment of the Dalit peasants with other peasant
and land rights struggles has been largely ignored. Establishing organ-
isations such as Bahishkrit Hitkarni Sabha, Konkan Praant Shetkari
Sangh (KPSS, 1931) and the Independent Labour Party, led him to
shape the dalits, workers and peasants movement in the Konkan re-
gion in the decade of the 1930s. As a consequence, he was able to
build a formidable organisation of peasants here that not only mobil-
ised farmers across various caste groups, but also tried to emphasise
that long-lasting peasants’ solidarity in India could only be achieved
if and when other social questions (of discrimination) are taken up
seriously.29 Behind this understanding lay an incontrovertible belief
held by Ambedkar that ownership over land and produce (modes of
production) was key to a final disintegration of the caste system that
–apart from other indignities and structural denials – was a crude ex-
pression of exploitation of segregated labour. Similar issues had also
been raised two years earlier, in 1929 in the declaration released by the
Bhagat-Singh-led Hindustan Samajwadi Prajatantrik Association. Final-
ly, this issue reached the Constituent Assembly, where representatives
from different strata of the Indian society deliberated. After about three
years of wide-ranging discussions, heated debates and compromises, the
Constituent Assembly finally adopted the Constitution of India on No-
vember 26, 1949 that came into effect across the country from January
26, 1950.
The build-up to Indian Independence forged, first through the active
struggles of India’s indigenous peoples, peasantry and industrial work-
ers, who strove to end the control of British colonial powers over natu-
ral resources (land-water-forests) and establish the political rights of all
communities. India’s elite and urban dwellers undoubtedly joined and
later dominated articulations at the penultimate stage but did not appre-
ciate the depth and expanse of the responsibilities they carried and had
hide-bound interests which they sought to protect.30 While the devolu-
tion of political, economic and social rights of all sections should have
become the principal basis for nation-building in the future, the reality
has been far from this.

The words of Dr. Ambedkar, while dedicating the Constitution on
November 26, 1949 to the nation, display a haunting prescience:
“On the 26th of January 1950, we are going to enter into a life of
contradictions. In politics we will have equality and in social and eco-
nomic life we will have inequality. In politics we will be recognising the
principle of one man one vote and one vote one value. In our social and
economic life, we shall, by reason of our social and economic structure,
continue to deny the principle of one man one value. How long shall we
continue to live this life of contradictions? How long shall we continue
to deny equality in our social and economic life? If we continue to deny it
for long, we will do so only by putting our political democracy in peril.”
Transition
The period of transition between when India attained Independence
and when the Constitution came into effect also saw widespread protest
assertions of peasants and people at large. One such, led by the Com-
munist Party of India was an armed rebellion under the Kisan Parishad
(Peasants Council) against the Nizam-ruled Telangana and the Razza-
kars, between 1946-51.31 While the newly formed Indian government
intervened to take over the Nizam state and crush the Razzakars, Indian
forces also simultaneously crushed the farmers’ movement and the Kisan
Parishad.
In Bengal, it was the 1946-47 Tebhaga movement, an agitation to se-
cure two-thirds of the produce for the exploited sharecropper (bargadar,
tiller) that was the harbinger of lasting change. It spread to 15 districts
out of a total of 28 districts of Bengal, especially in the North and coast-
al Sunderban regions. About 50 lakh peasant-cultivators participated in
this rebellion, called by the Kisan Sabha; there was widespread support
among agricultural labourers too.32 Only after this did the government
propose to bring in the Bargadar Law as an attempt to quell the protests.
Finally, in 1950, a Bill was passed and in 1955, the principles included
in the Bengal Land Reforms Act.33 Under the Act, sharecroppers had to
be given 50% of the produce. Later, in 1978, the Left Government in
Bengal launched ‘Operation Barga’, under which the sharecroppers were
given permanent cultivation rights over the land, the sharecropper could
not be evicted from the land and this system was to continue in perpetu-
ity generation after generation.34
Truth Tells: Post-Independence Land Reform
Zamindari Abolition Act, 1950, Forest Land out of the purview of
‘Land Reform’
To reverse the hunger and impoverishment caused by the exploit-
ative system of agrarian production in colonial India, which essentially
squeezed labour at unproductive rates for the profit of land-owners and
contractors, and to increase the productivity of land, it was necessary
to increase the productivity of labour. This could only have happened
if inequalities had been reduced and enforced practices of indebtedness
through usury curtailed. The first legislative enactment to this end was
the proposed Zamindari Abolition Act, 1950.35
The creatures of British policy, the Zamindars not only held vast
tracts of village lands but also forests. Ironically forest lands of zamin-
dars over which Adivasis had traditional control was simply not included
within the purview of the Zamindari Abolition Act, 1950. As a result,
the land rights of hundreds of thousands of Adivasis and other tradition-
al forest-dwelling communities occupying those lands were never rec-
ognised. During the heated Constituent Assembly debates the presence
of voices like Jaipal Singh Munda and, of course, Dr. BR Ambedkar
ensured guarantors of autonomy like the special provisions in the Vth and
VIth Schedules of the Constitution for the protection of the Forest and
Land rights of the scheduled tribes under the Constitution.36
In 1948 –even as the Constitution was being deliberated upon -- top
officials in the forest departments of Uttar Pradesh and Bihar (present
day Jharkhand) colluded with the upper castes and ensured the passage
of a new law, ‘Private Forest Bill’ passed by the then Governor General
of India. Under this Bill, all non-government forest areas (like forests
controlled by zamindars and princely states), which are in fact the forests
under the Adivasis and village woods) were declared government forest
areas and brought under the control of the forest department.37 Today, the
forest department owns 24% of the country’s land, more than any entity
in the world. Of this 9% is forests and the rest of the 24% consists of wa-
ter bodies, grass lands, grazing grounds, agricultural lands, etc. All this
forest land has been grabbed by the Forest Department and brought un-
der its control only after Independence. A process of historical injustice,
launched under a foreign colonial dispensation has been perpetuated and
continued in independent India.
How could such an important issue be ignored at the time of the
drafting of the Zamindari Abolition Act in 1950? While there is no legal
provision under any of the revenue laws of the country for handing over
lands to the forest department, how was this allowed to take place? This
acquisition is and was illegal because, under the Zamindari Abolition
Act, 1950 the village land cannot belong to anyone other than the village
panchayat. The forest department literally grabbed all this land through
announcements in the Official Gazette, steps which are contrary to both
the Zamindari Abolition Act and to the Constitution. In the same way, the
Gram Sabha (village council) land and forest land was transferred to big
companies for a pittance. Conflicts between Adivasis, traditional forest
dwellers and the administration only grew.38
The 1970s saw the use of ‘environmental protection’ and ‘conser-
vation’, even in statutes like the Wildlife Conservation Act (1972) and
the Forest Conservation Act (1980) to further alienate traditional forest
dwellers and the indigenous people from their habitats and autonomous
control over forest produce. This misplaced notion of ‘environmental
control’ resulted in mass displacement, made worse by large projects.39
The issue was misrepresented as “Wildlife-People conflict”. After a de-
cade and a half, as movements among the indigenous peoples grew and
international attitudes changed, another vocal section of environmental-
ists more effectively articulated the fact that that it was impossible to
conserve forests without securing the traditional land and other rights of
traditional forest dwellers.
In terms of agrarian land, the first pushback from India’s privileged
elite was witnessed with the passage of state laws often in contravention
of the central 1950 Zamindari Abolition Act. Some states particularly
took decades to get laws enacted and the interim period saw huge tam-
pering with land records.40 This resulted in neither a narrowing of gap
between the rich and the poor nor an end to starvation.
After the ruthless crushing of the Tebhaga and Telangana rebellions
by the Indian state even the Communist Party of India backed away from
such militant peasant-mass rebellions. By 1955-56, there was a sense
that the process of land redistribution should be attempted only through
the administrative system.41 In contrast to other states during the same
period, under Article 370, the Big Landed Estates Abolition Act, 1950
(for the abolition of Jagirdari system) was passed in the state of Jammu
and Kashmir, which had no provision for compensation to the Jagirdars
for the land taken away from them. The land was taken away from the
Jagirdars by the government and redistributed among the peasant-culti-
vators there. As a result, the land was not concentrated in the hands of a
few but was redistributed among the landless labourers on a large scale.
This helped to end landlessness there.
It was also during this period, on March 18, 1956, speaking on the
issue of land redistribution at a seminar for the backward classes, that
Dr. Ambedkar had raised a seminal point: in order to give the landless
their land right, the government should nationalise land. To counter the
problem of the landless being denied land, he authored the rousing slo-
gan, “Joh zameen Sarkari hai, who zameen hamaaree hai,” (‘Public land
is our land’). This conveyed the political sense of the unfinished agenda
before the Indian people, if not the state (which appeared to have desert-
ed its pre-1947 commitment). The slogan was an affirmative assertion
that the primary tiller, the landless agricultural labourer – also the most
deprived class – had first right and claim over the vast tracts of common/
public land and that a movement should be launched to claim this right.
Neither the government, nor any political party picked up the gauntlet.
The result: most public land was grabbed illegally on a large scale by
various companies and the powerful, as also by government departments
and agencies.
In 1967, in West Bengal, for the first time, the United Front Gov-
ernment assumed power in the state consisting of opposition parties (in
which the Left parties were dominant). Adivasis grew hopeful about get-
ting their land. Led by the Kisan Sabha, they started taking possession of
land in a village, Naxalbari hopeful of a sensitive ear from the new gov-
ernment. A violent push back and discrediting of this move led to police
firing on a large crowd of peaceful farmer activists, leading to the mar-
tyrdom of seven protesting women. An armed revolt that became known
as the ‘Naxalbari Movement’, was born. The traditional Left was divided
on this development, especially when armed rebellions also arose in oth-
er parts of the country like Andhra Pradesh, Bihar, Assam, Punjab, Uttar
Pradesh, Maharashtra and Madhya Pradesh (modern day Chhattisgarh).
Though these movements reflected the aspirations of the Telangana Up-
rising, the demands raised by these movements, regrettably, threw up
no serious political deliberations; instead the Naxalbari Farmers’ Move-
ment was merely seen (and discarded) as divorced from mainstream Left
politics. What resulted was a dispersal of the Kisan Movement.
Some more efforts by the Indian state to attempt land redistribution
included the passage of the Land Ceiling act in the 1970s. Again, land-
owners put legal obstacles to its implementation.42 Another scheme for
distribution of land leases to Dalits and Adivasis during the Emergency
(1975-77), failed.43 We see therefore how, landlessness in the agricul-
ture did not lessen but actually increased in most states after indepen-
dence. Although there was some decrease in landlessness in the 1960s
and 1970s – largely due to agitations by landless farmers who agitated
and forcefully took possession of government lands, compelling state
governments to validate these later – after 1980 however, the Indian gov-
ernment gave up on any efforts at land re-distribution, stressing ‘poverty
eradication’ programmes instead. In some exceptional states, like West
Bengal and Tripura where the Left Front was in power, land distribution
efforts continued for some decades.
Women’s Land Rights Movement in Bodhgaya

Some markers of struggle arose in the 1970s and 1980s. The wom-
en’s land rights movement at Bodhgaya (Bihar) was one such; it demon-
strated how, even under hostile conditions, women’s economic rights
can also be secured: women not only participated in large numbers but
also played an important role in its leadership. The slogans were inspir-
ing Zameenkenka? Jotedonkar! (Who owns the land? Those who till!)
and Aurat, Harijanaur Mazdoor, Ab Nahin Rahenge Majboor! (Women,
Dalits, Workers, shall not remain helpless)44 Its last and decisive battle
was fought after 1978, under the leadership of the Sangharsh Vahini and
finally, in 1987, during the tenure of the then Chief Minister of Bihar,
Shri Bindeshwari Dubey, 35,000 bighas of land was distributed among
the landless peasants, including women.
Dalit Land Rights Movement in Tamil Nadu

During British raj, a rule was passed in the Madras Presidency, re-
serving a portion of the village Panchayati land for use by Dalits.45 This
reserved plot was called Panchama Bhoomi. However, in most villages,
Dalits were unable to avail of this right; upper castes and the middle
class had taken possession of this land. In Northern Tamil Nadu, in the
1990s, Dalits started an aggressive movement to establish their rights
over these lands, again with widespread participation of women.46 This
struggle that speaks of Dalit women’s land rights, resonates today.47
The Dalit Struggle for Land

Babasaheb Ambedkar, who understood the economics of caste dis-
crimination, had argued48 that rural Dalits should be given cultivable land
controlled by the government and commons, such as grazing land. At a
rally at Marathwada in 1941, he had urged Dalits to capture public land
in villages and cultivate these. By doing so, he said, they could become
self-sufficient farmers. Seventy-two years later his demands were to
prove prophetic. India’s failed land rights and re-distribution programme
post-Independence paints a grim picture: Almost 60% of Dalit house-
holds did not own any farmland in 2013, the latest year for which fig-
ures are available, according to the India Land and Livestock Holding
Survey.49 Nearly 70% of Dalit farmers are labourers on farms owned by
others, according to the2011 Census.50
Today, across 13 Indian states, there are 31 conflicts involving 92,000
Dalits who are fighting to claim land; the wilful occupying of govern-
ment land in Maharashtra has spread to Punjab, Kerala and Tamil Nadu.
In Bihar, Gujarat and Madhya Pradesh, land titles given to Dalits over
the years in land-redistribution programmes are useless because higher
castes, who earlier owned the land, never ceded control.51
2006, a Breakthrough
Finally, in a political response to an upsurge of organised demands by
India’s forest dwellers and Adivasis, Indian Parliament finally accepted
that a historic injustice committed by the Forest Department needed to
be statutorily rectified. Fifty-six years after India gave itself the Con-
stitution, the Scheduled Tribes and Other Traditional Forest Dwellers
(Recognition of Forest Rights) Act, 2006, commonly known as the For-
est Rights Act was passed. Before this, in baby steps the 1996 PESA
Law was passed to secure the rights of the panchayats in the Schedule V
areas. Some states have however still not passed the rules needed to give
this law any teeth.
It was the passage of the 2006 law – a moment of emancipatory vic-
tory for India’s indigenous peoples – that was preceded by a policy shift.
The growing impact of the Forest Rights movements of the ‘80s had
impacted governance and the Indian government came out with a new
Forest Policy in 1988. This, for the first time, acknowledged that the
participation of the adivasis and the forest dwelling communities was
essential for the conservation of forests.52
National Forum of Forest People, Forest Workers

The increasing conflicts between the communities and the forest de-
partment energised social movements to restore the traditional rights of
the forest dwelling communities. In 1994, under an initiative of the Na-

tional Centre for Labour (NCL) efforts were made to launch a national
forum for the forest workers. At Dehradun in 1996, a decision was taken
to launch a national campaign for the legal recognition of the traditional
rights of the forest workers and a resolution was passed53 to set up a
national forum to take this campaign forward. Thereafter, in September
1998, at a 3-day conference was organised in Ranchi, a national forum
for forest workers, ‘Rashtriya Van-Jan Shramjivi Manch’ (National Fo-
rum for Forest People & Forest Workers – NFFPFW) was launched.54
After extensive discussions on giving a legal framework to the tradi-
tional rights of the forest communities, the NFFPFW came out with a
declaration, which raised the following crucial issues:
1. Rights in National Parks and Protected Areas
2. Rights of a forest village and a Taungiya village
3. Rights over minor forest produce
These formed the basis of the 2002 Declaration of the NFFPFW at

Nagpur attended by 350 delegates from 15 states. A historic proposal
was passed to build a membership-based organisation. Later, in the Deh-
radun session in 2012 and55 in 2013, at the Orissa session, the All India
Union of Forest Working Peoples (AIUFWP) was launched. The mobil-
isations across movements took place at a time of a tectonic shift in the
policy of the Indian state, post 1991.56, 57
Draconian Order From the Forest Department in 2002

A dangerous order issued by the Inspector General of forest depart-
ment in May 2002 when the NDA I58 was in power. Under the 2002 ex-
ecutive diktat, orders were issued to declare all those people (adivasis
and traditional forest dwellers) living without proper documents in the
forest areas as “encroachers” and to forcefully evict them. Such people
were asked to leave the forest area by September 30, 2002. Widespread
protests against the use of elephants to destroy human settlements
and outrage compelled the NDA I government to withdraw the order.
Amidst protest and resistance, a process was begun to bring all the
peoples’ organisations on a common platform at the national level. In
September, 2002, at the Nagpur session of NFFPFW, a strong demand
was made to end the hegemony of the forest department and to make
laws to secure the traditional rights of the adivasis and other traditional
forest dwelling communities. Soon, this demand for a law turned into a
movement at the national level. Keeping in mind the general elections
and also assembly elections in tribal dominated states, in 2003, the NDA
government, which was in power then, was compelled to commit itself
to giving ownership rights to the forest dwelling adivasis on forest land.
Strangely enough the “eviction” order passed by the Supreme Court,
17 years later in 2019, harks back to the forest department’s order.59
Widespread protests and legal action led to the staying of the court order.
2004 – Foundation for Change

The defeat of the NDA I in the 2004 general elections brought in the
UPA,60 under the leadership of Congress, forming a government with an
alliance of Left parties. The Common Minimum Programme became the
basis for governance. Due to the insistence of the Left parties, the Forest
Rights Law became a significant promise in this Common Minimum
Programme. This is how the historic process of formulating the law be-
gan.61 Finally, this emancipatory law was passed by both the Houses of
the Parliament (Lok Sabha – 15 December/Rajya Sabha – 18 December)
titled the ‘Scheduled Tribes and Other Traditional Forest Dwellers (Rec-
ognition of Forest Rights) Act, 2006’, commonly known as the Forest
Rights Act. This law is a recognition of rights law, it gives crucial consti-
tutional rights to the Gram Sabha; it confers two kinds of rights – com-
munity (13) and individual (3). Most significantly it recognises adivasi
and forest dwelling women’s right to deal and control forest produce,
land control and ownership.62
This is the first law in the country which not only gives communi-
ty right but also equal right to women over resources. Of all the laws
passed since Independence, this is also the only law which recognises
both the Taungiya community and nomadic tribes (a first) and makes
provisions for their special rights. After being passed in both the Houses,
its rulebook was passed on December 31, 2007 and it came into force on
January 1, 2008.
Achievements of Forest Rights Act, 2006

The background of the Forest Rights Act, 2006 is linked, as men-
tioned above, with the 250-year long struggle to establish the sovereign-
ty of the communities over their forests. In the Introduction to this Act,
the Indian Parliament acknowledged as much. The main objective of this
Act is to right this historical wrong done to the adivasis and the forest
dwelling communities by giving recognition to their traditional rights
over forests, forest lands and produce, rights which had been systemi-
cally snatched away.

This law was amended and made more rigorous in 2012. With this,
communities were given full rights over the forest produce and the com-
munity members, working either through a co-operative or through the
Gram Sabha, were allowed to trade in the forest produce. This was done
to make the forest-dwelling communities economically independent.
According to the available figures, the forest department has an annual
turnover in forest produce of, at a minimum, approximately Rs. 50,000
crore. The actual control of local communities over this trade would en-
sure that they emerge as a strong economic and political force in the
country.
It is now nearly 15 years since the passage of the Forest Rights Act
and about 13 years since its implementation. Even today, its effective
execution has not been achieved. More than half of all the personal and
community claims submitted have been illegally rejected by government
officials. According to the August 2020 report of the Ministry of Trib-
al Affairs, Government of India, a total of 42,53,089 claims (41,03,177
personal claims and 1,49,913 community claims) were filed, of which
only 19,85,911 claims (19,09,528 personal claims and 76,383 commu-
nity claims)63 were accepted. Even though, under this Act, there is no
provision for the officials to reject such claims, that right is vested only
with the Gram Sabha, there remain serious political impediments and
tough challenges for the execution of this law. Adivasi and forest-dwell-
ing communities continue to face violent evictions and barbaric state
reprisals in their on-going struggle to assert their traditional rights legit-
imised under this law.
The tussle between concentration and abuse of power and its re-dis-
tribution has been going on for decades and continues today.
Over a period of time, a powerful nexus between the local mafia,
police and Forest department officials has emerged, and they have, reg-
ularly and systematically, exploited and oppressed the forest-dwelling
communities. This state of affairs has allowed the “historical injustice”
to be perpetuated, despite the laudable and emancipatory objectives be-
hind the law (FRA 2006). This is in clear contravention of the Intro-
duction to the FRA 2006 (and its aims and objectives), which requires
the State to act to mitigate the ‘historical injustice’ on the forest people.
Legal training combined with informed community organising and pa-
ra-legal trainings becomes also now a key to deepen the struggle.64 In
September 2019, two Adivasi women, Sokalo Gond and Nivada Rana
backed by the AIUFWP and Citizens for Justice and Peace petitioned
the Supreme Court in the very case where attempts were being made to
dilute the FRA 2006.65
Post-2014, a significantly altered political reality is in place. While
robust struggles around many issues abound, an increasingly aggressive
crony capitalism is in operation: today, private companies dominate
every field of industrial activity, energy sector, banking, insurance and
financial institutions, infrastructure construction, education, health and
agriculture While massive protests from mass organisations and opposi-
tion compelled the newly elected, NDA I, central (federal) government to
withdraw the central Land Acquisition Ordinance (2014), brought about
to nullify the Land Acquisition Act, 2013, it was still successful, despite
hundreds of protests, in reducing 44 Labour Laws into 4 Labour Codes
and through this undemocratic act passed in 2020 –while Parliament
barely sat due to the pandemic –to utterly dilute the basic rights and pro-
tections, won through hard-earned struggles by the organised working
class in India. State governments dominated by the same party in power
as the centre (Bharatiya Janata Party) have since October 2014, passed
state land acquisition laws that in effect nullified the breakthrough 2013
legislation. Law rarely used to actually liberate, is increasingly being
used to snatch away hard-earned rights and protections.
Closest to the crude exploitative politics that played itself out under
colonial rule of the British, the NDA II government has been voted back
in power with an even larger majority in 2019; it has employed a sinis-
ter politics with India’s indigenous peoples, its Adivasis and traditional
forest dwellers. Socially and politically keen to appropriate the crucial
eight per cent of the vote that this vastly disparate community represents,
it has no intention of devolving economic and social rights or control
over land and production to them. The past seven years have therefore
seen clear efforts to derail the Forest Rights Act and render it ineffective
through the passage of contrarian laws like the CAMPA (afforestation
law), amendments to the Mining Act, Environmental Protection Act and
the National Highways laws. All these in some way or another allow
legal caveats to the land rights claims of indigenous communities over
their land. Besides, stringent environmental clearances on companies for
use of forest land have been weakened, forests are being handed over to
them on a platter. This has been a singular contribution of the NDA II
government. The period of the pandemic inspired lockdown saw brutal
assaults on India’s indigenous peoples.66

Still, the Protests –Though Made Invisible by a
Pliant Media – Continue
New equations and fronts have been born in this hostile political en-
vironment, forging alliances between and across various movements, la-
bour organisations and other progressive forces. Among these is ‘Land
Rights Movement’ (Bhumi Adhikar Andolan) which encompasses all
the farmers’ organisations, peoples’ organisations, organisations of for-
est-dwelling communities and organisations against displacement. Adi-
vasi-Dalit woman power has also played an impressive role in this. Be-
hind these developments, the All India Union of Forest Working Peoples
(AIUFWP) has played a key role. Seminal to the movement for the land
rights of traditional forest dwellers since the late 1990s, its emphasis on
a women’s’ leadership makes it unique. Bharati Roy Choudhary (1953-
2011) inspired community women in the forest area in taking leadership
of the forest and land rights movement into their own hands and lending
it their unique perspective. Her inspiration helped the organisation to
build a women-oriented perspective on critical issues of collective own-
ership rights of women with respect to forest, land and other natural re-
sources, especially, with an eye to challenging patriarchy.” Jo Jan Jangal
ke liye ladega, woh Jail Jayega,” (whoever struggles for land, will go to
jail) was her living credo. Roma67 today carries the baton passed on by
Bharati. Ever since inception, a strong women’s leadership has guided
the movement and the union. Even though some of them are no lon-
ger present, these women continue to inspire this collective community
struggle. Chavli Devi from Raja Ji National Park, Haridwar who was
considered to be the Maa (mother) of the organisation formed; Ganga
Arya, a Dalit woman from Udham Nagar, Uttarakhand worked for land
and forest rights and Phool Mati from Dudhwa National Park, Lakihm-
pur Kheeri district, UP died at the young age of 29. These are only a few.
Today, Rajkumari Bhuiyan, Sokalo Gond, Nevada Rana, Sevaniya, Rani
are among the vast membership of the AIUFWP who are tirelessly and
fearlessly leading their community to its place in the sun. Sokalo Gond
has been jailed twice; her colleagues Roma, Kismatiya and Rajkumari
too.68
Since early 2020, the imposed lockdown and the peculiarly restric-
tive conditions surrounding the breakout of the Covid-19 pandemic,
violent repression in the remote areas inhabited by India’s indigenous
peoples continues. While other economic activity was forced to shut
down, mining extractions of precious resources continues unabated. The
economic cost has been high with mass unemployment and stoppage
of all economic activity. The months of 2020 witnessed the large-scale
migration of India’s vast (63 crores is the estimate) migrant working
population, forced to hit the road as a callous government simply over-
looked their existence. Forced to return to their villages and lands which
they had left long ago in search of work,69 they left without their wages,
with little on their back. During the 2020 three-month long lockdown,
an estimated 1.5 to 2 crore people were forced into displacement once
again after losing their jobs. In the month of May 2020 alone, Indian
railways recorded that 10 million workers and their families caught the
train home, a mode of transport that they were forced to pay for. Migra-
tion and displacement, that have become a perennial reality for millions
of Indians, can only be prevented if collective land and forest rights are
secured. For this to happen the implementation of the Forest Rights Act,
2006 among other laws is the key; the most profound challenge to the
effective implementation of the Forest Rights Act 2006 is, therefore, to
overcome the persistent political and administrative stonewalling.
The Forest Rights Movement needs to bring together various natural
resource based communities to form a strong and committed opposition
to any move to snatch away sovereign control over land. Other water-for-
est-land movements like the Agricultural Workers’ Movement, Farmers’
Movement, Fishermen’s Movement, Environmental Justice Movement,
and Movement against Displacement etc. are natural allies towards a
more broad-based land and forest movement. Strong legal action to back
this mobilisation and its cultural expression is vital. Only then can the
aim of establishing total autonomy of the communities related to water,
forest and land be achieved, where the system is transformed into one
in which all productive forces can avail of both their constitutional and
democratic rights. Only this will ensure equitable development of the
toiling peoples with a sorority and synergy among and with the people
of the country.
There is need to be armed with this rich and chequered history, which
can be traced back to the struggles of adivasis and Indian peasants of 250
years ago against the oppressive exploitation of the East India Company,
harking back to different stages that this struggle has waded through,
after Independence. An ideological steadfastness with a nuanced ability
to adapt to challenging realities and build alliances needs to inform this
phase of the struggle

Hum Mahnatkash Jagwalon Se, Jab Apna Hissa Mangenge,
Ek Khet Nahin, Ek Desh Nahin, Hum Saree Duniya Mangenge
When we, the hard-working people, ask the world for our share.
It will not be a mere field, or a country but instead, the entire world.
Faiz Ahmed Faiz

Endnotes:
1
Colonial State and Differentiation among the Adivasis in Chotanagpur divi-
sion of Bihar; P.K. Shukla; Proceedings of the Indian History Congress Vol.
69 (2008), pp. 756-763 (8 pages); Published by: Indian History Congress
2
Enclosing Land, Enclosing Adivasis: Colonial Agriculture and Adivasis in
Central India, 1853–1948* Bhangya Bhukya Associate Professor, De-
partment of Social Exclusion Studies, The English and Foreign Language
University, Hyderabad, India, Sage , Adivasis in Colonial India: Survival,
Resistance, and Negotiation. Hardcover – 1 January 2011, by Biswamoy
Pati
3
Sanjay Subrahmanyam, 1990; Political Economy of Commerce: Southern
India 1500-1650, Cambridge University Press, 1990; Sovereignty, Property
and Land Development: The East India Company in Madras, Journal of
Economic and Social History of the Orient, Bhawani Raman; Between Mo-
nopoly and Free Trade: The English East India Company, 1600–1757, Emily
Erikson; Series: Princeton Analytical Sociology Series; The Eric Stokes,
Peasant and the Raj: Studies in Agrarian Society and Peasant Rebellion in
Colonial India: 23 (Cambridge South Asian Studies, Series Number 23) Pa-
perback – 3 July 1980,
4
The Permanent Settlement, The Ryotwari System and the Mahalwari System
are the three kinds of systems introduced by the British.
5
Late Victorian Holocausts, El Niño, Famines & the Making of the Third
World, Mike Davis, Verso, 2001, 2002, 2017; Churchill’s Secret War: The
British Empire and the Ravaging of India during world War II, Madhushree
Mukherjee, 2010, Basic Books, New York
6
“British shareholders made absurd amounts of money by investing in the
railways, where the government guaranteed returns double those of gov-
ernment stocks, paid entirely from Indian, and not British, taxes. It was a
splendid racket for Britons, at the expense of the Indian taxpayer. The rail-
ways were intended principally to transport extracted resources – coal, iron
ore, cotton and so on – to ports for the British to ship home to use in their
factories.” Shashi Tharoor ,Inglorious Empire, Hurst & Company, In 1600,
when the East India Company was established, Britain was producing just
1.8% of the world’s GDP, while India was generating some 23% (27% by
1700). By 1940, after nearly two centuries of the Raj, Britain accounted for
nearly 10% of world GDP, while India had been reduced to a poor “third-
world” country, destitute and starving, a global poster child of poverty and
famine. The British left a society with 16% literacy, a life expectancy of
27, practically no domestic industry and over 90% living below what today
we would call the poverty line. (An Era of Darkness: The British Empire
in India. Hardcover; October 2016, Aleph Book Company, Shashi Tharoor;
After a head start in the cotton and opium trade, the Tatas grew to domi-
nating heights by 1947: TATA: The Global Corporation that built Indian
Capitalism, Mircia Raianu, Harvard University Press, 2021
7
“The Poverty of India” (Dadabhai Naoroji, 1878), a pamphlet that focused
sharply on the economic impoverishment suffered by Indians under the
British
8
The Colonial Legacy of Forest Policies in India, Arun Bandopadhyay, Social
Scientist Vol. 38, No. 1/2 (Jan. - Feb., 2010), pp. 53-76 (24 pages). Pub-
lished by: Social Scientist
9
Forest Management in India since Ancient Times, Gopa Ghosh, Geo-Analyst,
December 2005
10
The opening line of this Law states as much. “An Act to consolidate the law
relating to forests, the transit of forest-produce and the duty leviable on tim-
ber and other forest-produce.” Clearly the law was enacted as an enabler for
revenue collection in forests and for the transport of forest produce. Under
this law, local communities which had been living there for centuries were
now dubbed “trespassers/encroachers” and sections 4 to 20 were included
for this purpose.
11
Taungya villages were not recognised as regular revenue villages by the
authorities and were dubbed temporary settlements; this was the way a
colonial administration excluded them from the legislative system and even
from the Census. Only in 1976, did the Planning Commission, rectifying
this serious flaw in governance, strongly recommend regularisation of all
forest villages. Still the government of India did not pass any rules/order
for permanent settlements of rights for forest villages. However, since the
1980’s, forest villagers have been included in the voters’ lists for State
Assembly and Parliament elections but again surprisingly not included in
Village Panchayat election’s voters lists. Later, they were included in the
Gram Panchayat election list. As residents of the Taungya villages are situ-
ated in the Reserve Forest Area, these villages/settlements were also denied
any developmental activities (as ensured by 73rdAmendment of Panchayati
Raj Act) as the FCA (Forest Conservation act) 1980 Rules barred develop-
mental activities in RF areas. This was rectified through an amendment in
2006, six months before the passage of the historic forest law.
12
Scheduled Tribes and Other Traditional Forest Dwellers (Recognition of
Forest Rights) Act, 2006’
Peasant Struggles in India, AR Desai, 1979, OUP, British Rule and Tribal
Revolts in India: The curious case of Bastar, Ajay Verghese, Cambridge
University Press, 2015
13
The first uprising by the adivasis in 1769 under the leadership of Ganga
Narayan Singh and Raghunath Mahato. They were protesting the appro-

priation of their water, jungles and land, for freedom from all forms of
exploitation. It lasted until 1805.
14
The second important rebellion started in the hills of Santhal Pargana
(Jharkhand) under the leadership of Baba Tilka Manjhi (1784). Threat-
ened by this challenge to their political and economic control, in 1785
the British, without conducting a trial, hanged Baba Tilka Manjhi from a
mango tree in the Bhagalpur collectorate. Tilka Manjhi’s sacrifice led to a
renewed awareness among the tribals and the start of a sustained and armed
uprising against the plunder of common resources and to re-establish tribal
autonomy, which lasted for about 130 years. The Bhagalpur University was
renamed the Tilka Manjhi Bhagalpur University in 1991. Meanwhile, in the
British protected kingdom of Singhbhum, when the king Jaggannath tried
to oppress the Adivasis, the Ho Adivasis of Chhota Nagpur rebelled strong-
ly and this came to be known as the Ho Rebellion (1820-21).
15
The sanyasis and fakirs mounted an armed rebellion against the British, the
revolt now known as the Sanyasi Rebellion. The prominent leaders of this
rebellion were Sarkar, Dirjinarayan, Manjar Shah, Devi Chaudhrani, Musa
Shah and Bhavani Pathak. The crippling Bengal Famine of 1770 and the
restrictions placed on Sanyasis were the main causes of this rebellion. The
rebellious sanyasis were religious mendicants, but basically, they were
peasant cultivators whose lands had been snatched away from them. The
ever-increasing problems in farming, increasing land revenue and the
famine drove a number of peasants, employees, retired army men and poor
villagers to join the sanyasi groups. These rebels used to roam the coun-
tryside in Bihar and Bengal, in groups of 5000-7000 and used to employ
guerrilla tactics to attack the officials and the rich, plunder their homes and
their food stocks.
16
Local zamindars and peasants, led by Titu Mir (Syed Mir Nisar Ali), started
an agitation against the Company and Indigo traders in Bengal, in 24 Par-
ganas, Faridpur and Nadia. They declared these areas liberated from British
rule and set up their own administration there. In 1831, the British quelled
this rebellion and killed Titu Mir. Titu Mir is still an icon among peasantry
in both parts of Bengal, East and West. A university has been founded in his
memory in Dhaka.
17
Due of the implementation of the Permanent Settlement (land revenue sys-
tem) in the province of Bengal, a new and empowered class of zamindars
or land owners and merchants arose who started exploiting the members
of the Kol tribal community physically and financially. In 1831, the Kols,
under the leadership of Budhu Bhagat, Joa Bhagat and Madara Mahto, re-
belled against the non-adivasis. The toiling class of Kol tribals were forced
into labour and their womenfolk forced to work in the houses of the za-
mindars and rich merchants. Land tilled and controlled by Kol adivasis for
centuries was ‘distributed’ by the East India Company among non-adivasis.
The agitators destroyed the property of non-adivasi zamindars, merchants
and moneylenders, looted the government treasury and attacked courts and
police stations. In the end, realising the seriousness of the situation, a large
unit of the Army was sent and the uprising was mercilessly crushed. A large
number of Kols were killed.
18
Under the leadership of the Santhal Adivasi, Sidho Kanha, in this rebellion,
20,000 people were martyred and this was the largest human sacrifice of
the Indian Freedom Movement. This combative Santhal rebellion shook the
British administration to its foundations. Hence, the British enslaved 50,000
Santhals and perforce took them, via the river route, to areas like Assam
and Darjeeling, to work as bonded labour on tea plantations. En route, thou-
sands of Adivasis died of starvation and cholera. This was the beginning
of forced displacement by the ruling class, displacement which continues
unchecked in Independent India today. Even today, lakhs of deprived, poor
people are forced to go to cities in search of work and return to their villag-
es during the harvest season. Digambar and Vishnu Biswas,
19
During this rebellion of the Indian peasant-cultivators against the British
indigo merchants started in September 1859 in the Govindpur village of
Nadia district in Bengal, then spread to areas like Nadia, Pabna, Khulna,
Dhaka, Malda, Dinajpur etc. The British Government had to bow before
this rebellion and in 1860, indigo farming stopped completely. Under the
Dadani System, the British officials used to take land from the local zamin-
dars (land owning cultivators) in Bengal and Bihar and force cultivators to
grow indigo there without being paid. Indigo-producing cultivators were
paid a minimal amount as advance and compelled to sign a contract, at a
price which was way below the market prices. The peasants were keen on
growing paddy on their fertile land.
20
The peasants rebelled against their exploitation by the absentee landlords.
Ishan Chandra Rai, Shambhu Pal and Khudi Mallah were the main leaders
of this rebellion. As a result of this uprising, the Bengal Tenancy Act was
passed in 1885.A Peasants’ Union was first formed, public meetings organ-
ised, some peasants declared their parganas to be-independent from za-
mindari control and tried to set up a local government also. They raised an
army to deal with the lathi-wielding henchmen of the zamindars and money
was raised through donations to fight the zamindars legally. They decided
not to pay their tenancy rent for some time. This uprising spread to far flung
areas like Dhaka, Maiman Singh, Tripura, Rajshahi, and Faridpur.
21
In the Poona and Ahmednagar districts of Maharashtra, exploitation by Gu-
jarati and Marwari moneylenders, the more privileged communities from
among the trading classes and castes, hailing from the regions of mod-
ern-day Gujarat and Rajasthan. The turning point was in December 1874,
when a moneylender in Kardah village of Shirur district obtained an attach-
ment warrant from the court for the auction of the house of a farmer (Baba
Sahib Deshmukh). In response, the farmers started an agitation against the
moneylenders and began entering their houses to burn their account books.
By 1875, this uprising had spread to other parts, led by Vasudev Balwant
Phadke.
22
In the Kamrup and Dirang districts of Assam, under the new revenue laws,
Land Tax increased by 50-70%; to protest against this, many public gath-

erings were organised under the leadership of rural people to discuss the
issue of non-payment of land taxes. Those paying their land taxes would
be ostracised. This was perhaps the first example of the use of boycott and
ostracism in a rebellion.
23
Here, the Adivasi hero, Birsa Munda led a historic uprising against the British
in Chhota Nagpur (Ranchi), which continued for the next five years as a
guerrilla war. This revolt united all the Adivasis in region.
24
India’s Struggle for Independence, Visuals and Documents, NCERT, 1986,
GL Adhya, Arjun Dev, Indira Arjun Dev, SK Chaddha
25
Ironically in ‘Independent India’, first in 1964 and then in 1976 these van
panchayats were placed under the Forest department!
26
The movement started as an opposition to two acts brought by the British,
The Colonisation Act and the Doab Bari Act, aimed at grabbing the land of
the farmers, illegal extortion of taxes and usury by money lenders.
27
Since the mid-19th century, movements for social justice and caste exclusions
had emerged in different parts of India, most noticeable in the regions that
come to be known as Maharashtra, Karnataka, Punjab. Even as momentum
was building against colonial rule, articulations against home-grown caste
and feudal hegemonies were being voiced. Jyotiba Phule’s Satyashodhak
Sangh, Savitribai Phule setting up the first all-Girls school in Bhidewada,
Pune (1848) where her first teacher-colleague was Fatima Shaikh are all
powerful symbols of this struggle.
28
The KPSS was originally established by Anant Chitre, a caste-Hindu fol-
lower of Ambedkar. Within a few months of its establishment, the KPSS
became a significant mass-based peasants’ organisation in the Konkan
region. In the first ever pamphlet published by the Shetkari Sangh, which
subsequently appeared in Ambedkar’s newspaper, Janata, the goals of
the organisation were clearly articulated.
29
Published first in 1946 as a doctoral thesis, AR Desai Social Background of
Indian Nationalism, 2011, Paperback edition
30
The demand was for land re-distribution to the tiller.
31
As part of this movement, hundreds of sharecroppers harvested their crops
and brought them back to their own storage places. Months before Indepen-
dence, on January 4, 1947, in the village of Talpukur (Chirirbandar area),
Dinajpur district, police fired on a peaceful protest by farmers, killing a
landless labourer, Sameeruddin and a Santhal, Shivram. This killing by the
colonial police was met with a powerful resistance that has become part of
local legend. Out to arrest leaders of the uprising, the police was met with
over 500 people who captured a policeman and pierced his body with their
arrows! Known as the ‘Chirirbander Incident’, there was systemic retalia-
tion a month later, when, despite contestation and resistance, on February
20, the infamous Khanpur firing by police claimed the lives of 22 farm-
er-martyrs.
32
https://advocatetanmoy.com/2018/06/24/bargadar-law-relating-to-under-west-
bengal-land-reform-act-1955/
33
Agrarian Politics and Rural Development in West Bengal, Sunil Sengupta,
Harisn Gazdar, Oxford University press, Scholarship Online
34
The main objective of this Act was the abolition of the zamindari system and
the redistribution of land among the landless cultivators so that the pur-
chasing capacity of labourers would increase. The zamindars retained some
rights; they would get compensated for the land taken from them. Each
state was mandated to pass laws for the abolition of the zamindari system
and the redistribution of land.
35
Under this, trading of the land belonging to a scheduled tribe with a person of
another community is prohibited. Schedule V is in operation in the Special
Areas of eight states. Among the North eastern states, except Arunachal
Pradesh, Schedule VI is operational in different areas of the other states.
The Governors of these states have been given special powers to protect
these special rights of the tribals. However, in spite of the rights of the
scheduled tribes being constantly violated in these states, Governors en-
trusted with enforcing the rights under these Schedules, actually protected
the interests of ruling elites, and have never exercised their power to step in
when infringements have taken place.
36
This effectively meant that, on the eve of India’s Independence, before the
Constitution could come into force, the forest department had already read-
ied a scheme of establishing its hegemony over almost all the forest land
of the country. This move made the Forest Department the single largest
landowner in India.
37
The management of commercial activities related to forest produce –tradi-
tionally held and controlled by the indigenous peoples before the advent of
colonial rule --was now handed over to the forest department. Huge profits
were earned through the Forest Corporation and its contractors, and the
financial activities of the Forest Corporation relating to this income were
kept out of the purview of public scrutiny, meaning the Comptroller Auditor
General of India (CAG).
38
After independence, in the name of national development, the government
acquired land from the jungles and the adivasis for several development
projects such as construction of dams on rivers, industrial projects, mining
and road construction, setting up of national parks and Project Tiger. Mass
displacement was the result. From 1947-1990, over about 40 years, more
than 7 crore people had been displaced (at present, this figure stands at over
10 crore), most of them being SCs/STs (66%). Only27% of this population
has got the promised rehabilitation and compensation, 73% of them have
not received any compensation. A huge sacrifice at the altar of national
development coupled with mass impoverishment.
39
The main objective of the law – which was to strengthen the peasant-cultiva-
tors – fell by the wayside. Hence, though some cultivators, whose names
were registered in tenancy records, managed to get some pieces of land, the
rest, about 25-30% of agricultural labourers, whose names did not figure in
the tenancy records, did not get any land and remained, after Independence,

deprived of their land rights. Predictably, these were largely households
belonging to India’s SC/ST (Scheduled Caste/Scheduled Tribes) and
Extremely Backward Castes. On the other hand, after tampering with the
records, the zamindars and the middlemen maintained their hold over land:
a lot of land that was declared benaami (land controlled by landlords but
held in the name of unknown persons) property but was actually controlled
by landlords.
40
The government launched the Bhoo-Daan Andolan (Land Donation Move-
ment) to distribute land to the landless. Under this scheme, the zamindars
were encouraged to donate the extra land. However, this programme was
not successful because a majority of the members of the various commit-
tees set up to co-ordinate and implement it belonged to the landowning
class.
41
As a result, though land was re-allotted in the names of the landless labourers,
they rarely, if ever, got possession of the land. Even in a large state like Ut-
tar Pradesh, the landless got full ownership rights over barely 1.66% of the
potentially redistributed land i.e. over less than 2%. The rest has been mired
in endless litigation. Even today, there are hundreds of thousands of cases
pending in the High Courts, where the government, and not the people, is a
party. The complete absence of political will dictates this inaction.
42
Under this scheme, people got the lease on paper but about 50% of the
lessees did not get possession of the land: those who had the lease did not
have possession of the land and those who possessed the land did not have
the lease! Without an effective political programme of action, such schemes
were bound to fail and did fail.
43
https://feminisminindia.com/2020/11/02/bodhgaya-movement-bihars-dalit-
women-equal-land-rights/
44
In this area of Bodhgaya, Shankar Math, a religious establishment, had
illegally expanded the 150 acres of land received from the descendants
of Sher Shah Suri to become a zamindar or landowner of over 1500 acres
of agricultural and non-agricultural land. On these lands, Dalits, mainly
Bhuiyan (Musahar) Dalits, worked as bonded labour. The men and women
of this landless Dalit community carried out the struggle for the Bodhgaya
Land Rights Movement.
45
https://frontline.thehindu.com/social-issues/social-justice/how-dalit-lands-
were-stolen/article23595691.ece
46
After the success of this movement, a Dalit Land Rights Federation has been
set up at the state level to look into the issue of land rights for Dalits. C.
Nicholas, convenor of Dalit Land Rights Federation, cited information
obtained under the RTI Act to contend that over 18,400 acres of land in
Cuddalore and Villupuram districts were Panchama lands. He alleged that
the Updating Registry Scheme (URS) had done more harm than good to the
Dalits. Under the scheme, he claimed that in 1984, the lands were illegally
transferred to private individuals and titles registered in their name. (https://
www.thehindu.com/news/national/tamil-nadu/panchami-whose-land-is-it-
anyway/article29995102.ece)
47
In Villupuram district, about 100 women’s groups were formed in 40 villages
to start this programme; today there are about 200 such groups.
48
https://www.iss.nl/sites/corporate/files/2017-11/BICAS%20CP%205-51%20
Kumar%20and%20Lieberherr.pdf
49
https://www.epw.in/journal/2016/47/commentary/dalit-emancipa-
tion-and-land-question.html
50
http://www.censusindia.gov.in/2011census/B-series/B_7.html
51
https://www.indiaspend.com/dalit-battles-for-promised-lands-rage-across-
india/
52
A series of six departmental circulars by the secretary in the ministry of
environment, SR Shankaran that recognised the need to enlist this partic-
ipation was the first official recognition of this need. What then followed
is the proverbial ping pong with the forest department that was simply not
prepared to accept this. First with the World Bank funded Joint Forest Man-
agement Programme in select states from 1991-92, a scheme for planting of
fast-growing trees for commercial timber was initiated and it failed. Then
the Forest Department tried another such programme with the help of the
Japanese firm, JICA. But, due to the previous experience, the local commu-
nities showed no interest and JICA’s programme was also unsuccessful.
53
Comrade D. Thankappan took the lead in this.
54
The definition of Forest People and Forest Worker was expounded by the
famous litterateur, Dr.B.K.Roy Burman, which was later used in its report
by the Second Labour Commission (2001).
55
Where 500 delegates from the forest dwelling communities and delegates
from the three main South Asian nations (viz. Pakistan, Bangladesh and
Nepal), decided to transform the Forum for Forest People and Forest Work-
ers into the All India Union/Forum for Forest People and Forest Workers
(AIUFWP).
56
Displacement caused by the neo-liberal economic policies of 1991.
57
Despite the policies adopted by the government in the 1990s and the decades
that followed, mass mobilisation among the people against the growing
inequality in society and the new-liberal policies of the government aborted
many proposed government schemes: for example, 500 important SEZ
projects belonging to Reliance and other companies, covering thousands of
acres, had to be cancelled due to protests by the people; new power plants
with a total generation capacity of about 500 GW, which would have led to
the destruction of thousands of acres of land, water bodies and forests, had
to be called off due to people’s protests.
58
This was the first time post-Independence that a minority government led by
the proto-fascist Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) through its parlia-
mentary wing the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) assumed power in India,
riding on the back of a violent majoritarian movement and also years after
India adopted an aggressive neo-liberal economic regime abandoning its
commitment to a welfare state and social justice for all Indians.

59
On February 13, 2019, the Supreme Court suddenly pronounced a regressive
order in an on-going case challenging the constitutional validity of the 2006
FRA. Out of turn, without hearing adivasis and forest dwellers who are
the affected parties, 21,00,000 people, whose claims had been dismissed–
due to bureaucratic non-application of mind and ineptitude – would stand
displaced from their lands. This directive not only violated the statutory
premise of the Forest Rights Act, because this Act is intended to settle the
forest dwelling communities, not to displace them, but revealed that even
a constitutional court like the Supreme Court had developed little appreci-
ation of the historical vision behind the passage of such an emancipatory
law. It was only after widespread protests by the entire country that, barely
ten days after it passed its controversial order, on February 27, 2019, the
Supreme Court stayed its operation. Even when the Supreme Court tried to
block the implementation of the Act, it was compelled to backtrack on this
issue by mass protests.
60
United Progressive Alliance
61
The Joint Parliamentary Committee (JPC) played a major role in formulating
this historic Act.
62
Not just this; post 2004, people’s struggles forced the parliament to pass
many progressive laws like Right to Information Act, MNREGA, Forest
Rights Act, Revised Land Acquisition Amendments Act 2013, National
Food Security Act, Protection of Women Against Domestic Violence Act.
63
https://cjp.org.in/forest-land-claims-filed-in-chitrakoot-cjp-and-aiufwp-make-
history/; Forest Land Claims filed in Chitrakoot: AIUFWP and CJP make
history! Claims filed for eight villages, 10 more in the pipeline.
64
https://cjp.org.in/cjp-webinar-on-forest-rights-testimonies-from-grassroot-ac-
tivists/; CJP webinar on Forest Rights: Testimonies from Grassroot Activ-
ists. In Part 3 of our report on the CJP webinar, activists strike a hopeful
chord; https://cjp.org.in/legal-muscle-to-defend-forest-rights/; Legal muscle
to defend Forest Rights Day 2 of CJP webinar sheds light on laws and their
implementation; https://cjp.org.in/forest-rights-and-covid-19-through-
the-eyes-of-up-and-uttarakhand-grassroot-activists/; Forest Rights and
Covid-19: Through the eyes of UP and Uttarakhand grassroot activists Part-
1 of CJP’s webinar reveals how authorities are abusing their power to usurp
rights of forest dwellers. https://cjp.org.in/forest-rights-act-2006-training/;
65
https://sabrangindia.in/article/sokalo-gond-and-nivada-rana-move-sc-de-
manding-forest-rights; Sokalo Gond and Nivada Rana move SC demanding
forest rights
66
https://cjp.org.in/forest-rights-van-gujjar-family-released-on-bail-after-custo-
dial-assault/ Forest Rights: Van Gujjar family released on bail, after custo-
dial assault, CJP and AIUFWP writes formal complaint to NHRC; https://
cjp.org.in/why-did-bihar-police-open-fire-on-kaimur-adivasis/; Why did
Bihar police open fire on Kaimur Adivasis? Findings of report co-published
by AIUFWP, CJP and DSG; https://cjp.org.in/tharu-women-allege-as-
sault-in-dudhwa-fir-registered/; Tharu women allege assault in Dudhwa,
FIR registered. Amid lockdown, forest working people are being repeatedly
harassed by forest officials; https://cjp.org.in/adivasi-women-attacked-in-
up-cjp-aiufwp-move-nhrc/; Adivasi women attacked in UP, CJP-AIUFWP
move NHRC Forest officials brandishing rifles allegedly molest Tharu
women in broad daylight, assault youngsters.
67
https://cjp.org.in/roma-unbowed-unbroken-unbent/; Roma: Unbowed, Unbro-
ken, Unbent Human Rights Defender Profile
68
https://cjp.org.in/sokalo-gond-adivasi-warrior-who-defends-her-people/;
Sokalo Gond: Adivasi warrior who defends her people. Human Rights
Defender; https://cjp.org.in/rajkumari-bhuiya-songs-as-her-tool-sonbhadra-
forest-rights-leader-marches-on/; Rajkumari Bhuiya: Songs as her tool,
Sonbhadra Forest Rights leader marches on Human Rights Defender Pro-
file; https://cjp.org.in/a-dalit-womans-resilience-forms-the-bedrock-of-the-
forest-rights-struggle-in-sonbhadra/; Shobha: A Dalit woman’s struggle for
Forest Rights in Sonbhadra Human Rights Defender Profile; https://cjp.org.
in/free-sukalo-and-kismatiya-now/; Free Sokalo and Kismatiya NOW CJP
and AIUFWP move Allahabad HC; https://cjp.org.in/kismatiya-and-sukh-
dev-free/; Kismatiya and Sukhdev Released.
69
Migrant Diaries: https://cjp.org.in/tag/migrant-diaries/; https://cjp.org.in/
migrant-diaries-a-cjp-special-series/
This Land is Their Land

A Revolutionary Working People’s History
Of the United States
By George Gruenthal
A brief, 130 pages, working people’s history of the United

States from the wars against the Native Peoples to the War of Terror
against the peoples of the world. Each of the 38 chapters is short,
with illustrations and songs.
The cost is $5 to the author, postage included within the United
States. For postage from other countries please contact the author:
georgeg0626@hotmail.com
The cost is $5 to the author, postage included within the United
States. For postage from other countries please contact the author:
georgeg0626@hotmail.com
George Gruenthal
192 Claremont Ave., #5D
New York, NY 10027

THE BRICS MEETING AND
THE INTER-IMPERIALIST STRUGGLES
En Marcha
Between August 22 and 24, the XV BRICS Summit was held in Johan-
nesburg, South Africa, a bloc made up of Brazil, Russia, India, China
and South Africa.
This association of countries that emerged in 2008 as a parallel struc-
ture to the G7 (Germany, Canada, United States, France, Italy, Japan
and United Kingdom), has been trying to consolidate itself and, at this
meeting, the incorporation of six new members was approved: Argenti-
na, Egypt, Iran, United Arab Emirates, Saudi Arabia and Ethiopia; whose
participation will begin on January 1, 2024.
This meeting cannot be analyzed without taking a political position
on the stage in which humanity is living today. Imperialism is highly
developed and concentrated capitalism, whose essence is the emergence
of monopolies, cartels and economic groups that concentrate capital and
commodities. This confrontation leads the imperialist powers to contest
influence over markets, which leads to strong trade wars, and which in
several cases even converge into great conflagrations.
The resolutions taken by the BRICS show the strengthening of the
bloc within the framework of the contest between the imperialist powers.
It is not the emergence of a counter-power to the hegemony of the North,
as many revisionists, Trotskyite and “progressive governments” point
out. It is not a model for independent development of the peoples, it is
an anchor of several countries to the imperialist powers such as China
and Russia.
Among the main elements identified in the final declaration are: (a)
Strengthening of the coordinated macroeconomic measures and promot-
ing local instruments of payment as opposed to the dollar; b) Reform of
multilateral institutions such as the UN Security Council, as well as re-
form of the International Monetary Fund and World Bank; (c) Strength-
ening of the New Bank of Development, joined by Bangladesh, Egypt
and the United Arab Emirates; (d) Reiteration of their national positions
on the war in Ukraine and taking note of proposals for mediation for the
peaceful settlement of the conflict. From this summary, it is worth high-
lighting the incentive to local currencies for the payment of international
commercial transactions, an option that aims to build a BRICS currency
that is not tied to the interest rates of the Federal Reserve of the United
States.
The BRICS resolutions show the strengthening of the partnership at a
time when China is beginning a process of economic slowdown and re-
quires a market to increase its investments. The same is happening with
India and Russia, which is why this meeting allows for the strengthening
of these mechanisms in the contest for the markets that these imperial-
ist powers (China and Russia), have been carrying out with the United
States. Therefore, they [the United States] do not like the idea of de-dol-
larizing the world economy so that the yuan and the ruble can become
more broadly means of circulation and they do not need to depend on
Washington’s fiscal policies.
While it is true that the new additions can mean an advance in Chi-
nese influence, they also aggravate the management of agreements
because the heterogeneity of the bloc can create contradictions, since
countries such as Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates are clearly
subordinate to the United States.
It must be clearly seen that this association does not represent an
alternative for the workers and peoples of the world. On the contrary,
we must put an end to imperialism and capitalism, sweep away their
institutions and, on their ashes, build a society without exploited and
exploiters.

AN INTERVIEW OF QEMAL CICOLLARI,
GENERAL SECRETARY OF THE
COMMUNIST PARTY OF ALBANIA
Thales Caramante
In 1992 the end of socialism in Albania came. For a long time this small
country in the Balkan region, on the Adriatic Sea, was the beacon of
socialism for the world, for hundreds of Marxist-Leninist parties and or-
ganizations and peoples who fought against oppression and who, always
anxiously, marvelled at the transformations created by the November
1944 revolution led by the Communist Party of Albania (PKSH) with
comrade Enver Hoxha at the head. We interviewed the current Secre-
tary-General of the Communist Party, Qemal Cicollari, to give us an
overview of the past and present of that country which, throughout its
history, has always been surrounded and occupied by its enemies, but
has never abandoned the revolutionary banner of national independence
and socialism.
Thales Caramante
Journal A Verdade
***
Could I introduce you, comrade? I would also like to take this op-
portunity to say that there is a lot of misunderstanding in Brazil
about the fall of socialism in Albania. What are the essential factors
to understand about the end of socialism in that country?
Before giving answers to all the questions, I would like to introduce
myself briefly to the Brazilian comrades and readers of the newspaper A
Verdade. My name is Qemal Cicollari, I am the Chair of the Communist
Party of Albania (PKSH). Our party is faithfully guided by the revolu-
tionary and scientific doctrine of Marxism-Leninism and the teachings
of Marx, Engels, Lenin and Stalin. The PKSH was born on September 1,
1991, founded by the comrades known as The Enver Volunteers, led by
comrade Hysni Milloshi.
To your first question, comrade, it is natural that numerous misun-
derstandings will arise in your country regarding the fall of socialism in
Albania. I believe that this fact has to do not only with the lack of reliable
information among the Brazilian comrades and people in general, but is
also linked also to the furious anti-communist crusade of the imperialist
bourgeoisie and the opportunist revisionists against Marxism-Leninism,
socialism, its achievements and comrade Enver Hoxha. I would like to
express, in this interview, the principled Marxist-Leninist position of the
PKSH in relation to this question of fundamental importance not only for
the communist movement in Albania, but also for the entire international
communist movement.
After the death of Enver Hoxha, socialism in Albania was over-
thrown due to a process of degeneration starting with the revisionist be-
trayal of the liberal-revisionist leadership of the former Party of Labour
of Albania (PLA), led by the revisionist and traitor Ramiz Alia. This fact
was affirmed by the PKSH in an open statement to the whole world, from
its creation on September 1, 1991.
Socialism in Albania was overthrown by a bourgeois and revision-
ist counter-revolution. To better understand the causes of the overthrow
of socialism in Albania, I think it is necessary to present, very briefly, the
history of the overthrow of socialism throughout the world. The bitter
and sad historical experience of the fall of socialism in the world shows
us, very clearly, that the imperialist bourgeoisie uses two ways to try to
overthrow socialism.
The first mode was characterized by open armed aggression against
the socialist countries, such as the intervention of the fourteen imperi-
alist countries against Lenin shortly after the Great October Socialist
Revolution; we also have the experience of the Great Patriotic War, the
aggression of the Hitlerite Nazis and their satellites against the Soviet
Union of the great comrade Stalin. At other times we also had the armed
invasion by US imperialism, British imperialism against the Democratic
People’s Republic of Korea, Vietnam etc.
The second mode was the “peaceful” path of bourgeois and revi-
sionist counter-revolution within the party itself. This method reached
the centre of the socialist countries, being orchestrated mainly by the
former Soviet Union with Nikita Khrushchev at the head. Historical ex-
perience has shown us very clearly that the second method, acting from
within and “peacefully”, through the road of counter-revolution, was
able to overthrow socialism.
Thus, we will focus briefly on the main causes that led to the over-
throw of socialism in Albania. These causes have an objective and sub-
jective character, internal and external. The causes are, according to the
Communist Party in Albania (PKSH):
— The significant increase in the pressure of imperialism and revi-
sionism against socialist Albania after the death of comrade Enver Hox-
ha. This condition caused the leadership of the former Party of Labor of
Albania (PLA), with the revisionist Ramiz Alia at its head, to capitulate
to this imperialist and revisionist pressure, which led to the birth and
spread of anti-communism in Albania.
—The increase in imperialist pressure was stirred up by the rem-
nants of the old feudal-bourgeois classes defeated by socialism, it was
also stirred up by the most vacillating and degenerate elements that
chose to ally themselves with the international imperialist bourgeoisie.
This imperialist pressure created fissures in the country that allowed for
foreign interference, so that petty bourgeois and petty-bourgeois cells
would take the consciousness of social life into the individual conscious-
ness of the people; the refusal to broaden the revolutionary class struggle
by the PLA, with the revisionist Ramiz Alia at its head, led to allowing
imperialism to roll back the advance of socialist consciousness of the
people in Albania.
— The disintegration of the revolutionary consciousness led the
former PLA, with the revisionist Ramiz Alia at its head, to degenerate
and renounce the revolutionary and scientific doctrine of Marxism-Le-
ninism. The old PLA did the same with the teachings of comrade En-
ver Hoxha. Ramiz Alia took advantage of the difficult circumstances
in which Albania found itself after the death of comrade Enver Hoxha.
Under the pretext of “facilitating” and “avoiding” the life of the people,
Ramiz Alia and his group of liberals undertook a series of liberal and re-
visionist policies, presenting their measures as “a political development
of Marxism in the face of the new conditions,” as policies “loyal to the
path of Enver.”
Ramiz Alia promoted the spirit of liberalism within the party, the
state and throughout social life under the pretext of reforms necessary
for the “expansion of the democratization of the life of the country”, ac-
cording to the model of Perestroika and Glasnost of Mikhail Gorbachev
according to the concrete conditions of the Albania. As a result of these
“democratic” liberal reforms, the process of revisionist degeneration of
the party, the socialist state, socialist relations of production, the whole
political, economic, ideological and social life of Albania began, just as
had happened to the former Soviet Union after the death of the great Sta-
lin, when the infamous revisionist Nikita Khrushchev and his revisionist
gang and later Brezhnev came to power and placed themselves at the
head of the old Bolshevik Party and the Soviet state.
Ramiz Alia, in order to achieve his revisionist and counter-revo-
lutionary goal of ending socialism and restoring capitalism in Albania,
took decisive steps to make the Party of Labour of Albania (PLA) degen-
erate up to its foundations. To achieve this goal, he encouraged and sup-
ported, through various means, the spreading of the spirit of bourgeois
liberalism in the domestic life and political activity of the PLA under the
pretext of “democratizing” the internal life of the party, of finding “new
ways” to advance in the “socialist” construction by the way of “comrade
Enver.” These actions led to the violation of Marxist ideological prin-
ciples and their Leninist norms. As a result of this liberal spirit in the
party, the conditions were created for the birth of the opportunist and re-
visionist spirit in its ranks and, consequently, of the complete revisionist
degeneration of the PLA. He encouraged the petty-bourgeois, liberal and
bureaucratic spirit in the committees and leading bodies of the PLA. He
sought to introduce and manoeuvre the liberal and opportunist elements
into leading positions of the party and state, gradually purged the cadres
who were opposing his policy, his opinions, his liberal and opportunist
attitudes. Thus, also gradually, the Central Committee and Political Bu-
reau of the former PLA degenerated from its foundations into opportun-
ist and revisionist tendencies. In this way, step by step, the whole party,
in a period of less than half a decade, degenerated to the revisionist line.
This is the main reason why the former PLA did not resist and openly
oppose the open betrayal of Ramiz Alia and his counter-revolutionary
revisionist gang. In this catastrophic way, the overthrow of socialism
and the restoration of “democracy,” that is, capitalism, became a reality
in Albania in the 1990s.
This is the reason why the former PLA of Ramiz Alia did not do
a thing for the masses to protect the Enver Hoxha Monument, violently
torn down by the anti-communist and counter-revolutionary forces; this
is the reason why Ramiz Alia’s former PLA did not oppose the transfor-
mation of the Party of Labour of Albania (PLA) into the Socialist Party
(PS), with a social-democratic programme dominated by the bourgeoi-
sie; this is the reason why no communist organization from the base of
Ramiz Alia’s PLA came to build the new Communist Party of Albania
(PKSH) that was re-established after the open betrayal.
The revisionist degeneration of the former PLA, the socialist state
and the dictatorship of the proletariat in Albania, begun after the death of

comrade Enver Hoxha in 1985, was crowned by Ramiz Alia in the late
1990s with the official proclamation of “political pluralism”, the “mar-
ket economy”, in other words, the most reactionary Western capitalism.
Thus, the period after the death of comrade Enver Hoxha, from 1985 to
1991,was the period of the bourgeois-revisionist “peaceful” counter-rev-
olution; it is the period of capitalism masquerading as socialism. In this
way, the overthrow of socialism in Albania did not occur by chance or
spontaneously, like lightning. Socialism in Albania was not overthrown
by way of open imperialist armed aggression, the overthrow of socialism
in Albania was a “peaceful” counter-revolutionary political project from
its leading organs, by the former PLA with Ramiz Alia at the head.
The overthrow of socialism in Albania, the former Soviet Union,
China and the other socialist countries was a tragedy for the international
communist and workers’ movement, but it was not a fatal one. From the
point of view of the historical development of society, there has been
social regression, because we find ourselves with a temporary barrier
to social development; there has been a reversal from a higher econom-
ic-social order, socialism, to a lower economic-social order, capitalism.
These setbacks in the development of society also occurred in the
pre-socialist economic-social orders. The history of human social devel-
opment shows us that, although barbarians occasionally destroy entire
civilizations, despite setbacks in which society passed from a higher stage
of that development to feudalism; the restoration of the feudal Bourbon
aristocracy in France was not able to paralyze historical development,
and finally the new capitalist order finally overcame the old feudal order.
In this way, the historical setback that struck the old socialist countries is
temporary, after all the new communist order will finally conquer the old
capitalist order. This is an objective law of the development of society.
Economic and social development cannot be stopped. We communists,
led by Marxist-Leninist science, by historical and dialectical material-
ism, cannot fail to accept and understand, we cannot close our eyes to
the temporary and partial historical turns of the development of society
that occur in concrete reality. No, we will never fall into pessimism, we
must understand the dialectical essence of the process of development,
between progress and regression. In this regard, the great Lenin said that
“to imagine world history as progress that advances uninterruptedly,
without obstacles and without care, without hope, often without turns, is
not dialectical, is not scientific, theoretically it is not correct.”
Comrade Enver Hoxha also stated: “The struggle against impe-
rialism, for the triumph of the proletarian cause, shows that the world
revolutionary process does not develop and cannot develop on a single
path, always on the offensive. History is full of zig-zags, ups and downs,
offensive and defensive, temporary successes and defeats. This is an ob-
jective law of social development.”
The Albanian communists, guided by Marxist-Leninist science,
have not fallen and will never fall into pessimism, regardless of the his-
torical turns that have occurred since the overthrow of socialism and the
restoration of capitalism in our country. We are guided, in this regard, by
the slogan of the father of scientific socialism, Karl Marx, who says that
“if we are defeated, we have no choice but to start all over again.”
The Communist Party of Albania (PKSH), guided by Marxist-Le-
ninist science, has fought and will continue to fight to overthrow the
old oppressive and exploitative capitalist order with a new proletarian
revolution and to restore a new socialist and communist order in Albania,
without oppression and exploitation of man by man, as in the time of the
great comrade Enver Hoxha.
At the 9th Party Congress, comrade Adil Çarçani pointed out in

his report a series of economic problems that the country faced for
the fulfillmentof the8th Five-Year Plan that marked the policy of
self-sufficiency. Do you think that these economic deficiencies were
fundamental to the fall of socialism in Albania?
Undoubtedly the country faced great and varied economic difficul-
ties of an objective and subjective character, internal and external. So-
cialist Albania was a small country with about three million inhabitants
and with a very limited economic potential under the great pressure of
the siege of the imperialist-revisionist blockade, which fought day and
night to overthrow socialism in Albania. But even under these condi-
tions, socialist Albania, with comrade Enver Hoxha at the head, always
fought and won! This was a great revolutionary experience of how so-
cialism can be defended and built on the basis of its own forces.
Despite the difficult circumstances that arose after the death of En-
ver Hoxha and his absence, the country still had every opportunity to de-
fend and further build socialism. The great comrade Enver Hoxha created
and inherited a great socialist economic base; under his leadership it was
possible to develop our country in all fields. However, the construction
and protection of the socialist system in Albania required fidelity to the
basic principles of Marxist-Leninist science, with its creative application
with its base in the masses and according to the concrete conditions of
the time. However, as we know, the old PLA, with the revisionist Ramiz
Alia at the head, betrayed Marxist-Leninist science and Enver Hoxha.
Economic difficulties, therefore, were not essential to the fall of so-
cialism in Albania. The difficulties served the Albanian revisionist trai-
tors as a pretext to deny and corrupt socialist relations of production and
overthrow socialism in our country. Thus, despite weaknesses or certain
inadequacies that arose, socialism in Albania could have been defended
and paths built according to the fundamental principles of Marxist-Le-
ninist science and the teachings of comrade Enver Hoxha.
Is it true that after the fall of socialism and the coup d’état of Sali
Berisha (PD), the country erupted into a civil war in 1997 for the
return of the socialist system? Why was the party not able to partic-
ipate in the popular armed uprising and make the socialist system
again a reality in Albania? Do you consider that the party was divid-
ed during the Civil War period in 1997? What would have been the
correct way forward?
In 1997, mainly in southern Albania, an armed popular uprising
broke out. Our evaluation is that it is not true that this popular revolt
took place in order to return socialism in our country. The cause of this
popular revolt was actually a demonstration against the widespread theft
of public money through the neoliberal pyramid schemes created by the
reactionary and neo-fascist bourgeois government of Sali Berisha. The
popular insurrection, especially through its main leaders, was manipulat-
ed by the bourgeois Socialist Party (PS), at the time led by Fatos Nano.
The revolt demanded the return of the money stolen by the pyramid
schemes, the end of the reactionary and neo-fascist bourgeois regime
of Sali Berisha and its replacement by the Socialist Party (PS) of Fatos
Nano, as he promised to return the stolen money. This popular insurrec-
tion, more precisely its political leaders, did not demand the return of
socialism in Albania or the re-establishment of people’s power. Thus, the
armed popular uprising of 1997 in Albania had a bourgeois-democratic
character.
The Communist Party of Albania (PKSH), at the time of the pop-
ular uprising in March 1997, was in deep illegality. In July 1991, the
bourgeois, neo-fascist and anti-communist state of Sali Berisha decreed
the illegality of our party, something that was only revised in July 1998.
Even in the difficult conditions of illegality, the PKSH actively partici-
pated in the popular insurrection, guiding the overthrow of the reaction-
ary regime of Sali Berisha. We can say, with great honour, that we were
very active in this struggle. We fought with all our might on the side of
the people and took every opportunity that the moment would support
and stimulate the deepening of the popular revolt and advance the dis-
cussion of its political programme. At the time of the armed insurrection,
we judged that sufficiently mature subjective conditions—as opposed to
the objective conditions, internal and external—did not exist to carry out
a new socialist revolution.
The Communist Party of Albania (PKSH), guided by Marxist-Le-
ninist science, made a profound analysis of this popular insurrection.
We have seen, in this popular revolt, its bourgeois-democratic character.
That is why the PKSH did not allow itself to be deceived about a pro-
letarian revolution in March 1997 in Albania; in our opinion this would
have led us to fall into a position of left adventurism. So, in short, it was
not that the PKSH in 1997 did not want to lead a proletarian revolution
in Albania, but that the conditions for the revolution simply did not exist,
that is the truth; then, we were not divided during the popular insurrec-
tion of 1997, the path that the PKSH had to follow was followed by all
its members.
After the civil war the party splits into several factions? What pre-
vented the reunification of these organizations into a single rev-
olutionary Marxist-Leninist communist party? Do you think that
the political consequences of the fall of socialism had not yet been
overcome internally? Which path to reunification had to be followed
and what barriers overcome? There is an evident rivalry among the
prominent figures in four Communist Parties in Albania. How can
these rivalries be overcome? Do you think such rivalries are trivial
to the common struggle?
We do not believe that the PKSH has divided into fractions, in fact
this is a dirty narrative created by opportunist and factionalist elements,
unmasked and expelled from the party. They are Muharrem Xhafa, Preng
Cuni and Marko Dajti.
In order to understand the essence of this negative phenomenon,
which affects not only the communist movement in Albania but also the
international communist movement today, I think it necessary to very
briefly explain and analyze this phenomenon on the basis of Marxist-Le-
ninist science. Before moving on, I would like to present a brief picture
of the communist movement in Albania from 1991 to now.
The Communist Party of Albania (PKSH) was founded on Septem-
ber 1, 1991, under the leadership of comrade Hysni Milloshi.

In the autumn of 1998, another “communist” party was founded,
the New Party of Labor of Albania (PRPS H), led by the revisionist Mu-
harrem Xhafa, a former phantom member of the PPSH, straight out of
the offices of Ramiz Alia. We point out that Muharrem Xhafa was ex-
pelled from our party for opportunism.
On April 3, 2003, another supposedly “communist party” was le-
galized by the electoral court. Termed the Communist Party of Albania
“November 8” (PKSH8 Nëntori), it was led by Preng Cuni, a recognized
opportunist who was expelled from the PKSH.
In July 2007, another supposedly “communist” party was legalized
in the electoral court, called the Party of Labour of Albania (Reconstruct-
ed) – PPSh(R). Today this party bears the name of the “Left Front”, led
by an opportunist expelled from the PKSH.
This is the picture of the communist movement in present-day Al-
bania. Hence a question: from this negative phenomenon, what is the
consequence of many supposedly “communist” parties in a single coun-
try? To understand the essence, form and content of this deplorable phe-
nomenon in the communist movement, it is necessary to analyze it in the
light of Marxist-Leninist science.
Marxist-Leninist science teaches us that the proletariat, in order to
successfully fulfill its historical mission, to overthrow the old oppressive
and exploitative capitalist order, to build the new socialist and commu-
nist order, creates its own Marxist-Leninist party, the theoretical and po-
litical reflection of the revolution and the construction of socialism. The
revolutionary experience of the world proletariat has perfectly proved
the universality of this fundamental principle of Marxist-Leninist sci-
ence.
The victory of the Great Socialist Revolution of October 1917 and
the construction of socialism in the former Soviet Union was made pos-
sible thanks to the monolithic leadership of Marxism-Leninism and the
indivisible Communist Party (Bolshevik) of the USSR (ВКП(б) with
Lenin and Stalin at the head; and not, absolutely not, by many “commu-
nist and Bolshevik” parties.
In this way, Marxist-Leninist science teaches us the validity of
this great principle from the revolutionary experience of the proletari-
at. The existence and activity of a single Marxist-Leninist communist
party in a country is an objective premise, a key condition, a basic
general principle, an objective law of development, for the victory of the
revolution and the construction of socialism. Loyalty to this fundamen-
tal principle of Marxist-Leninist science is the cornerstone, the line of
demarcation between the true Marxist-Leninists on the one hand and the
opportunists and revisionists on the other.
Thus, the phenomenon of the existence and activity of many “com-
munist” parties in a country is a blatant and completely revisionist betray-
al of Marxist-Leninist science; it is a variant of the revisionist conception
of “communist” political pluralism. And in the same way, Marxist-Le-
ninist science teaches us that political pluralism is a system characteristic
of bourgeois and revisionist countries, which recognizes the legalization
of many communist parties, groups and political forces with different
interests and conceptions. It is a revisionist view that demands such a
social political system, capitalism. In this way, capitalism opposes the
indissoluble single leadership of the Marxist-Leninist, revolutionary and
scientific communist party. In the light of Marxist-Leninist science, it is
very clear that this revisionist variant of “communist” political pluralism
is a manifestation of bourgeois ideology in the workers’ movement; for
this is a necessary system for a bourgeoisie that is divided into several
parties with different conceptions, all defenders of the capitalist system,
whether bourgeois, petty-bourgeois, Trotskyist, “communist” parties,
etc. This is what they call “bourgeois democracy.” For these filthy revi-
sionists, anything can be “communist” and “Marxist” but communism
and Marxism. They thus try to convey the idea that the existence and
activity of many “proletarian” parties is as natural as the existence and
activity of many bourgeois parties in a single country.
The bourgeoisie is not a homogeneous class, it consists of different
strata and groups, the big bourgeoisie, the petty bourgeoisie, etc. Con-
sequently, the various bourgeois parties also represent politically every
stratum and group of the bourgeoisie. So bourgeois political pluralism,
in other words, the existence and activity of many bourgeois parties, is
a necessary phenomenon for the capitalist system. All bourgeois parties,
whether “right” or “left,” despite their various names and colours, ex-
press the same defence of the vital interests of the bourgeoisie as a ruling
class. They serve the bourgeoisie as its “chariot horses,” those that pull
the wagon into bourgeois power. The existence and activity of many
bourgeois parties has served and will continue to serve the bourgeoisie to
create illusions among the popular masses that the “alternation in pow-
er” that occurs from election to election in the capitalist countries will
radically change their tragic economic-social situation. But the history of
capitalism shows very clearly that no matter which bourgeois party rules,
nothing will change at the root of society; the bourgeois class will remain
in power, the means of production will remain the private property of the
capitalists; the bourgeoisie will continue to ruthlessly exploit the work-
ing class and the working masses.
We do not mean in any way that the proletarian class is “pure.”
From time to time our class is “disturbed” by the “recruits” who have just
entered its ranks, by elements of the petty bourgeoisie who go bankrupt
due to the capitalist tendency to strengthen the monopolies; the same
happens with other classes that gradually descend to the level of the pro-
letariat. These new “recruits” bring to the ranks of the proletariat (as the
great Lenin said) the influence of bourgeois and petty-bourgeois psy-
chology and ideology. Thus, the revisionist parties represent politically
precisely these new “recruits”, these elements of the petty bourgeoisie in
the ranks of the proletariat and the semi-proletarian strata. This is what
Marxist-Leninist science teaches.
Therefore, the content and form of “communist” political pluralism
is a concept of bourgeois and revisionist practice; it is a manifestation of
the influence of the bourgeoisie on the proletariat; it is a new variant of
the already existing and outdated bourgeois-revisionist pluralism.
In the light of Marxist-Leninist science, it is very evident that those
who create other supposedly “communist” parties in a country, when the
Marxist-Leninist party already exists in practice, do nothing but revise
Marxist-Leninist science, they are nothing but ideological and political
agents of the bourgeoisie within the communist movement; they are
nothing but filthy revisionists. On this question, the great Lenin stated:
“The revisionism of Marxism today is one of the main, if not the most
prevalent, manifestations of bourgeois influence on the proletariat and of
the rottenness of the bourgeoisiein the proletariat.”1
Clear as daylight, this teaching of the great Lenin shows that the
phenomenon of “communist” political pluralism, that is, the existence
and activity of many “communist” parties in a country, is nothing more
than a revision of Marxist-Leninist science, nothing more than blatant
revisionism. Therefore, it is very evident that Muharrem Xhafa, Preng
Cuni and Marko Dajti and their respective parties are of the revisionist
tendency.
These filthy revisionists and their revisionist parties, as the great
Lenin teaches, exert bourgeois influence over the Albanian proletariat
with the aim of corrupting the workers. The main feature that distin-
guishes this new variant of “communist” political pluralism from Titoist,
Eurocommunist, etc. political pluralism is that these “socialists” are not
in power in the country; The other main feature of this new revisionist
variant of political pluralism is that such parties are not openly revision-
ist for the entire public through their anti-Marxist political platform and
program, but by implementing, in their counterrevolutionary practice,
the task of undermining, dividing and sabotaging the communist and
workers’ movement within the country, trying their best to sell them-
selves to the public as “communists” and “Marxist-Leninists.”
In order to distinguish and understand the proletarian character of
a communist party, the great Lenin emphasized that “whether a party is
really a proletarian party or not depends not only on whether it is made
up of workers, but also on who leads it, what is the content of its political
actions and tactics. Only the latter is what determines whether we are
really dealing with a political party of the proletariat.”2
Enlightened by this great teaching of Lenin, we have seen in the
past and are still seeing in the present, for almost 25 years, that the so-
called “communist” parties of Muharrem Xhafa, Preng Cuni and Marko
Dajti and company were never guided by Marxist-Leninist science, but
rather by bourgeois conceptions and practices. The 25-year history of
these so-called “communist” parties has proven in the past and in the
present something very evident: that the content and form, the political
tactics have been and continue to be that of systematically degenerat-
ing and destroying the Communist Party of Albania (PKSH) guided by
Marxism-Leninism; as well as undermining and provoking the division,
through sabotage, of the workers’ movement in our country, in order to
protect and perpetuate the prevailing capitalist system. In this way, for
almost 25 years the content of the tactical actions of these revisionist
parties has brought water to the mill of the bourgeoisie, has been in polit-
ical tune with the strategies of the bourgeois parties. It is not in vain that
the great Lenin called these parties “the bourgeois party of the working
class.”
Based on Leninist conceptions, the non-proletarian character of
these so-called “communist” parties is very clear. The leaders of these
parties also adhere to non-Leninist revisionist methods of organization.
Muharrem Xhafa, Preng Cuni and Marko Dajti and their parties pose in
the press as “great Enverists”, but this is a far cry from what they do in
practice, for it is there that they trample on the work and teachings of
comrade Enver Hoxha. On the question of the creation and methods of
organization of a Marxist-Leninist party, comrade Enver Hoxha wrote
that “The Marxist-Leninist party is not born and is not created in vain.
This party is born and created as a result of some objective and sub-
jective factors. The Marxist-Leninist party, the de facto representative
of the working class, represents its highest aspirations, its revolutionary
content, its revolutionary aims, its Marxist-Leninist theory which is the
theory of the working class. Without Marxist-Leninist theory there is no
Marxist-Leninist party.”
These so-called “communist” parties of Muharrem Xhafa, Preng
Cuni and Marko Dajti and company are not working-class parties. This,
for us, is due to the fact that the working class creates only its own sin-
gle Marxist-Leninist proletarian party and not several other vanguard
“proletarian” parties. These parties operate outside of Marxist-Leninist
theory, which is the very theory of the working class. These parties are
therefore also operating outside of the working class, outside their rev-
olutionary aims. Thus, the parties of Muharrem Xhafa, Preng Cuni and
Marko Dajti, by wanting to “revise” or “correct” the teachings of com-
rade Enver Hoxha, become anti-Enverist parties with equally avowed
anti-Enverist leaders.
According to this logic, we ask these hypocritical revisionists how
many “communist” parties there should be in Albania, four, forty, four
hundred, four million... How many?
According to the logic of these revisionists, honoured comrade
Thales Caramante, it is certain that in Brazil, a country about fifty times
larger than Albania, there should be more than two hundred million
“communist” parties. Of course, this concept belongs to the revisionist
“logic” and is so absurd and ridiculous that it is exposing even further
before the eyes of the people the ideological decadence of these shame-
less revisionist vulgarizers.
Guided by the revolutionary Marxist-Leninist scientific doctrine, in
analyzing this revisionist variant, it is very clear that the essence of this
variant of the concept of “communist” political pluralism in the commu-
nist movement is the negation of the leading and indivisible role of the
Marxist-Leninist party, as the only theoretical and political nucleus of
the proletariat in the process of building the revolution and in the con-
struction of socialism. Ultimately, they are protecting and perpetuating
the old system of capitalist oppression and exploitation by undermining,
sabotaging and dividing the communist and workers’ movement; it also
denies and attacks other basic principles such as the role of the proletari-
an revolution, the dictatorship of the proletariat and the construction and
building of socialist society. Marxist-Leninist science and the world his-
torical experience of the proletariat fully teach us that without a vanguard
and indivisible party, the revolution and dictatorship of the proletariat
cannot complete its historical task and be victorious, the dictatorship of
the proletariat cannot assert itself and act, socialism cannot be built and
developed. Therefore, this revisionist variant of “communist” political
pluralism denies, in one way or another, both the proletarian revolution
and the dictatorship of the proletariat and also socialism.
We can say, in making the above analysis, that the bourgeois-revi-
sionist phenomenon of “communist” political pluralism in a country is
essentially one of the various expressions of the influence of bourgeois
ideology on the proletariat and its independent communist movement,
a way of giving bourgeois political pluralism a communist label. It is
a vulgar manifestation of bourgeois thought. The main feature of this
variant is the way it masks its hostile anti-Marxist activity with “Marx-
ist-Leninist” slogans. In this regard, the great Lenin emphasized that “the
dialectics of history is such that the victory of Marxism forces its oppo-
nents to disguise themselves as Marxists.”3
The first revisionists were unmasked by Lenin, who wrote: “The
opportunists are the bourgeois enemies of the proletarian revolution
who, in times of peace, do an insidious job. Our means of uncovering
their complete denial of Marxism is by reaffirming Marxism, by un-
masking their opportunist hypocrisy.”4
The Communist Party of Albania (PKSH), guided by the teachings
of the great Lenin, has unmasked and will continue to ruthlessly de-
nounce the “opportunist hypocrisy” of all revisionists and opportunists
of any kind. The PKSH will continue to ruthlessly unmask revisionists
and opportunists of the type of Muharrem Xhafa, Preng Cuni and Marko
Dajti.
The classics of Marxism-Leninism, that is, Marx, Engels, Lenin,
Stalin and Enver Hoxha, unmasked and severely condemned any con-
cession of principles with the opportunists and revisionists in their par-
ties; they never cooperated with them — the PKSH, guided by Marx-
ist-Leninist science, severely unmasks any union and collaboration with
opportunists and revisionists and their parties. The PKSH recognizes
only the Leninist unity, from the bottom up, of the communists in the
Communist Party of Albania (PKSH), according to its Marxist-Leninist
Programme and Statutes.
History has shown that the unity with social democrats, opportun-
ists and the leaders of the “communist” parties has only led to the de-

generation of the foundations and destruction of the Marxist-Leninist
party, when it does not lead to splits. As proof of this assertion, we bring
a fact: in 2006, the main leaders of the PKSH united in a social-demo-
cratic unification with the opportunist and revisionist party of Muharrem
Xhafa; in 2011 they did the same with the opportunist Preng Cuni. Both
unifications were damaging and failed.
Opportunists and revisionists that they are, when Muharrem Xh-
afa and Preng Cuni entered the PKSH, they began a hostile, disguised
and factionalist activity, with the aim of usurping the leadership of the
party, causing it to degenerate and destroying it. The hostile activity of
these filthy opportunists and factionalists deeply damaged the PKSH. In
this way, the PKSH and its leadership ruthlessly unmasked and expelled
from its ranks these opportunists, factionalists and Trotskyists in 2012.
Today, the Communist Party of Albania (PKSH), although in very
difficult conditions of a furious anti-communist crusade of the interna-
tional and reactionary bourgeoisie in power, is fighting without wavering
and growing both in quantity and quality in the class struggle against the
bourgeoisie. We are becoming an important political force in the life of
the country, with almost total influence in the communist movement in
Albania, which is constantly increasing its influence over the working
class and the other working masses.
The Communist Party of Albania (PKSH) is struggling to success-
fully fulfill its historic mission. On the other hand, the revisionist parties
of Muharrem Xhafa, Preng Cuni and Marko Dajti, from an organization-
al point of view, are not operating either. These parties are, in short, a
small group of leaders with a chair and almost no members or militants.
The people never see these parties in the streets, in the demonstrations,
because these are parties that meet in cafes, which exist only in the lists
of electoral voters. These revisionist parties, with only one chair and no
members, have no influence on the communist movement in Albania, but
they continue to corrupt and delay the development of the class struggle
among a part of the people.
Marxist-Leninist science teaches us that without fighting against
opportunism and revisionism, the bourgeoisie and imperialism cannot be
fought properly. The Marxist-Leninist PKSH will continue to ruthlessly
denounce these revisionist parties among the communists and the people
until their complete destruction. This is a question of great importance
that I have dealt with more deeply in my pamphlet entitled Political Plu-
ralism: A Bourgeois and Revisionist Theory and Practice.
It is clear that there is a lot of nostalgia among the people for the
socialist past, but gradually this nostalgia can die along with the
nostalgic ones? What are the tasks of the communists towards the
youth? Do you think it is important to create a unified and national
communist youth movement for the formation of new cadres? If so,
what are the challenges to this construction?
It is true that the people, especially among the older generations
who were able to live through the socialist era, miss that time. The main
concern is that this longing may be extinguished with the death of the
earlier generations. In this case, I have a slightly different view. This
political nostalgia of the Albanian people for socialism is not the same
as the mourning of a man who is longing for a loved one. It is different
with the people. The people are immortal, despite the changes from gen-
eration to generation; the elders transmit their longing, their thoughts,
to future generations. In this case, I will be a little more prosaic and
say that we transmit and propagate to the youth the material and cultur-
al experiences of our socialist politics, as a true heritage. The nostalgia
of the Albanian people for socialism is rooted in history, in the great
achievements of socialism almost half a century ago, preserved deep in
their memory.
In the matter of nostalgia for socialism, two antagonistic tenden-
cies operate. On the one hand, there is the tendency to preserve, keep
alive and develop nostalgia for socialism, and on the other hand, there is
the tendency to liquidate, to “kill the nostalgia” for socialism, especially
among the new mass of youth who, unfortunately, did not live through
that great historical epoch. These two antagonistic tendencies, in connec-
tion with the question of socialism, are one of several expressions of the
class struggle which is taking place between the proletariat and the other
toiling masses on the one hand, and the bourgeoisie on the other. It is the
expression of an irreconcilable struggle between Marxist-Leninist pro-
letarian ideology on the one hand, and bourgeois ideology on the other.
There is no doubt that, in the end, the first tendency will prevail
over the second one due to the objective development of society, of the
passage from the old capitalist order to the new socialist and communist
order.
But let us return to the specific case. I think it will be difficult,
not to say impossible, to “kill the nostalgia” of the Albanian people for
socialism, for it has deep roots in the soul of the people, despite the fact
that the Albanian bourgeoisie in power and its bourgeois state has devel-
oped and is still developing a fierce anti-communist crusade against the

great era of socialism with comrade Enver Hoxha at the head. For more
than thirty years the bourgeoisie has aimed to pluck these “roots” from
the soul of the people, to complete their brainwashing, to purge commu-
nist ideals and the great achievements of socialism from the minds of the
workers, to “kill the nostalgia” of the masses for socialism.
The Albanian people cannot easily forget the nostalgia for social-
ism, because in the epoch of socialism, with comrade Enver Hoxha at
its head, political power was in their hands, in an alliance of the workers
and peasants; Today, on the contrary, political power is in the hands of
the bourgeoisie, where a handful of capitalists and oligarchs oppress the
people!
ism, because in the epoch of socialism, with comrade Enver Hoxha at its
head, the means of production (the factories, mills, power plants, fields
and hydroelectric dams, etc.) were the common property of the people
and not, as today under capitalism, where these factories, power plants
and hydroelectric dams etc. are capitalist private property in the hands
of the bourgeoisie who constantly pressure the workers to provide still
more abusive rates of profits!
head, feudal-bourgeois private property disappeared and, with it, the feu-
dal-bourgeois exploiting class, and also the exploitation of man by man!
head, unemployment did not exist, the socialist state and the dictatorship
of the proletariat guaranteed employment to all people, in other words,
the state guaranteed a dignified life to everyone!
head, education was free for all people, health care was free, there were
no taxes, wages and pensions increased annually, the socialist system
constantly reduced the prices of goods and services. In other words, it
continually increased the material and cultural well-being of the masses!
ism, because in the epoch of socialism, with comrade Enver Hoxha at
its head, Albania was completely free and independent, it was not like
today under capitalism, when Albania became a colony of Euro-Ameri-
can imperialism!
In addition, there is another important factor in favour of the nos-
talgia of the Albanian people for socialism, which is precisely the com-
parison that people always make between the two epochs, between the
great achievements of the most brilliant era of our country and the great
tragedies that the masses are experiencing daily with capitalism today.
This does not mean, in any way, that our people’s nostalgia for so-
cialism is guaranteed at random and spontaneously. Without a consistent
and permanent class struggle that the PKSH is waging to preserve and
develop the memory of the people for socialism, without the systemat-
ic and organized propaganda of the socialist era, especially among the
youth, with the aim of broadening political consciousness in favour of
socialism and communism, we cannot be victorious. Therefore, the du-
ties of the communists among the youth today are:
• To propagate in a systematic and organized way, in various ways,
the great achievements of the epoch of socialism with comrade Enver
Hoxha at its head among the youth;
• To renew Marxist-Leninist education among the youth;
• To organize the youth in our fronts of communist, anti-fascist and
progressive struggles under the leadership of the Marxist-Leninist party;
• To launch and prepare the youth for uninterrupted revolutionary
actions, tempering the cadres in the school of the revolution, preparing
the youth in its cadre of professional revolutionaries;
To achieve these great goals in working with the youth, of course,
the Marxist-Leninist party faces great challenges, complicated but never
insurmountable. I believe that the implementation of the tasks mentioned
above in relation to youth work makes it possible to successfully face
any challenge.
How do you assess the internal situation of Albania today and what
are the most urgent tasks of the communists?
The situation in Albania today is very serious. The poverty and mis-
ery of the Albanian people, the working class and other working classes
is growing rapidly everywhere as a direct result of the increasing ex-
ploitation of labour by the ruling bourgeoisie.
Unemployment has risen sharply in the country, especially during
the period of the Covid-19 pandemic, with about 30% to 40% of the peo-
ple infected; social polarization is increasing rapidly; the prices of food-
stuffs and the fees for all services are skyrocketing; the level of inflation
is rising, workers’ wages are constantly falling below the level of infla-
tion, and their working conditions are increasingly precarious; pensions
and social assistance for the families of the unemployed are undergoing
cuts every year; the Albanian workers, especially the youth, thus prefer

to emigrate, something that is increasing every year; about a third of the
population of Albania has left the homeland in order to survive.
In capitalist Albania, anti-communism has become the official pol-
icy of the bourgeois state. The main anti-communist blows are led by
the bourgeois state and the bourgeois parties of the right and “left”, all
against Marxism-Leninism, against socialism, against comrade Enver
Hoxha and also against the PKSH.
The violation and suppression of democratic freedoms and work-
ers’ rights has increased on the part of the neo-fascist bourgeois state
disguised by a democratic mask. The corruption of bourgeois politicians
and local governments is blatant and carried out with total impunity. Or-
ganized crime, drug trafficking, human trafficking and other incurable
social injuries typical of capitalist society are taking place in Albania in
broad daylight.
Faced with these conditions, the dissatisfaction and class struggle
of the Albanian proletariat and the other working classes against the
oppression and exploitation of capitalism is also increasing every day.
Thus, the general crisis of capitalism is deepening and worsening more
and more, the antagonistic contradictions of capitalist society in Albania
are deepening and becoming even more serious. In this way, the Alba-
nian communists face some urgent tasks, among them:
• Continuous strengthening of the revolutionary life, activity and
actions of the PKSH;
• Continuous strengthening of the Marxist-Leninist education of the
communists with the expansion of the agitation and propaganda work of
the PKSH and the spreading of Marxist-Leninist ideology among the
masses to strengthen the ties of the party with the people;
• Strengthening the work of the PKSH among the trade unions,
peasantry and youth, with emphasis on the Qemal Stafa Communist
Youth Union, and the strengthening of revolutionary work among wom-
en,with emphasis on the Margarita Tutulani Women’s Movement in Al-
bania.
Enver Hoxha and Nexhmije Hoxha are highly respected figures

among the Marxist-Leninists of Brazil, but they are little known
among the people. What do you think can be done to broaden this
knowledge? What works and books do you think are essential for
everyone to read?
I believe that to expand the knowledge of Marxist-Leninists and the
Brazilian people about the revolutionary life and work of the great Enver
Hoxha, the main way would be the dissemination of his works. I believe
that all the works of Comrade Enver are very important for the people
and, in the first place, for every true revolutionary communist. However,
I think that for the formation of true revolutionary Marxist-Leninists we
must all engage in the reading of works such as Imperialism and the
Revolution, Eurocommunism is Anticommunism, The Khrushchevites,
Reflections on China, Yugoslav Self-Management: A Capitalist Theory
and Practice, With Stalin (Recollections), etc.
In addition to being a great Marxist-Leninist, Enver Hoxha was also

a great teacher. What teachings of his do you consider the most im-
portant for the working class?
Enver Hoxha is a great teacher of the working class, his lessons
for our class are fundamental and of the greatest importance. I think
that the main lesson of comrade Enver Hoxha for the working class is
that he, with his ideas and consistent Leninist practice of a prominent
Marxist and great revolutionary leader of the working class, as a great
and historic leader of socialist Albania for almost half a century, showed
the possibility of destroying the old capitalist system of exploitation of
the working class with the construction of the proletarian revolution, the
dictatorship of the proletariat in establishing people’s power, the founda-
tion of the new socialist and communist system which puts an end to the
exploitation of man by man and every form of human oppression.
What message would you leave for the Brazilian readers of the news-
paper A Verdade?
It is with great pleasure and honour that, through this interview, I
have the opportunity to wish all readers of the newspaper A Verdade, the
Brazilian men and women, a great greeting and infinite wish for success
in our common struggle for the triumph of the great cause of communism
in Brazil, in Albania and throughout the world. Thank you very much!
Endnotes:
1
. Vladimir Lenin: Against Revisionism; page 182, Albanian edition.
2
. Vladimir Lenin: Collected Works, Volume 31; page 285, Albanian edition.
3
4

ASIATIC MODE OF PRODUCTION
IN SOUTH ASIA: AN EMPIRICAL STUDY
Tripta Wahi
Any mode of production is a unity of both the processes of production as
well as the social relations of production. The actual processes of pro-
duction are defined by the knowledge system/s pertaining to any sphere/
field of production, while social relations of production signify control
over the means of production, labour and the final product. We may
also note that the two aspects work in tandem, but they also contain an
inherent potential of conflict. The potential of conflict is situated in the
very nature of its two components; the processes of production, through
accumulative experience, have an inherent tendency/capacity for growth
and change while, social relations of production, that is, the property
relations, tend to resist change. Over time accumulative knowledge of
the forces of production tend to outgrow the existing social relations of
production. It is when the forces of production outgrow the existing
property relations that they undermine and transform the existing social
relations. It is against this backdrop that we proceed to examine the issue
under discussion.
Land and water are/were two essential components for agrarian pro-
duction. This may seem a rather naïve way of introducing a subject
that is at the centre of an international debate and polemics. But perhaps
the naivety of this statement can be the best introduction to the subject
under discussion. When we begin to examine and seek information on
water as a parallel component to land in our study of the agrarian history
of the subcontinent, we are confronted with new issues and dimensions
unnoticed otherwise,` revealing layers upon layers of water rights hidden
from the view.
We propose to look at water as a parallel component to land in agrar-
ian production in South Asia to explore the political economy of irriga-
tion and water relations in agrarian production and their import both for
the state and the society in pre-colonial India.
(i) Both land and water are different in nature. While land is by and
large a fixed entity,1 water is in a constant flux. Further, while the land
once cleared and developed could be regarded largely as a constant nat-
ural resource for agricultural production, water on the contrary is/was
a constant variable and, thereby, a factor of instability in agricultural
production. Variability of water produced a constantly fluctuating agri-
cultural landscape2 and stability in agriculture was in direct proportion
to human intervention in water.3 As the pre-modern states and societies
within the Indian sub-continent depended primarily on the agrarian sur-
plus, irrigation was at the core of their organization and existence.
(iii) For understanding the Asiatic Mode of Production, we have
to look at the relationship between irrigation, state and society in the
pre-colonial India. In this article this relationship is being explored with
regard to two modes of irrigation, namely, canals and wells. These two
modes have been chosen as they represent almost two ends of the scale
in irrigation. Different sources of water require different scales of organ-
isation and resources, technologies, structures of organisation and forms
of labour for creating irrigational mechanisms and also involve different
systems of usage, distribution and control. These features stand out con-
spicuously when dealing with two ends of the scale.
(iv) While canals deal with running surface water, and usually huge
volumes of water and cover large areas, the wells are field-specific and
their source of water is underground. The role of the state and the society
individually and in interdependence and interaction is distinct in each
one of these two modes of irrigation and yet there is commonality in
terms of right to water, labour appropriation and socio-economic and
political consequences both for the state and the society.
(v) It is noteworthy that while the structures of organisation, forms
of labour, mechanisms of usage, distribution and control emerge more
clearly from the canal irrigation, rights to water stand out in sharp relief
from the field-specific mode of irrigation.
(vi) There is centrality of irrigation both for the agrarian production
as also for the structures and mechanisms of appropriation of the surplus
produce. The state itself was deeply involved in creating and controlling
irrigation facilities. Indeed the water rights defined the nature of the state.
Canal Irrigation
For primary data for the canals the paper confines itself largely to the
region covered by the British Punjab,4 which encompassed more than
two subahs of the Mughal empire, namely, Lahore, Multan and parts of
Delhi.
(i) There was a great deal of irrigation from canals in the pre-colonial
Punjab.5 Indeed, there were canals all over the region, notwithstanding
Babur’s observation that there were no canals in Hindustan.6 There is
plenty of evidence to show that all rivers, streams and nullahs, perenni-
al or seasonal, large or small, had canals. It can be safely asserted that
topography and gradient permitting, canals were made on all running
surface water. The British carried out an extensive survey of all the ex-
isting canals in the region with a view to working out their future course
of action regarding canal irrigation. They even recorded remains of the
abandoned canals. The exhaustive British survey forms the initial and
main basis of evidence to work on the theme under discussion. However,
invariably this evidence gets corroborated and supplemented by infor-
mation from a variety of other sources from the earlier periods of the
history of the region.
(ii) There were two types of canals, namely, perennial and season-
al. The perennial canals by definition had a constant supply of water
whereas the seasonal canals worked for a few months in a year. The
duration of the seasonal canals being operational synchronised with the
optimal flow of the source of their running water.7 The seasonal canals
are described as inundation canals in the British sources and by modern
historians, but to avoid confusion between the actual sailab (inundation)
and the channelisation during the period of optimal flow of rivers etc. of
the water through human intervention,8 it has been preferred to call them
seasonal canals. While the seasonal canals could be located anywhere
on the river, they tended to be concentrated in the middling courses of
the rivers. Their operations were directly linked to the fluctuating flows
of the rivers. Thus, for instance, of the main fifteen seasonal canals in
the Multan district, the Diwanwah, Mahmudwah and the Bahawalwah
on the Satluj worked from April to October, while the Sardarwah and
the Sultanwah were operational from April to November and the Kabul-
wah and the two Jumwah Doobabs worked from April to September. On
the river Chenab, three canals were operational from April to October
and four from April to September.9 Operation timings of these and such
other canals were linked to the volume of flow of the rivers/streams on
which they were built. The volume of flow of the Indus rivers is at its
lowest from October to March while in the pre-monsoon months their
flow gains from the melting snow of the Himalayas10 and the river water
begins to get diverted by the bunds to the canals whereby it is conducted
inland. The seasonal canals existed equally on the non-perennial rivers,
but they were more dependent on precipitation as these rivers did not
originate in the snow-clad Himalayas. Numerous canals on the Ghaggar
and the Sarswati are an instance in point.11
The perennial canals could cover short or long distances, but wa-
ter was nearly always available in those canals. The constant supply
of water was due to their head-works/embankments being usually lo-
cated in places where rivers debouch from the hills. The submontane
region with so many streams and nullahs having a constant supply of
water, was full of perennial canals; such canals covered short distances
in between numerous streams. Thus, for instance, canals from the two
perennial streams in the Dera Ghazi Khan region represent such a phe-
nomenon.12 Making canals covering much longer distances required far
greater technical expertise, management and resources. Several such ca-
nals are known to have been built in the Punjab several centuries prior to
its annexation by the British. Two large canals were built by Firuz Shah
Tughluq in the thirteen-fifties and at least one by Akbar and Shahjahan
each. All these canals subsequently fell in disuse and were reconstructed,
extended and/or remodeled by the subsequent rulers at different points
of time. Firuz Shah Tughluq built an extensive network of canals in the
Sirhind and Hissar region, the dry belt in the Satluj-Jamuna interfluve,
and linked these to two perennial canals with one each from the rivers
Satluj and Jamuna.13 Akbar not only revived Firuz Shah’s canal from the
Jamuna, but also built a new canal on the river Ravi. As stated earlier,
the Firuzi canals were rebuilt by Akbar; Shahjahan too had them repaired
and extended.14 Shah Jahan also revived the Firuzi canal on the Jamuna
and brought it further to Delhi.15 The Shah Nahr on the Ravi, with its
head-works at Madhopur, was built during Shah Jahan’s reign. Running
through the upper Bari Doab, it brought water to Lahore.16 Ali Mardan
Khan also made a perennial canal on the river Tavi; it was brought from
Sodhra to Ibrahimabad, a town that he had founded and named after his
son.17 There were four more perennial canals on the Ravi; they could
well be branches of the same canal. They all started from Shahpur but
had different destinations, namely, Lahore, Pathankot, Batala and Biar
Pati Haibatpur.18 There was also a perennial canal from a branch of the
river Aik; this served the Sialkot region.19 Seasonal or perennial, these
canals kept on falling in disuse and kept on getting revived periodically.
Shah Jahan’s Shah Nahr was rebuilt by Ranjit Singh as the Hasli Canal,20
while the Khanwah, attributed to Akbar’s period, was revived by the
British in the eighteen-forties.21
The names of the canals invariably indicate their origin. To cite a
few examples, the Bahawalwah canal goes back to the Daudpotras of
Bahawalpur, Kabulwah presumably owed its origin to the Kabul rulers
who held sway over Multan for some time, the Dewanwah was made by
Dewan Sawun Mal and the Shah Nahr by the Mughal rulers.
(iii) The construction of canals required technical expertise, plan-
ning, knowledge of the river regimes, topography of the area and its
gradient, besides financial outlay, organisation of labour and the actual
work of construction. By any standards the making of a canal required
well-established state structures to carry out the work. However, there
were notable exceptions where canals were made by private individuals/
groups of individuals or villages/communities.
In the British sources while there is a good deal of information on the
maintenance of the canals, there is very little information on the process-
es of construction of the canals by the earlier rulers. This abundance of
evidence on the maintenance of the canals is due to the fact that when the
British assumed power in the region they also assumed the role of their
predecessors in maintaining the canals. Till they established their own
structures, they used the existing system, ‘native’ as they called it, with
some improvisations. The near total absence of information on planning
and construction of canals by their predecessors may be due to the fact
that they constructed new canals entirely on their own without having to
fall back on their predecessors. Nevertheless their surveys of the existing
and abandoned canals occasionally convey some good insights in the
planning processes. Also as scattered pieces of information spread over
several centuries, from different sources and contexts, are pieced togeth-
er and analysed, there emerges a fairly coherent picture of the structures
and processes of canal-making in the pre-Colonial times.
(iv) In the Mughal times, improvement and expansion of agriculture
was the responsibility of the Sipah Salar22. This presumed expansion
of irrigational facilities. The Subahdar was, in any event, the custodian
of water-related structures.23 Decision to make canals presumably could
emanate from him. However, it was Akbar who took the decision to re-
build Firuz Shah’s canal.24 This may be due to the fact that the canal fell
within the Subah of Delhi and that the Sarkar of Hissar had been con-
ferred on his very young son Salim. In any event, the long perennial ca-
nals in view of the hugeness of the project, must assume decision-mak-
ing by the rulers themselves. However, relatively smaller canals are
known to have been built by powerful individuals/groups/ communities/
groups of villages. Numerous examples of such canals are available from
the districts of Dera Ghazi Khan, Bannu and Muzaffargarh.25 In fact, the
region had water lords.
(v) Rebuilding a canal may or may not involve any survey, but mak-
ing a new canal would necessarily involve topographical and gradient
survey. Such an exercise would involve experts to work out where to
situate the head-works, particularly of the perennial canals and also the
route to be followed in terms of feasibility and desirability; local knowl-
edge would be an integral part of the entire exercise. In the eighteen-for-
ties when the British were carrying out a survey with a view to supplying
water to the eastern Majha region, they discovered that they had been
anticipated on the ‘very best line of country’ and ‘in the most favourable
direction, by the traces of an old canal.26 The opinion that the old canal
followed ‘the very best line of country’ indicates that the survey for the
decayed canal had been carefully carried out. Any lacunae in the survey
could lead to catastrophe as it happened in the case of the Nahr-i-Bihisht
during Shah Jahan’s reign.27
(vi) The work of making a canal involved several agencies and struc-
tures at multiple levels. It is evident from Akbar’s sanad concerning the
reconstruction of Firuz Shah’s canal on the Jamuna that a skilled maimar
(architect/mason), the superintendent of construction and the faujdars,
all worked in unison to make the canal.28 Such co-ordinated activity of
various agencies and structures of the state at multiple levels would be
essential for any canal-making exercise, even seasonal canals; for sea-
sonal canals small political units/chiefdoms could undertake this activi-
ty, but much bigger states and extremely well-coordinated and cohesive
activity in different places at different levels was a given pre-requisite
for the canal system that was of the magnitude of the canals of the four-
teenth century or of the sixteenth-seventeenth centuries.
In a huge network of canals drawing water both from the Satluj and
the Jamuna and linking it up with the entire Ghaggar system of rivers,
Firuz Shah Tughluq himself was incharge of the operations and he was
thus acting as the chief engineer of this immensely huge undertaking.29
He was desperately keen to get a constant supply of water in the region
of deficient precipitation without a perennial river. It is quite remark-
able that prior to his decision to draw water from the rivers Satluj and
Jamuna, Firuz Shah Tughluq had attempted to cut through a mountain to
ensure a constantly flowing stream in the region.30 He did not succeed
in his enterprise. Firuz Shah Tughluq, as he a lost control over large
areas in his sultanate, created huge and numerous irrigational facilitated
elsewhere, so as to bring new areas under cultivation to yield revenues
for the state.
Perennial canals covering long distances were far more difficult and
complex to make than the seasonal or short distance perennial canals.31
Perennial canals covering long distances had invariably to negotiate dif-
ficult terrain and opposing streams and torrents on the way. Thus, for
instance, the Shah Nahr had to cross the torrents Chakki and Jena on the
way.32 Technical aspects and the execution of the project could only have
been handled by the state. In fact due to inadequacy of water reaching
Lahore, the entire terrain of the canal had to be revisited and reviewed.33
(vii) Constant maintenance and vigil of the canals, including regula-
tion of water supply, were essential components of the canal system. For
both types of canals annual desilting was essential; the Himalayan rivers
because of the poor rock formation of the mountains, always carried a
heavy sediment with them. This affected both the headworks34 and the
canals, including the subchannels. Hence a systematic annual desilting
was the norm. This was undertaken during the winter months when there
was a much reduced flow of water in the rivers. Even during the opera-
tional season, a constant vigil was maintained on the canals for any re-
pair that might be needed in the eventually of any bund getting damaged.
We may keep it in mind that the bunds were semi-permanent structures
and, therefore, vulnerable to damage with a strong and heavy flow. The
stoppage of breaches required a constant vigil.
On the Multan canals, the annual repair, clearance, the stoppage of
breaches and all other expenses were borne by the ‘public’ and this was
so on almost all canals when the British assumed power.35 While the la-
bour was provided by the villages using the canal water, the management
was done by the state agencies. Within the villages using the canal water,
work of desilting was carried out locally, but for the mouth the labour
was requisitioned from villages;36 the same norm was applicable to the
main channel. However, where the canals were the property of private
individuals/groups etc., their maintenance was also undertaken by the
self-same agencies.
For an overview of the kind of establishment that was needed for
the maintenance of the canals and the regulation of water supply, it may
be noted that the British, after considerably reducing the establishment,
still had 197 persons for the Hasli canal, (part of the Shah Nahr that was
revived by Ranjit Singh, the ruler of the Punjab from 1799 to 1839)
among whom 130 persons were beldars.37 In the mid-eighteenth century
the British had learnt that on the extended Jamuna canal reaching Delhi,
a darogha was stationed at every 3-4 kos for purposes of police and
the ready repair of accidents and he had peons and beldars under him.38
One thousand armed peons and 500 horse were supposedly maintained
on the establishment.39 Under Ranjit Singh even army contingents were
assigned to keep vigil on the Hasli.40 That a very close watch was main-
tained on the use of canal water is apparent from the fact that in 1732 an
order had to be issued to the darogas of the Shah Nahr41 to restrain their
gumashtas from charging naharana from the village Talibabad in the
Batala pargana. Obviously, the gumashtas were not aware of the nature
of the grant and they had started demanding the naharana when the new
muzarain were settled in the village and the canal water had begun to be
used. Hence, the canal establishment was truly functional at the ground
level.
(viii) There was a state establishment for the allocation of water and
mir-i-ab was in charge of it. The Ain-i-Akbari tells us that the kotwal
in the Mugahal empire was the appointing authority for the mir-i-ab.42
However, Akbar, after virtually reconstructing Firuz Shah Tughluq’s ca-
nal, conferred the title of Mir-i-Ab on Muhammad Khan Tarkhan, the su-
perintendent of the work ‘from first to last’.43 He was presumably made
the Mir-i-Ab for the entire canal while the appointments made by the
kotwals would be at a lower level. The British records show several mir-
i-abs on a single canal.44 The office holder was supposed to be a person
of integrity who would allocate water fairly to all.45
Firuz Shah Tugluq also had an establishment to oversee the reach of
the water of the canals that were made by him. Some maliks (nobles)
were especially designated for that task;46 Afif’s own father and uncle
had held this duty.47 It may be safely assumed that the purpose of such an
establishment was to regulate the supply of water with the intent of rais-
ing accurate naharana. Indeed, such establishments continued through
the entire pre-British period in the Punjab. Ranjit Singh, as noted above,
even sent army contingents to police the hasli canal. Where the canals
were built by the non-state agencies, the distribution and supply of water
was regulated by the owners/builders of the canals; the entire system of
distribution was worked out to its minutest detail and the British were
struck by its accuracy and equity.48
The making of canals found reverberations in the changing social
impulse of the region within the reach of the canals. They changed the
social dynamics of the region that they covered. The impact of the canals
both on the state and the society was immediate and multi-dimensional
and it got reflected in the changed landscape as also in the pattern of eco-
nomic activity encompassing agriculture, horticulture and trade. It got
physically reflected in the construction of buildings and beautification of
the existing towns as also in the establishment of new towns. Indeed, the
entire canal-making exercise was symbiotically linked to the establish-
ment of new towns, centres of administrative power and control.
The canals stabilized,49 expanded and diversified agricultural produc-
tion. They gave impetus to the production of cash crops and orchards
flourished everywhere the canals reached. In and around Hissar-Firuza
where only one crop used to be grown, the network of canals led to the
growing of two crops.50 Both crops began to yield abundant produce and
a variety of fruits and flowers began to be produced. Orchards and gar-
dens were made on a large scale and they were made both by the Sultan
and the nobles. Similarly Fathbad was established with a network of ca-
nals. With the network of canals for these two newly established centres
of power, the entire region got transformed and agriculture improved
dramatically both by way of variety and production of high quality cash
crops besides expansion of the area under cultivation. The region began
to yield such a huge revenue that Firuz Shah Tughluq deemed it appro-
priate to convene an assembly of the Muslim learned and the divine on
the issue of the revenues being generated by the canals.51 The assem-
bled personages gave the opinion that since the canals had been built
entirely with the labour and expenditure of the Sultan, he was entitled to
haqq-i-shurb, that is, one-tenth of the revenue so generated. Similarly, he
founded and brought numerous villages in his imlaq (personal property)
by bringing them under cultivation.52 The revenues collected from the
naharana and the imlaq went to his personal treasury as distinct from the
baitulmal (public treasury).53 Similarly, the founding of Ibrahimabad54
with a perennial canal from the river Tavi by Ali Mardan Khan during
Shah Jahan’s reign translated itself into an analogous transformation of
the area. He made in it a garden rivaling the Shalimar garden of Lahore,
constructed numerous buildings and patronized men of learning. The
place became famous as a centre of learning and good handwriting.55
There was a substantial increase in the population of the area and Shah
Jahan gave in inam a village to Ali Mardan Khan and his family for the
maintenance of the canal.56
When the British took over the Sikh possessions, they found
that they could not substantially repair or enlarge the Hasli canal as
cultivation extended right up to the brink of the canal.57 With the exten-
sion to Delhi of the Firuzi canal on the river Yamuna under Shahjahan,
channels reached innumerable villages around the capital city of Delhi
and with these channels orchards came up all over the region. We may
also recall that Akbar had fruit trees planted all along the banks of the re-
constructed Firuzi canal.58 Canals defined the landscape, the social habits
and the milieu through prosperity and patronage. The canals, and for
that matter all irrigational facilities, also encompassed within their ambit
of impact, religious institutions and religious ambience of the region.
With the revenues generated by the canal system, Firuz Shah Tughluq
bestowed extensive patronage on the Muslim divines and the learned
men.59 It is a distinct possibility that the family of the pirzadahas of
Dhatrat, from whom the document ‘A Canal Act of Akbar’ was procured
in the nineteenth century, goes back to Firuz Shah’s patronage.60
The seasonal canals during their dry period would become easy foot-
paths for the people to travel by instead of having to traverse thorny
and bushy wayfares.61 Further, most canals were navigable for shorter or
longer distances. It is remarkable that in the Multan region thirteen out of
the fifteen main seasonal canals were navigable.62 Akbar’s clear instruc-
tions for the restructuring of the Firuzi canal to Hissar Firuza mention
that the canal must be navigable; small boats could ply even on very
small canals. These canals thus provided a network of communications
to various regions and sub-regions and connected them with larger net-
works of communications. With the expansion of agrarian production
and especially of cash crops, increase in trade would be a natural corol-
lary. The network of canals by being navigable would facilitate trading
activity. Trade too would benefit both the state and certain sections of
society. Most of all, canals provided some safeguard against famines.
The canals generated huge revenues for the state. Firuz Shah’s per-
sonal treasury getting filled with immense wealth accruing from the
canals directly or indirectly has been noted above. Increase in agrarian
production and greater emphasis on the production of cash crops inevi-
tably enhanced the state revenues and gave impetus to trade. Also there
was naharana on the canal water. Increase in revenues came not merely
from substantially enhanced agrarian production and the naharana, but
also through the ferry tax. With canals being navigable, boats would be
a constant source of income to the state. Increase in trade too would
generate additional revenues through taxation. It is amply evident that
there was a close and multi-dimensional relationship between the state,
society and the canals.

The relationship between the state, society and the canals is best
summed up in the preamble to Akbar’s sanad regarding rebuilding of the
Firuzi canal. We may let it speak for itself :
‘My government is a tree, the roots of which are firm in the earth.. In
acknowledgement of God’s mercy in establishing this great empire,
my desire, purer than water, is to supply the wants of the poor; and
the water of life in my heart is larger than the sea, with the wish to
dispense benefits and to leave permanent marks of the greatness of
my Empire, by digging canals, and founding cities, by which too the
revenues of the Empire will be increased.
‘God says, sow a grain, and reap sevenfold. My desire is to reap

one-hundred fold that my crown may become wealthy, and the zamin-
dars may obtain double returns.63
Remaking the canal and making water available is the ‘best purpose
to which my wealth can be applied’. Akbar, the real founder of the Mu-
ghal Empire, goes on to add:
‘For God has said, from water all things were made. I consequently
ordain, that this jungle, in which subsistence is obtained with thirst,
be converted into a place of comport, free from the evil…
‘Behold the power of God, how he brings to life land that was dead.
Truly a canal is opened…

‘He (Akbar) is such a king, that from the canal of his liberality, the
garden of the world is green all the year round…’64
Akbar acquired name, fame, resources and a stable social base in the
region. He was also concurrently hoping for a reward after death as is
stated in the preamble, ‘The seeds sown in this world are reaped in the
next.’65 This perennial canal was extended further to Delhi during Shah
Jahan’s reign. It reached thousands of villages around the capital. Except
for the ‘reward in the next world’, history is testimony to the fact that
the canal yielded all the multi-dimensional results anticipated by Akbar.
According to a proverbial expression current in Delhi in the mid-eigh-
teenth century, the net revenue from these canals was reckoned equal to
the maintenance of 12,000 horses.66
The material benefits accruing to the state and different sections of
society from the making, remaking and maintenance of canals came
from the labour provided mostly by the villages on the canal routes.
With the exception of Firuz Shah Tughluq, who seems to have partly
used slave labour on a large scale, the labour for the canals used to be
provided by the superior land-holding sections on the canal route. The
labour supplied by the superior land-holding sections would inevita-
bly be comprised of the tillers of the soil and the artisanal, service and
menial labour castes, sepi as they were called in the Punjab, who were
tied with agricultural production during the period under study. Among
those whose labour produced material wealth, only a small section of
the tillers of the soil might have had marginal access to and benefit from
the canals, the remainder either had no access to or use for the water
their labour made available to others. Their labour generated increased
surplus through stabilization of agriculture, expansion of the area under
cultivation and production of superior /cash crops which supported the
state and the dominant sections of society.
Wells and Water Rights

A
The field specific mode of irrigation, the well*, known by different
names in different parts of the Indian subcontinent, was extensively used
and still continues to be used within the entire length and breadth of
the sub-continent. While the prevalence of well-irrigation and the state
policy of encouraging sinking of wells, the history of various techni-
cal devices, their dissemination, efficacy and costs and their impact on
productivity have received attention from historians, the issue of rights
and mechanisms of sinking and repairing wells largely remains a desid-
eratum in historical writing on the subject. This may partly be owing to
the fact that despite serious attempts by a few historians,67 water rights
have substantially remained outside the discourse of the history of the
agrarian system in the subcontinent.68 Also the fact that being field-spe-
cific mode of irrigation, the wells may have been assumed to be part of
the land system itself. The issue emerged clearly and powerfully when,
during the course of my research on irrigation and social relations in the
Punjab, I came across a document entitled the ‘Right of Tenants to Sink
Wells’.69 The document defined the issue itself.
There were proprietary rights in wells. The ownership of the well
belonged to the individual, family, community / communities, authority
depending upon who had sunk the well. The wells could also be owned
by institutions such as temples. The state-sunk wells belonged to the
state. The property in wells was inheritable and alienable; it could be
leased, rented, mortgaged or bestowed. Each well had a title plate indi-
cating its ownership. It is precisely owing to the title plate of the well that
we have rich epigraphic evidence on the subject. Each well was known
either by the name of the individual / caste / community/ authority who
had sunk it or by the purpose for which it was sunk. If the wells were
sunk outside of the state authority, permission was required for sinking
them. The tillers of the soil had no right to sink wells almost till the end
of the nineteenth century.
There is varied and substantial evidence to support each one of the
points made in the preceding paragraph. It comes from different sourc-
es from different parts of the sub-continent and is spread over nearly
two millennia. There is a remarkable continuity and convergence in the
entire range of evidence from different sources, places and time. The
British settlement reports are replete with information on each one of the
issues outlined in the preceding paragraph and several additional issues
pertaining to wells and irrigation from wells. Once the issue gets de-
fined through the British records, already known and existing evidence
acquires a new meaning and yields information and throws light on the
rights relating to wells. This is true of all genres of evidence: epigraphic,
documentary and literary.
The ownership of the irrigation wells was not subsumed under the
land-holding. It was a property in its own right and was distinct from the
land rights of a land-holder. An irrigation well owned severally watered
several land-holdings and there were defined shares in its water. Even an
individually owned well serving only one estate was a property by itself,
an entity distinct from the land-holding.70
The British government recorded extensively and meticulously prop-
erty in wells besides the land holdings during the course of making and
revising land settlements in different parts of the Punjab mostly in the
second half of the nineteenth century.71 These rights were recorded in
view of the litigations that invariably followed any land settlement. In
some districts it was noted that while litigation in severally-owned wells
was frequent, it was not totally unknown in the individually-owned
wells.72
In view of the information in the British records regarding property
in wells and the fact that water rights attached to particular plots of land
were often enumerated in the deed on the occasion when they changed
hands by sale or transfer,73 the information regarding wells in the docu-
ments from the earlier period pertaining to grant or sale of land assumes
a new meaning. Thus, for instance, in a collection of 52 documents74
from the Mughal and the Sikh periods covering the time span 1695-1857
AD, there are seven documents that deal with the substantial question
of grant, sale or lease of land75 as distinct from grant of proceeds from
land, their confirmation subsequently or issues relating to or emanating
from such grants, sales or leases; one of these seven concerns culturable
waste.76 Of the six documents dealing with the developed land, five con-
tain explicit information on the wells, information which is significant
from the point of understanding property in wells as an entity distinct
from the land in which they stood. Document no.1, coming from Au-
rangzeb’s reign, dated 1696 AD deals with a certain amount of land be-
ing given on ijara, land ‘irrigated by well’.77 The subject matter of the
document numbering II, dated April 1711 dealing with the sale of an
entire village with ‘valid proprietary and exclusive rights’ records that
this sale was ‘with all its rights and including, in full,78 fruit-bearing and
non-fruit bearing trees and one pucca well of sweet water’.79 Document
no. IV of January 1738, registering the sale of land comprising of the
entire village, does not specifically refer to any well but qualifies it with
‘each and every right’.80 However, the document no. V of March 1738
dealing with the grant of a village ‘with all its cultivated and uncultivated
and, inhabited and uninhabited land’, adds that this was ‘together with
all its fruit-bearing and non-fruit-bearing trees and one pucca well’.81
Similarly, the document no. XXVII of October 1789 records the grant of
twenty-four ghumaons of land ‘together with a well, and an orchard’.82
Document no. XLIV of 1823 recording Ranjit Singh’s dharmarth grant
goes beyond all earlier documents in terms of information regarding the
well in the document. The grant of the land is captioned in Gurumukhi
as ‘A well has been granted’.83 The document records that ‘some land to-
gether with a well, with a single Persian wheel, named after Amin Chand
Thalwala’ was granted in dharmath to the mahant of Pindori.84 This
alone validates all the points made in the preceding paragraphs. The fact
that land grants / sales were being made ‘together with’ trees and wells is
important in the context of the theme under discussion. There were dis-
tinct rights in trees and, therefore, the grant of trees was also specifically
recorded.85 For the same reason the grant of wells was being separately
recorded and one well was recorded with its type and name. From anoth-
er set of documents coming from Akbar’s period from Vrindavan-Aritha
there are similar references; there is one reference to a well by name86
and another to a plot ‘including well’,87 and yet others to trees.88 In a
document from the family archives of a madad-i-maash assignee in the
village Nandla in the pargana and subah Ajmer, the mention of both the
lined (Chah-i-Basta) and unlined well (Chah-i-Kham) would undoubt-
edly fall within the category of the wells within the Pindori documents.89
From South India too there are records of land being sold with wells.
There is a reference to 3000 kuli of land with five water levers being sold
by the villagers to Ukkal during the period of Rajendracola Deva I.90
Our reading that land and well rights are treated as distinct entities
in all these documents receives unambiguous support from the evidence
coming from the reign of Firuz Shah Tughluq (1351-1388 AD). Two of
Firuz Shah Tughluq’s letters/orders in the Insha-i-Mahru deal with the
subject of grant/its confirmation to two khanqahs. The first one reads
‘the wells of the khanqah and of the neithbourhood of the Nahrwala
town, which are related to the khanqah and for various reasons been un-
der the control/right of Sayyid Muhammad were being given/confirmed’
(the khanqah and the wells).91 It was being ordered that all officials of
Gujarat, from the wali to the karkun were to regard the khanqah and the
wells as under the right/control of Saiyyid Muhammad.92 Similar distinc-
tion is made in the next document regarding the khanqah of Kodia where
rights over ‘wells and land were granted’.93
There is also ample epigraphic evidence on the ownership of wells
and rights in wells. This evidence exists precisely because each well
carried a title plate and some of these title plates have been recovered,
rescued and deciphered as inscriptions; many of these are from step-
wells or otherwise large wells constructed by royalty. But there are a few
inscriptions dealing with wells sunk by private individuals/communities,
albeit those are also from fairly big wells. A close scrutiny of the entire
Epigraphica Indica series is likely to yield more extensive evidence on
the subject.
One of the earliest known inscriptions from a well is on a massive
stone and it is ascribed to the first century BC.94 It is from Ghosundi
in the Udaipur State. But from 644 AD onwards there are numerous
inscriptions from Rajasthan pertaining to different kinds of wells that
have been used and noted by B.D. Chattopadhyaya. They are given in a
tabulated form indicating chronology, sites and types of wells.95 Similar
kind of information is available for other parts and dynasties too.96 A few
examples may be cited; a Chalukya inscription of the Vikrami Samvat
of 998 records the construction of a well97 and some of the Pallava in-
scriptions give similar and more information about wells.98 There is a
remarkable continuity in the inscriptions from wells from the Sultanate
and the Mughal periods. One of the earliest inscriptions from the Sultan-
ate period is regarding the restoration and construction of a well by Qut-
lugh Khan in Bengal ‘in the days of Iltutmish’.99 There is an inscription
recording ‘the clearance and re-digging of a well’ in Bayana in Bharatpur
state from Balban’s period under the governorship of Nusart Khan; this
was done ‘as scarcity of water was causing trouble to the people’.100 The
inscription was found in a well when it was being re-excavated.101 From
Ghiasuddin Tughluq’s reign there is a bilingual inscription from Petlad
in Baroda recording the repair and completion of a well and the grant of
20 kubhas of land for its maintenance.102 There is an inscription which is
preserved in the Delhi Museum of Archaeology but which was originally
found in a ruined well at Humayunpur near Hauz Khas. The inscription
is engraved on a marble slab and records the building of a well named
Chahi Khass during the time of Sikandar Shah Lodhi when Munnavar
Beg was the governor of Delhi.103 A Persian inscription of 1584 AD from
Bhonsara in the ‘Gwalior State’ records the construction of a well by the
order of the Mughal emperor Akbar.104 There are several inscriptions re-
cording the construction of big wells by the Kachchwahas, Sisodias and
other Rajput chieftains during the Afghan-Mughal period; Bhogidas ki
Bavadi105 and the baoli at Joda Raya Simha are two such examples. The
latter was built by Purohit Chakrapani and his sons during Salim Shah’s
time.106 Among the numerous extant wells, the best preserved example is
of a well built by the Muttaraiyar family, a subordinate of Dantivarman.
The well is known as Marpidugu-Perunginaru well after the title of the
Muttariyar family.107
(iii) While most of the wells were constructed by powers that be,
there are several instances of individuals and communities constructing
wells of different types. Thus, for instance, the Dabok inscription of 644
AD refers to the individual ownership of the araghatta fields. Also the
Kekind inscription of 1143 AD refers to individual ownership of the ar-
ghatta fields.108 Four centuries later, a baoli called Kalibaya near Khan-
dela was constructed by one Agrawala Vania Prithviraja of Kolha and his
son. The construction work was begun in samvat 1575 (1518 AD) during
the reign of Sultan Ibrahim Lodhi and it was completed seventeen years
later (samvat 1592) during the reign of emperor Humayun.109 An inscrip-
tion built into the wall of a baoli at Gyaspur in Pratapgarh records that
the well was constructed by the Banjaras in the samvat 1684 (1627 AD)
in the time of Rawat Singha. Together with Nayak Gira of the Banjara
caste seven other family names are mentioned and one of them is from
Agra.110
For individuals and communities to have sunk wells, permission to
sink would have been acquired from the state. Presumably permission
would have been acquired from the rulers whose names appear on the ti-
tle plates of the wells. In the case of the Kalibaya baoli the names of two
rulers appear, one of Ibrahim Lodhi during whose reign the construction
work was begun and the other of Humayun in whose reign the work got
completed. Presumably permission was acquired again from the new rul-
er with the overthrow of the dynasty in whose rule the construction had
begun. Also because it was a huge work, renewal of permission would
have been essential with the change of the ruling dynasty. Indeed, no
well, particularly of such huge dimensions, could be constructed without
the royal permission.
B
Two of the earliest pieces of evidence on the right to sink wells come
from the 7th and 8th centuries from the Pallava charters gifting land to
Brahmadeyas.111 Besides the land, the donees were also given the right
to sink wells ‘small and big’ in the lands granted to them. The Anabil
plates of Sundracola also give the donees the right to sink wells.112 These
rights were qualified by certain restrictions.113 Obviously, the state con-
trolled the construction of wells. In fact, there was a double control over
the construction of masonry wells. Besides controlling the right to sink
wells, the state also controlled the right to the usage of the burnt bricks.
While the Tanjavir plate gives the right to use the burnt tiles, Chitrur
Plates give the donees the right to the usage of the burnt bricks for houses
and mansions.114 In view of these controls, it is not surprising that most
irrigational facilities, including the arghattas in Rajasthan emanated
from the State. Obviously the right to sink wells rested with the state and
it granted that right to others.
The state maintained a close watch and control over the wells through
various administrative mechanisms. Thus, for instance, the formal sanc-
tion of the village governing bodies for sinking wells (particularly a large
well) through the payment of a small cess called ulliya-kuli retained the
control of the ruling power.115 In South India there were inspectors of
wells called kupa-darskas.116 In Rajasthan there was a tax called kosya,
presumably a tax on the kosas or leather buckets used for irrigation.117
Also several cesses were levied on the araghatta fields; sometimes parts
of the arghatta fields were earmarked for certain purposes.118 Disputes
in wells could receive attention from the rulers themselves; Maharaja
Ranjit Singh’s order to stop the sinking of a new well on another’s land
is on record.119 At the village level, the panchayats could grant the right
to sink wells.120 While a cess was charged in south India for permission
to sink wells, in the Punjab a saropa had to be given for sinking a well.121
Even repair of wells was regulated; in some areas shares of repairs were
defined,122 in others applications were made to authority seeking per-
mission to repair wells.123 In South India there is ample evidence of vil-
lage and supra-village bodies supervising irrigation facilities, including
wells.124 Firuz Shah Tughluq addressed himself to the entire hierarchy in
Gujarat from the wali to the karkun regarding the grant of wells to the
khanqah mentioned earlier. In the Multan region of the Punjab, and even
elsewhere, the state was fully cognisant of the state of wells in the 19th
century and so was it in different parts of Rajasthan. The issue will be
discussed a little later.
It is apparent that there were well organised structural mechanisms
of controlling even field-specific mode of irrigation. They might have
varied in form in different regions and at different times, but the systems
of control were maintained by the state throughout the entire sub-conti-
nent. These systems of control could have been maintained directly or in
partnership with different levels of authority/power/dominant groups as
the situation would have required at any given point of time.
C
The tillers of the soil had no right to sink wells. While it is under-
standable that they could not have had the means to construct masonry
wells but what is remarkable is that they did not have the right to sink
even a kachcha125 well which, in greater part of north India was ‘no more
than a hole dug in the ground to the depth of a few feet within a diame-
ter of three to four feet’126 with stake/wattle but invariably without it. A
kachcha well is sunk down low enough to ensure a good supply of water.
The kachcha wells are not renewed or repaired, but have to be cleared
out.127 It is significant that the tillers of the soil had no right to sink even
a kachcha well which only required their family labour and a small sum
of money. Indeed, they were debarred from sinking wells.128 The vital
import of this denial of the right to the tiller of the soil and its raison
d’etre would emerge in the following paragraphs. Suffice it to say here
that the economic irrationality ascribed by Frykenberg to the villagers of
lower standing for borrowing money not for improving productivity of
land, but for supporting ‘unproductive ceremonials and extravagances’
is poignantly misplaced;129 they did not possess the right to improve the
productivity of the soil on their own. In fact, they were penalised for
doing so as it would emerge from a judgement of the Agra High Court
in 1867.
The right to sink wells was a highly prized right and it was closely
guarded by those who possessed it. Sinking wells was one of the privi-
leges of the superior land holding class and the cultivators were debarred
from that privilege.130 It is repeatedly underlined in the customary law
digests, settlement reports and the tenancy documents from the Punjab
that the tenants/cultivaters of the soil did not have the right to sink wells.
It was emphatically stated that the ‘right of tenants to sink wells is rec-
ognised under no circumstances’.131 In a report of the Law Committee of
the Anjuman-i-Punjab, it was noted that in certain adverse circumstances
the owner of land could be compelled by the need of securing tenants
at any cost, including ‘allowing them to exercise certain rights almost
resembling proprietary rights over the land’. The Anjuman unanimous-
ly objected to the use of the expression ‘almost resembling proprietary
right’ and wished it to be substituted by an expressedly unambiguous
statement that the tenants never acquired the right ‘to sell trees or sink
wells or transfer the land’.132 It is apparent that the right to sink wells was
a proprietary right. In one of the exceptions to the prevailing customs in
the common holdings in the Punjab, sinking wells has been mentioned
‘as exercise of one of the powers attending absolute ownership’.133
Control over rights to sink wells gave control over the tillers of the
soil and the untouchables. Historic denial of rights in wells underlay un-
touchability; they were not allowed to draw water from the wells used by
the upper-castes. The untouchables were provided with wells much be-
yond the village boundary limits. Such wells as were specifically located
for them were known as parai-kulam in South India.134 Control over their
labour followed control over the wells. As for the tillers of the soil, they
were denied the right to sink even a kachcha well because rights in land
accrued as a consequence of sinking wells. If cultivators’ hold over their
land became secure, it would weaken the control of the land-holding
sections over them and thereby their control over the surplus.
The British government went in a tizzy following a judgement of the
full bench of the Agra High Court in July 1867 whereby the court upheld
the eviction of an occupancy tenant on the ground of his having sunk a
kachcha well without the prior permission of the landlord.

The case which went through several stages of appeal was finally
decided by the full bench of the Agra High Court on 20th July 1867.135
The landlord’s having ejected the tenant for having sunk a kachcha well
without his prior approval was upheld by the full bench. It was argued
that ‘the act of digging a well or planting trees may not necessarily im-
ply or assert a proprietary right in the land in which the well is dug or the
trees are planted, yet by the general law of these provinces, a ryot even
having a right of occupancy being prohibited from doing certain acts,
such as planting of trees or digging of a well, without his landlord’s con-
sent, makes himself liable to ejectment’136 It was further argued that ‘the
beneficial nature of an act is not a justification of it, if it be a breach of
contract’. Further, ‘A condition not expressly made between the parties
to a contract, may nevertheless be attached to such contract by custom.’
It concluded ‘The court must recognise the law as it is found to exist, so
long as it shall not be superseded by positive law’. As for the penalty, it
concluded, ‘the unwritten law of the country must be our guide. Were we
free to legislate upon the subject, it might seem to us equitable to look
to the amount of injury actually caused to the landlord by the act com-
plained of, and to grant him relief and compensation, whenever possible,
otherwise than by the ejectment of the tenant. But it is not contended or
proved that any other penalty than forfeiture of his holding for such a
breach of contract is sanctioned by the law of these provinces.’137 The
case was decided with costs. The tenant by sinking the well had chal-
lenged the existing social relations of production
The judgement created furore in the Legislative Council in its meet-
ing held to discuss the Oudh Rent Act. That an act of improvement such
as a ‘mere hole dug in the ground’ could lead to an occupancy tenant to
lose his land was baffling for the members of the Legislative Council.
They regarded the fact of digging of a kachcha well leading to the for-
feiture of his occupancy rights as ‘truly extraordinary’.138 They failed to
understand the implications of the issue for social relations.
Indeed, primary proprietary rights existed in water. In some areas
in the Punjab it was held that ‘property exists essentially in water’.139
The land-holdings were known by its water, and the estates irrigated by
wells, were defined by the nature of their wells.140 In fact, superior rights
in land accrued as a consequence of rights in water.141
It is evident from the judgement of the Agra High Court that the act
of sinking a well was deemed as an assertion of proprietary rights in
land. In fact, superior rights in land and/or its produce accrued as a con-
sequence of sinking and/or repairing wells. Although the tillers of the
soil did not have the right to repair and sink wells, yet there is ample
evidence to show that they did repair/sink wells. Presumably they did it
with the permission of the malik or the ruler of the day. Under whatever
circumstances the hereditary cultivator sank/repaired a well, the fact of
his having done so gave him some rights in the land which were quali-
tatively different from and were superior to his right to hereditary culti-
vation. Not only were such cultivators allowed to remain in ‘undisturbed
enjoyment of their holdings’, it was understood that by allowing a cul-
tivator to sink a well at his own cost, the proprietors ‘tacitly permitted
him (cultivator) to get a title to cultivation even against themselves’.142
Sinking a well could make him a joint proprietor of the land in which the
well was sunk.143 All kinds of exceptions to the existing rules and usages
were permitted where a cultivator had sunk a well.144 With the sinking of
a well the cultivator apparently became a proprietor.145 It is noteworthy
that those hereditary cultivators who had repaired/sunk a well invariably
went beyond seeking the occupancy rights in the Punjab when the Brit-
ish made their first regular land settlement in the early eighteen fifties;
they sought malkiyat rights. Even when the entire question of occupancy
rights in the Punjab was reopened by Edward Prinsep,146 and he reversed
three-fourths of the occupancy tenancies from the earlier settlements,
1253 occupancy tenants were raised to the superior status of proprietor-
ship.147 This was done with mutual consent from both sides owing to
the tenants having repaired/sunk wells. After repairing wells, even some
untouchables acquired superior rights under Prinsep’s settlement. Under
Maharaja Ranjit Singh new tenures such as chakdar, siledar, taraddakar,
adhlapidar, kasurkhawar developed arising out of sinking and repairing
wells in the lands belonging to others. These tenures gave them rights in
land and/or its produce.148 The nomenclature of these tenures is derived
from the well itself; chak is the wooden frame at the bottom of the well
and the siledar is derived from the word for brickwork of a pucca well.149
There were nuanced differences between and within these tenures de-
pending upon the circumstances and conditions under which a particular
well was sunk, but all these tenures were inheritable and alienable.150 It
would be worth examining whether such tenures developed in other re-
gions too where the state towards the end of the eighteenth century was
attempting to get the trading communities, as in the Punjab, to invest
money in repairing and sinking wells.151 It is quite remarkable that even
after the landlords had acquired indefeasible proprietary rights in land
under the British, they were apprehensive that by sinking wells the culti-
vators would acquire superior rights in land. They put up stiff resistance
to the attempts by the British government to give hereditary tenants right
to sink wells. In the Punjab, they were not agreeable to tenants being
given the right to sink wells unless they ‘put the proprietors’ name on
the title-brick or sign a written agreement with the proprietor to prevent
the possibility of the latter ever losing his right of property’.152 As late as
1911 in the United Provinces they were demolishing the masonry wells
constructed by the tenants153 notwithstanding the fact that the tenants had
been granted that right by the British government.
Tight control over the right to sink and repair wells was an essential
component of the social relations defining access to means of produc-
tion with the aim of controlling and meticulously regulating the release
of the productive forces.154 This introduced a fundamental contradiction
between the interests of the ruling powers to enhance their resources and
simultaneously uphold the social relations which controlled and regu-
lated the release of productive forces. The nature of the state in the last
resort would be defined by its policy on water rights.
With the centrality of irrigation and of water rights in agrarian pro-
duction and generation of surplus, it is not surprising that water was an
essential component in the system of revenue assessment and classifica-
tion of cultivable land under the Mughals, a part of which the Mughals
had inherited from their predecessors. Akbar’s classification of cultiva-
ble land into, polaj, parauti, chachar, and banjar was based upon conti-
nuity or intermittence in cultivation; the polaj land was under continuous
cultivation with successive crops and was never allowed to remain fal-
low while parauti was left out of cultivation for sometime so that it could
recover its strength.155 The chachar land was that land that had remained
follow for three or four years while the banjar had remained uncultivat-
ed for five or more years.156 Water/irrigation was the basic criterion un-
derlying this classification based upon periodicity of cultivation. For the
chachar and banjar categories excessive rains and inundation are explic-
itly given as causes for the land falling out of cultivation both in the river
belts and the submontane regions. It is apparent that these two categories
of land are dealing with inundation (sailabi) and rain-based (barani) cul-
tivation; both sailabi and barani were unirrigated lands. As distinct from
the chachar and the banjar categories, the polaj and the parauti were un-
der continuous/nearly continuous cultivation and continuity and stability
in agriculture was in direct proportion to human intervention in water. It
may be safely inferred that irrigation underlay the basic classification of
cultivated lands for calculating ‘proportionate dues of sovereignty’ under
Akbar. Within the irrigated territories, that is, the polaj and the parauti,
there were soil related subcategories.157 The Mughals had inherited these
categories from their predecessors, the Sur dynasty.
Indeed, water as an independent and parallel component to land in
calculating ‘the dues of sovereignty’ has been explicitly enunciated in
the Ain VII on Khazandar. We may quote Abul Fazl for that –
‘And because the conditions of the royal state and prerogative vary
in different countries, and soils are diverse in character, some pro-
ducing abundantly with little labour, and others the reverse, and as
inequalities exist also through the remoteness or vicinity of water
and cultivated tracts, the administration of each state must take these
circumstances into consideration and fix its demands accordingly.’158
That water and irrigation formed an integral part of the system of

revenue assessment is apparent, but how they were factored in assess-
ment awaits research. It is a distinct possibility that administrative / fiscal
units / rates could have revolved around specificities of water/irrigation.
It may not be out of place here to mention that the two divisions of
Birun-i-Panjnad (Outside of the Rivers) in the Subah Lahore159 make
sense only in relation to water related factors. Separated by a large phys-
ical distance, with one located to the west of the river Indus and the other
to the east of the Satluj, these two divisions could not have formed one
administrative unit;160 their nomenclature suggests that they represented
one category in relation to running surface waters of the Indus system of
rivers of the Subah of Lahore. Under Ranjit Singh well was taken as a
unit of revenue-yielding capacity of the land that it cultivated. There are
numerous documents extant from Ranjit Singh’s period which refer to
grants of wells of varying values as dharmarth or for other purposes.161
Indeed, irrigation, through its implications for agrarian production
and generation of surplus, had wide and multi-dimensional ramifications
for the socio-political structures, politics and polity of any region/state.
Even a brief study of irrigation on the river Ghaggai in the first half of the
nineteenth century reveals that there were disputed claims by different
villages, zamindars and chiefs over waters of different streams and tor-
rents, over right to construct bandhs or embankments at different points
on the river and/or to make cuts/channels at different points.162 There
were rights even over the superfluous water and winter freshets. These
rights were both defined and contested and they generated tremendous
social tensions between villages and chiefs and invariably led to violence
and even loss of life. Disputed claims and their resolutions reveal arena
of social tensions and conflict and the nature and role of different insti-
tutions and levels of authority within that. Dynamics of larger political
situations had direct bearing on these contestations and their resolutions;
fluid political situations accentuated contestations leading to emergence
of newer rights, while larger and more stable political entities invariably
intervened to determine, regulate and also change these rights. History
of each region and sub-region awaits study with water as an essential
component in it.
At the higher political level, the politics of revenue assignments to
the ruling elite would be influenced by the level of development of irri-
gational facilities or their absence; assignees with less developed irriga-
tional facilities are known to have paid a great deal of attention to devel-
oping irrigation works in their assignments. In fact, the state itself would
have had a great stake in creating and improving irrigation facilities.
It were not only the Delhi-centric big and powerful states that devot-
ed attention to canal-making; this was the accepted norm everywhere
within the subcontinent. Several centuries prior to Akbar (1556 -1605
A.D.) and from a different part of the subcontinent, is a Tamil poet’s
advice to a Pandya king on the subject of canal-making.
On great king, if you crave wealth in the next world
and yearn to vanquish other kings who protect this world
and thus to become the greatest among them
hearing songs of praise to your glory,
listen to me to learn what deeds guarantee these rewards.
Those who give food give life to living beings
who cannot live without water.
Food is first for all living things, made of food,
and because food is but soil and water mingled together,
those who bring water into fields
create living beings and life in this world.
Even kings with vast domains strive in vain, when their land is dry
and fields sown with seeds look only to the sky for rain.
So Pandya king who makes dreadful war, do not mistake my words:
quickly expand watery places that are built to bring streams to your land!
For those who control water reap rewards
and those who fail cannot endure.163

Akbar’s preamble to the sanad quoted above is reminiscent of the
Tamil poet’s advice to a Pandya king given several centuries earlier. It
is remarkable how the two concur in their concerns; both show peo-
ple-centric concerns, but in the last resort the interests of the rulers/state
underpin their views on bringing ‘streams’ to the fields. While one views
‘control over water’ essential for survival of political powers, the other
eyes ‘hundred fold’ increase in agrarian production and consequent in-
crease in the imperial revenues. Indeed, rulers have always been deeply
involved in large scale irrigational activities and structures, systems and
rules concerning their use have been in place for centuries before Akbar.
As long back as Kautiliya’s time, the Head of the Department of the
settlement of the countryside was meant to ‘cause irrigation works to be
built with natural water sources or with water to be brought in from else-
where’.164 There were rules governing any one walking out of the joint
building of an irrigation work and165 there were different water-rates for
different kinds of irrigation facilities.166 Not only was the administration
supposed to keep record of water-works, but their regular inspection was
also mandated.167 Indeed, there are specific regulations given in The Ar-
thasastra regarding control over ownership of irrigation works, usage
of water, damage to the works or to the fields through which they pass,
nature of revenue obligations for those making irrigational works, rules
concerning renting, mortgaging and sale of these facilities and punish-
ment for violation of those rules.168 If from the Arthasastra we get in-
sight into the systems, structures and rules concerning irrigation, from
the Kaushiksutra we get a glimpse of the rituals and ceremonies con-
nected with the opening of a canal. When ‘a canal was opened gold plate
was laid at the mouth of the channel… and a frog was tied..169. Indeed,
information is forthcoming from all genres of sources, regions and times.
It is squarely staring us in the face to be picked up, studied and integrated
within the discourse of the history of the Indian subcontinent.
The centrality of irrigation both for the state and the society is writ
large on the face of Indian history, but what is not so apparent is the
nature of water rights. In fact, the nature of rights of access to water
is hidden from the view; there was inequitable access to water in the
pre-colonial times and this was an essential component of the social re-
lations. In the Asiatic Mode of Production tight control over water held
back release of the productive forces which alone could have created
conditions for changes in social relations of production. It did happen in
the Punjab under Ranjit Singh; he allowed everyone, including the cul-
tivators, to release forces of production so as to increase the revenue of
the state. He gave access to right of water to the tillers of the soil. Ear-
lier Guru Tegh Bahadur had created a revolutionary situation whereby
he had generated a movement for sinking well by the cultivators in the
sandy parched region of the Satluj-Jamuna interfluve. He was executed
by the Mughal state for challenging the existing social relations although
under religious pretext.
Irrigation, Labour and Artisanal Productions

Labour constitutes the first and the main condition for the creation
of any material structure and so did it for making irrigation structures
during the period under study. Here we intend to discuss the theme spe-
cifically with regard to canal and well irrigation in the pre-colonial Pun-
jab.
We begin by examining the labour requirements for the construction,
operationalisation and maintenance of canals and wells in the pre-colo-
nial Punjab. We then proceed to enquire into the mechanisms through
which the labour was mobilised and controlled. Finally we examine the
systems and degree of remuneration of the labour so rendered.
All these dimensions of labour when woven together lead us to the
central law of motion of any society, that is, the generation of surplus. Ir-
rigation expanded, stabilized, diversified and intensified agriculture with
inherent implications for the generation of surplus and its appropriation
and its significance both for the state and the society.
The Punjab was regarded as the land of wells in the centuries pre-
ceding the British rule.170 There were three types of wells in use in the
region to a larger or a smaller degree and these were the dhenkli, charas
and the rahat. Of these three, the dhenkli was the simplest device for
lifting subsoil water. It is/was a single lever system with a bucket tied to
one end of the long pole and weight on the other; the pole is swung back-
ward and forward by manual labour.171 The charas, though mechanically
simpler than the dhenkli172, supported bigger structures and systems. It
was a rope and leather bucket/bag system, the rope of which rested on
a pulley on the well. The rahat or the Persian wheel, as it is commonly
known through its English nomenclature, was the most complex system
of lifting water. This was a system of double–gearing mechanism which
rotated the wheel on the well on which hung one or more chain/s of pots
which lifted the water from the well.
All these well types had certain labour requirements in common, but
each type had its own specific requirement too. Common to them all is/

was the labour for digging wells, but the scale, size and the quality of
labour required for each type varied extensively. Similarly, the ropes and
buckets were common to them all, but their quality, quantity and sizes
varied enormously.
The dhenkli was a small shallow well usually with a diameter of 3’-
5’ and not more than a few feet deep. Hence the labour requirement for
digging this type of well was very limited. These were usually kachcha
wells, but occasionally these were lined with stake/wattle, but invariably
without it; these wells are not renewed/repaired, but have to be cleared
out.173
The digging of the charas and the rahat required actual sinking of
the well to much below the water level. The digging and sinking of both
types had far greater labour requirements with specialised expertise.
Making these wells required diggers, sinkers/divers besides carpenters
for chak-making, that is, the wooden base on which the cylinder of the
well (gola) rested. These wells were pucca wells and hence brick-mak-
ers’ and brick-layers’ labour formed an integral of the labour that went
into their making, but when the gola was made of wood instead of ma-
sonry, their labour was limited only to the masonry work on the surface
of the well.
The water-lifting devices of these wells too had certain labour re-
quirements in common, but the charas and the rahat had their specific
requirements too. The rahat had a chain of earthen pots for drawing wa-
ter while the charas used a big leather bucket/bag for that purpose. The
rahat, therefore, needed kumhar’s (potter) labour for its water-drawing
mechanism, while the charas used chamar’s labour for the same. For
the weight that the leather bucket carried in the charas, it was likely to
have been a multi-layered bag/bucket.174 The leather worker’s (chamar)
work of making the leather bucket involved not merely the stitching of
various layers of leather together, but also the processes of removing
these hides from the body of the dead animals and then converting the
hides into leather through various processes and stages of preparation.175
All types of wells required the labour of rope-makers. The charas
used a big thick rope, while both thick and thin ropes were used in the ra-
hat; the thin ropes were used for tying pots to the sides of the wheel on the
well whereas the side ropes were thicker; the dhenkli needed only a small
rope of medium size.176 While in the charas the carpenters’ (tarkhan)
labour was confined only to the chak-making, the rahat depended heav-
ily on the carpenter’s labour. Its double-gearing mechanism involving
the making of three big wheels and their interconnecting devices which
were made entirely of wood. Therefore, the carpenter’s labour formed a
prominent component of the rahat system.177 If the gola of any well was
made of wood, it then increased the carpenter’s labour manifold. The
leather work for the rahat included blinkers for the bullocks going round
the well. Besides all this skilled labour, unskilled labour was needed for
putting pressure from above for the actual sinking of the cylinder of the
well when the earth was dug under the chak.
The skilled labour was further needed for maintaining apparatuses of
various types of wells. The tarkhans repaired wheels of the rahat while
the potter constantly supplied earthern pots for replacement. The mochi
replaced pair of blinkers while the churha in Lahore region provided two
raw hide ropes annually.178
The working of the three types involved varying degrees and inten-
sity of human labour. The dhenkli, while easy on labour for its making,
is/was labour intensive in its working; not only is the pole swung back-
ward and forward with manual labour, each bucket of water is emptied
manually. In the charas system both human labour and animal power
operated in tandem in the process of drawing water. There were two
persons involved in the process along with a yoke of bullocks; while one
man guided the movement of bullocks for lifting the water up, the other
actually pulled out and then emptied the water into a trough/channel and
then put the bucket back.179 The filled leather bucket/bag was very heavy
and it required heavy labour and it was hazardous activity for the person
involved in moving the bucket/bag out of the well. In the rahat only one
animal driver was needed since the water-lifting mechanism in the rahat
was linked to the double–gearing mechanism and that was rotated with
the use of animal power whereby the pots automatically got filled with
water and then emptied themselves in the trough. While in the Persian
wheel system the animal power is used for lifting water, 180 the system
does not eliminate the use of human labour. Indeed, indirectly it increas-
es human labour for the irrigating device; it gets shifted to looking after
the animals and their needs. Besides tending the animals, procuring fod-
der for them and storing it for some part of the year, cleaning dung and
maintaining the animal sheds, human labour also went into producing
fodder where pasturage was not easily available. Invariably producing a
crop of turnips for fodder was a distinctive feature of the well-irrigated
lands. Occasionally, as in the Dera Ghazi Khan, production of fodder
assumed the form of the well-estates being bigger than what could be
irrigated by a well so that some area could be reserved for producing fod-
der.181 All these labour ingredients, although not apparent on the surface,
formed an integral part of the labour requirements of the rahat system.
Labour requirement for the canals

There was extensive irrigation from canals in the pre-colonial Punjab
notwithstanding Babur’s assertion that there were no canals in Hindu-
stan.182 There were seasonal as well as perennial canals in the region.183
Canals worked on the principle of diverting water from its natural course
to an artificially created channel to a particular destination. From the
main canal the water is led to smaller channels and then to the feeder
channels with their own subsidiary mechanisms of diversion, control and
distribution.
The construction work involved making of massive structures at
headwork (mund) for diverting water184 to an artificially created / natu-
rally existing channel, digging a channel, as and where needed, making
outlet, towards marked destination, particularly of perennial canals. In
the large perennial canals, the head works consisted of massive dams
(bunds)/ embankments made of stones/boulders and wood; heavy boul-
ders and huge tree trunks would need to be transported to the location of
the head works besides construction of the bund itself. Similarly such
bunds were made on a smaller scale for the seasonal canals. The fact
that abandoned channels could be/were being used partly may give the
impression that minimal digging was required for the canals. But we
do know that several months were spent in deepening the Shah Nahr to
ensure a sufficient supply of water to Lahore and when that too did not
work, another span of time was spent in re-routing it.185 A huge digging
activity was involved in it. We have an explicit reference to the deep-
ening of the Chittang nallah for using it as a canal channel.186 Further,
the seasonal canals were all made at a certain angle to the river187 and,
therefore, practically most of them had to be made by digging channels.
Digging the channels for canals went beyond simple digging activity
since it also involved firming up the sides of the channels and working
out appropriate levels while digging to ensure a proper flow of water.
In the long perennial canals there was invariably considerable extra
labour involved. Since these canals covered long distances, they usually
had to cross streams/nullahs flowing in the opposite direction and, there-
fore, aqueducts had to be made involving big labour; aqueducts over the
hill torrents Jena and Chakki for the Shah Nahr are examples of huge
extra labour.188

The headworks, which were massive, were maintained amidst great
engineering difficulties.189 Since they were not masonary, they were
vulnerable to constant damage with a strong flow, particularly during
the rainy season; hence they heeded to be constantly repaired.190 Even
the headworks of smaller and seasonal canals were liable to constant
damage and so were the small diversionary structures for smaller/feeder
channels.191 Further, these headworks had to be invariably relocated,
sometimes almost with annual regularity due to changes in the courses
of rivers/streams of the Himalayan rivers which were prone to constant-
ly shifting their courses.192 Similar repairs were essential for the aque-
ducts too.
The second aspect of the maintenance which was essential for keep-
ing the canals functional consisted of annual desilting both of the main
canals as well as the subsidiary feeder channels. Since the Indus rivers
bring and carry heavy sediment load with them, the canals begin to silt
and could/would fall in disuse within a short span of time if not regularly
desilted.193
Another aspect of the maintenance pertained to annual strong growth
of various descriptions of grasses and jungle on the canal bounds during
the rainy season; they had to be cleared annually to admit of repairs and
access to the banks.194 By any standards keeping the canals functional in
the pre-British times was highly labour intensive. Indeed, the working
of the canals hinged upon the organisation and control over labour for
continuous repairs and desilting.
Drawing water from canals in several areas was done through the
water lifting device called the ‘charkhee’. These charkhis were ‘Persian
wheels sunk into the streams or canals instead of into wells.195. Hence
the entire labour of the Persian well system got added to the labour of the
canal system in those areas.
Labour for Canals

Having outlined the labour requirement, we now proceed with the
procurement of labour for digging canals. The first explicit referenc-
es come from a document issued by Akbar in 1568 AD pertaining to
the restructuring/revival of Firuzshah’s perennial canal from the river
Jamuna.196 The first reference comes from Akbar’s policy of ‘ensuring
sufficient supply’ of water to those who had ‘aided’ in excavating the
canal.197 The second reference contains an order about any future exi-
gency requiring labour. It is significant that the order is addressed to all
the shiqdars, chaudharies, muqaddams and the ‘Rayats’ whether of the
Khalisah or of the other parganas ‘to render necessary assistant in labour,
& c’ should it become necessary to construct a bund or any other work
on the canal and this assistance was to be given ‘without any delay’.198
With such a clear mention of the various categories there is no room for
doubt that the same sections of the rural society had aided in procuring
labour for excavating the canal for which they were being allocated
sufficient supply of canal water as mentioned above. It is apparent that
besides the superior landholding sections, who had been incorporated in
the revenue system at the village level, a section of the peasantry too was
mobilisers of labour for the canal work. Obviously the labour was being
organised systematically pargana-wise going down to the village level;
shiqdar could have been overall incharge of the larger area unit through
which the work was being done.
It takes us to the next logical step of attempting to understand as
to which sections of the village society could have been mobilised for
rendering labour as demanded by the state. It can be safely asserted that
labour could not have come from the families of the rural aristocracy or
the well-off peasantry who were asked to arrange it. The labour would
have most certainly come from the menial/service castes including the
artisanal groups known as sepis/sepidars (craftsmen) in the Punjab most
of whom belonged to the untouchable castes. Further, the tillers of the
soil could have been mobilised for rendering such labour since from the
tenancy documents we do know that the resident cultivators were subject
to extra labour obligations in the form of begar from which the paikashts
were exempt.199 It is pertinent to note here that in the absence of any
right of access to create water structures on their own for irrigation, the
tillers of the soil were under the total control of the land-holding castes/
classes.200 It is thus only the sudras and the ati-sudras whose labour
could have been mobilised for excavating the canal under discussion.
The canal that was reconstructed by Akbar in the 1560s was part of
a large network of canals constructed in the mid-fourteenth century by
Firuz Shah Tughlug.201 Given the fact that the region was sparsely pop-
ulated in the early fourteenth century, it is highly improbable that local
labour could have been mobilised or at least could have sufficed for the
immensely huge network created by Firuz Shah Tughluq. In all likeli-
hood he used his army of slaves for the purpose besides, of course, the
traditional labour from the existing caste system in the region and from
the adjacent hills. We do know that he owned about one lakh slaves for
whose organization he had created a separate department.202

Turning to another labour-source for digging canals, the British
ethnographic sources list the od tribe and the beldars as canal diggers.
From the Ain-i-Akbari we do know that the beldars were workers for
laying foundations, building walls and battlement and digging ditches
in the fortresses.203 From the 18th and 19th century sources we do know
that they were part of the workforce engaged in repairing damage to
bunds/ embankments including the headworks of the canals.204 The od
community which is still engaged on the work of digging, was a vagrant
community, ghumantaru jan jati, as they call themselves.205 Regarded
as the ‘professional navvy’ of the Punjab206, the od community prides
itself in canal-digging, including subterraneous canals.207 The beldars
on the other hand, given their background of laying foundations and re-
pair work of canals, including head works, and the fact that they were
largely concentrated in the hilly and submontane region of the Punjab,208
where headworks for perennial canals were situated, probably worked
on the headworks for perennial canals. On the other hand, the od com-
munity did the work of canal digging. We may note that this is one
area of work where references to the work of women and children occur
directly. While the men dug, the od women carried the earth to their
donkeys, which they owned, and the children drove the donkeys to the
spoilbank.209
Besides digging, the transportation of heavy boulders and wood logs
to the site of the headworks, involved heavy labour. In the Kangra
region, the state sponsored and constructed kuhls, that is, gravitational
channels through the diversion of water-shafts/streams, forced labour for
transportation has been recognised.210
The maintenance of canals, which involved constant repair of bunds,
including headworks and annual desilting, was done through properly
defined systems and regulations. Usually the labour was provided by
the villages using the canal water and the management was done by the
state agencies; for the annual desilting there were fairly defined areas
of responsibility and labour provision.211 As with the canal digging un-
der Akbar, only the labour of the sudras and the ati-sudras would have
been provided by the zamindars etc. for desilting. However, the repair
work would have involved constant vigil and labour with some techni-
cal expertise for repair. On the Jamuna canal reaching Delhi, darogahs
with watchmen and beldars were stationed at regular intervals of 3-4 kos
for watch and repair purposes; these were obviously under the imperial
control.212 Under Maharaja Ranjit Singh, the responsibility of keeping
the headworks on the Shah Nahr in order rested with the villages under
Sujanpur, near where the headworks were situated.213 Labour here too
came from the lowest castes /classes.214
In the Derajat region where the canals were privately owned and
where the water-lords still existed as a separate class, there were several
sub-systems of repair of bunds and for desilting. Thus, for instance, in
the Bannu district in the Derajat, the land holders having no right in canal
water, obtained a share of canal water in return for doing a proportionate
amount of canal labour and a half as much more than the shareholders
who supplied the water.215 The land holders, of course, mobilised the la-
bour that was under their control. In the areas where the Khans had their
share in the canals, there was a separate group of canal workmen known
as wakoos. The wakoos contracted to keep the canals in order for which
work they received a part of the Khan’s land irrigated with the canal wa-
ter.216 Through their labour on the canals they thus acquired cultivating
rights but not without certain financial and revenue obligations both to
the Khans and to the state.217
It is apparent that for the maintenance of canals there existed multiple
levels, layers and modes of labour control and mobilisation linked to the
nature of political authority and social organisation in the region and its
sub-regions. Under Maharaja Ranjit Singh a serious attempt was made
to take over the work of the maintenance directly under the state control;
a cess called hasil-cher was levied on the land holders as part contribu-
tion towards the cost of desilting canals by the state.218
Labour for Wells

Digging wells, by its very nature, was a localised and limited activ-
ity and the labour for that was inevitably organised by those who were
getting the wells sunk. Digging a shallow well, like the dhenkli, was a
simple task, but digging deep wells for the charas and the rahat systems
required expertise and was also a hazardous activity. It would take sev-
eral months to dig such a well since it was done in co-ordination with
preparing the gola and sinking it by stages. Once the spring level was
reached, pieces of the chak were placed, joined and put in the well and
the gola was sunk over it.219 The sinking of the gola required a heavy
pressure from above and the labour for that would be procured locally.
Subsequently to reaching the water level, digging was continued beyond
it for 14’-15’ by the tobah (diver) and just this exercise could require
20 men on the job.220 Under water for long duration at a time with earth
being dug from deeper levels and becoming much heavier with water,
the process of lifting it to the ground surface became that much more
difficult and hazardous. Once the gola was sunk fully, the installation of
the mechanism of drawing water would take place.
Sinking well was a regular trade of its own.221 Abul Fazl had classi-
fied the chah-kan (well-diggers) into three graded categories.222 Howev-
er, the wells could also be sunk with family labour223 and it is noteworthy
that in a work propounding ideal life for a Sanatan Sikh, digging a well
is recommended ‘If the Guru gives strength’.224 The wells could be sunk
with family labour only if the water level was not very deep, as was the
case in the khadir of the Jamuna or any other river.225 The odes were
well-sinkers too and they needed around 9-10 persons of their communi-
ty for a fairly deep well.226
The maintenance of the wells included cleaning the wells periodi-
cally and replacing and repairing the wood work, ropes and the leather
items in use. While cleaning would be done by the divers, the repair
would be done by the tarkhan (carpenter), kumhar (potter), chamar and
churha (outcastes) locally. Daily tending of the animals and cleaning of
the animal shed would be done by the churahs. For working of the wells
different levels of labour would be required and the sources would vary.
The dhenkli would be operated with family labour, while for the charas
and the rahat, labour from outside the family would be used; this could
be provided by the regularly kept family servants for the purpose or
could be drawn from the menial and service castes residing in a secluded
habitation within the village. The scale of labour on the rahat depended
on the quality of the well and the quality was determined by how many
yokes of oxen and ropes and pots were operating in the well; the kamil
chah (perfect well) could have eights yokes of oxen. The churahs, who
were on the lowest rung of the sepi system, performed the work on the
wells during the cold winter nights.227
System of Remuneration
Remuneration for the labour includes the wages as well as the criteri-
on for calculating the wages. There are four categories discussed above
whose labour created and maintained the canals. Since the labour drawn
from the villages on the canal route was mobilised through the agency of
the land-holding sections, remuneration for such labour would inevitably
be integral to the system/s of traditional payment at the village level. For
remuneration, the share of the sepis was fixed in the produce at the time
of two harvests; it is unlikely that there was any extra payment for their
work on the canals. The tillers of the soil are likely to have rendered
begar. However, as far as the state was concerned, it provided food/
subsistence rations for the duration of the period of work on the canals.228
As for the slave labour arguably used by Firuz Shah Tughluq, there is no
question of remuneration since the slaves were owned by the Sultan. But
the question that needs to be raised is as to who these slaves were and
from where did they come. They could be prisoners of war as it is well
known that prisoners of war were always enslaved everywhere and we
do know that Sri Lankan prisoners of war were used as labour for irri-
gation works in South India.229 We also know that slaves were available
in the market and people were also forcibly captured and enslaved.230
As for the wages of the beldars and the Ods, the basis for calculating
their wages was not the days spent on performing their jobs, but specific
units of work. For their work on the fortifications, the unit of calculation
for the beldars was work per gaz231 and according to the Od community
itself, their work has always been measured by the amount of earth that
is dug out. It is remarkable that in the 1940s-50s they were receiving
1½ to 2 rupees per thousand maunds of earth they dug out. In the earlier
centuries too presumably at least part payment would have been made
in cash since otherwise it would not have been feasible for them to own
their own mules and instruments of work. As for the beldars, their wag-
es as given in the Ain-i-Akbari are in money.232 It is probable that for
their work on the canals too they received cash payment particularly
when they formed part of the Mughal state system of watch and repair
on the canals.233
However, under Maharaja Ranjit Singh there was no system of cash
payment for repair work on the mund of the Shah Nahr/Hasli. This re-
sponsibility rested with the villages of Sujanpur for which work they
were exempt from paying the naharana for the canal water. The British
government found this arrangement ‘unfair’ for the state since the labour
for repair was rendered only by the lowest castes/classes, but the benefit
of exemption accrued to all those who did not render any labour for the
repair work.234 Maharaja Ranjit Singh’s important administrator Diwan
Sawan Mal had also attempted to introduce the system of desilting by
organising the labour for desilting himself and instead of the labour, a
cess called hasil-cher (literally in lieu of labour) was levied by him on
the villages that used to supply labour for desilting.235
For the wells, the unit of remuneration is not given by Abul Fazl, but
according to the Od community, the wages were calculated according

to the size of the inner circle. However, the wages of the tobahs were
calculated either by the day or by the job.236 They were also fed by the
person getting the job done. They had to be given goat’s meat before
starting the work and gur (jaggery) during the course of their work; their
food was regarded as a heavy item of expenditure for digging wells.237 It
stands to reason that since they worked in and under water, their charges
varied according to season with winter charges being higher than the
summer charges.238 However, it is important to note that the tarkhans,
kumhars, mochis and the chamars were not paid by the unit of work or
by the day or by the job. They were part of the sepi system whereby
they had the obligation to render service to the land holding sections and
they were given a fixed amount of grain and some other items for the
entirety of their work for the wells, agricultural implements, including
plough, and items of household needs; they received specified shares of
the produce twice in a year at the harvest time. Suffice it to say that rates
of payment for different artisanal groups were different within the well
irrigated areas depending upon whether they were rahat or charas and
within the rahat, the different categories of wells. In the kamil chah, the
sepi received sugar cane juice and gur besides grains since such wells
always produced high quality cash crops.239 However, specialised repair
of gearing wheels usually got paid and calculated separately.240 Some
sepis got more than the others, but they all got remunerated in kind and
this was tied up with agriculture and was aimed at sheer subsistence.
With the churah, who probably rendered the maximum manual labour,
his dependence was so complete that he was given a roti twice a day.
Control over their labour was so complete that certain categories, includ-
ing the chamars, had no right to change their residence from one village
to another.241
There are a few notable points that emerge from the information giv-
en above. First, excepting the chahkan, all other workers received their
wages within the sepi system, that is, the artisanal production system
of the village and almost always in kind. A few rare instances of cash
payment for the repair work, for a specific portion of the charkhi are
found, but nothing beyond it. In the areas producing sugar cane, sugar
cane juice and gur (jaggery) formed part of the payment in kind. It is
remarkable that in all the areas producing cash crops (and these are all
irrigated areas that produced high quality cash crops), both the skilled
and the unskilled labour still got remunerated in kind for the creation,
working and maintenance of the irrigation structures. It is true that they

got higher amounts of payment in kind, for irrigation labour, but they
still received nothing beyond their wages in kind. The lowliest of the
lowliest, the chamars, who maintained the animal base and the leather
work for irrigation lived in condition of complete poverty and bondage.
Going further, the churhas who rendered the maximum unskilled labour
and were regarded as regular begarees, lived in abject servility and under
total control of the higher castes. Thus the labour that created and sus-
tained and operated the irrigation structures gained only by way of some
extra remuneration of grains and some small items of cash crops.
Irrigation provided material conditions for stabilization, diversifica-
tion and intensification of agriculture.242 Significantly, irrigation provided
a degree of security against famines, which were of common occurrence
throughout Indian history and which had serious repercussions both for
the state and the society; fall in revenues and the population, both human
and animal, always followed any serious famine. As pointed out earlier,
Ranjit Singh’s state could not recover from fall of revenues for four years
after the great famine of 1834-5.243
Further, with the expansion of area under cultivation, double-crop-
ping and production of cash crops as a consequence of irrigation facil-
ities, material conditions got created for the generation of surplus over
long spans of time and in newer areas. It happened through all modes of
irrigation on a larger or a smaller scale, but with large networks of canals
such as the one created by Firuz Shah Tughluq, the results were immedi-
ate and visibly transformative.244 This network of canals metamorphosed
the region with deficient rainfall and with no perennial river, into an area
yielding a huge surplus in a short span of time. This transformation
got physically reflected in flourishing urban centres, forts, architectural
monuments, big trading activity, gardens, orchards, a big variety of fruits
and flowers in the region;245 Shah Nahr also produced similar results but
in a different region.246 Well-irrigated areas were the best manured and
looked after agricultural lands anywhere and they too produced similar
results but on a smaller scale.
Making canals which immediately and in the long run generated
enormous surplus was of vital political importance for the ruling pow-
ers/ states that made them. Huge revenue from his network of canals was
of critical political significance for the Tughluq sultan Firuz Shah when
the Delhi Sultanate had shrunk territorially and when various echelons
of the nobility had become very powerful. The new source of big and
constant revenue undoubtedly enabled Firuz Shah Tughluq to survive for
a few decades. It is significant that Shah Jahan too made canals after a
devastating famine and at a time when the incipient financial crisis was
becoming manifest in the Mughal empire. Of further political impor-
tance is the fact that irrigation structures enabled the state to establish
deep linkages with religious establishments too.247 Irrigation, large ca-
nals in particular, generated demand for further labour by bringing new
areas under cultivation and by producing cash crops; cash crops provid-
ed impetus to large artisanal production and trade, which, in turn, creat-
ed material conditions for urbanization and non-agricultural production.
Human intervention in water, thus, emerges as a regulator of population
too. It is significant that the ruling powers saw the making of canals as
an activity that led to the growth of towns, prosperity and population.248
It is significant to note that the labour of those who made irrigation
structures and maintained them generation after generation over a cou-
ple of centuries, either had no access to those facilities or else had only
marginal or no use for them. It is quite remarkable that the tillers of the
soil had no right to sink / repair wells.249 Equally noteworthy is the fact
that the lowest castes which were sometimes given tiny plots of land in
lieu of their services, had no right to improve the productivity of their
tiny plots as they had no right even to their own koora (household rub-
bish) which could be used as manure.250 The system of control over the
use of the household rubbish was an integral part of the social controls.
They only acquired some extra grains and some additional items from
the cash crops in small quantities for their labour which was instrumen-
tal in creating, endlessly maintaining and operating the structures which
generated enormous surplus for the State and the socio-economically
and culturally dominant sections of society.
To conclude, there were wheels within wheels in the Asiatic Mode of

Production which precluded the possibility of change from within. For
more revenue, the state/s could and did bring new areas under cultivation
within the ambit of the existing social relations both with regard to land
and water; newer elements, such as pastoral communities, could be in-
corporated in the agrarian system within the ambit of the existing social
relations. While the forces of production continued to expand, they had
no scope to outgrow the existing social relations of production. On the
contrary, the release of the forces of production by the state by bring-
ing new land under cultivation by replicating the existing relations of
production further strengthened the existing social relations and ensured
their longevity. Only in small isolated pockets do we come across a few
challenges to it whereby social relations in water underwent transforma-
tion. We find one such example in the Satluj-Jamuna interfluve in the
late seventeenth century under the leadership of Guru Tegh Bahadur,
the ninth Sikh Guru, who was executed by the Mughal state ostensibly
on a religious pretext, but in reality for challenging the existing social
relations in water within the Asiatic Mode of Production. This happened
in a tiny small part of South Asia, but further researches may yield more
such pockets of change within the Indian sub-continent.
Endnotes:
1
However, the rivers emanating from the Himalayas were prone to frequent
changes in their courses and, therefore, the riverine belt of these rivers
accordingly remained susceptible to fluctuations.
2
See, Tripta Wahi, ‘Water Resources and the Agricultural Landscape: Pre-Co-
lonial Punjab’, Five Punjabi Centuries, ed. Indu Banga, Delhi 1997, pp.
280-82.
3
Ibid., p. 282.
4
It covered ten degrees of longitude and seven degrees of latitude, namely,
from 69.2°E to 79°E and from 27.4°N to 34.2°N.
5
For a large scale prevalence of canal irrigation in some other regions, see,
Irfan Habib, The Agrarian System of Mughal India 1556-1707, Second
Revised Edition, OUP 1999, pp. 33, 38-39 and James Heitzman, Gifts of
Power : Lordship in an Early Indian State, OUP 1997,pp. 37-47. It is well
known that there was extensive irrigation from canals in Kashmir. See
Francois Bernier, Travels in the Mogul Empire tr. Archibald Constable, a
revised and improved edition based upon Irvine Brook’s translation, Delhi
1972, pp. 396-97, 399, see also p. 454 for channels in Sindh.
6
Memoirs of Zehir-ed-Din Muhammed Babur, written by himself, translated
by John Leyden and William Erkine, ed. Lucas King, London 1921, II, pp.
205-6.
7
For flows of the Indus rivers, see, ‘The Indus and its Tributaries’, Mountains
and Rivers (21st International Geographic Congress India, 1968 Inde)
ed. B.C. Law, Calcutta 1968, pp. 351-52; see also, Tripta Wahi, ‘Water
Resources.’ pp. 268-69.
8
For such a confusion, see, for instance, H.C. Verma, Harvesting Water and
Rationalizaton of Agriculture in North Medieval India, 13-16 Centuries,
Delhi 2001, p.23.
9
‘Canals of the Mooltan District’, Selections from the Public Correspondence
of the Board of Administration for the Affairs of the Punjab, Lahore 1852,
I, pp. 1-13.
10
See, ‘The Indus and its Tributaries’, op.cit. pp. 351-52 and Tripta Wahi, ‘Wa-
ter Resources..’ pp. 268-69.
11
J.D. Cunningham, ‘Report of the Irrigation of the Gugur and the Sursootee’
Selections from the Public Correspondence of the Administration for the
Affairs of the Punjab, 1854-55, II, No.XXIV, pp. 383-469.
12
F.W.R. Fryer, First Regular Settlement of The Dera Ghazi Khan District in
the Derajat Division (1869-1874), Lahore 1876, nos. 163-67, pp. 59-60.
See also, B.R. Grover, ‘The Extension of the Irrigation System and the
Administration of the Canal Works in the Punjab during the Mughal Age,
1556-1707 A.D.,’ Land Rights, Landed Hierarchy and Village Community
During the Mughal Age, Collected Works of Professor B.R. Grover, ed.
Amrita Grover and et., Delhi, 2005, I, pp. 218-19, 225.
13
Shams Siraj Afif, Tarikh-i-Firuz Shahi, the Tughluq Kalin Bharat, tr. R.A.A.
Rizvi, Delhi 2008, (reprint), II, pp. 74-75. Yahya ibn Sirhindi, Tarikh-i-
Mubarak Shahi, ibid., p.199.
14
Foreign-Political Department, 31st December 1847, Nos. 2351-52, NAI, p.
88, No.5, New Delhi.
15
Sujan Rai Bhandari, Khulasat-ut-Tawarikh, Punjabi translation, Patiala 2000,
p.36; B.R. Grover, op.cit, pp. 227-91. Abha Singh ‘Irrigating Haryana’,
Medieval India, ed. Irfan Habib, Delhi 1992, pp. 57-58.
16
Loc. cit.
17
Sujan Rai Bhandari, op.cit., p.82.
18
Irfan Habib, op.cit., p. 36. Grover, op.cit., p.219.
19
Foreign-Political Deptt., 4th-11th August, 1849, Prog.No.87, ‘Canals in the
Rachna Doab’, No.18., NAI, New Delhi; see also, Grover, ibid., p.220.
20
R. Napier’s Report on the Shah Nahr or Hasli Canal, ibid., pp. 39-48.
21
Foreign-Political Dept., 21st February 1851, Nos.148-69, NAI, New Delhi.
22
Abul Fazl, Ain-i-Akbari, tr. M. Blochman, The Asiatic Society, 2010 (reprint),
II, Ain I, p.39.
23
Loc.cit.
24
Lieut. Yule, ‘A Canal Act of Emperor Akbar with some notes and remarks on
the History of the Western Jumna Canal’, Journal of the Asiatic Society of
Bengal, Calcutta 1846, Vol. XV, pp. 214-25.
25
See, for instance, Fryer, op.cit., p. 59, no. 165; Edward O’Brien, Land Reve-
nue Settlement of the Muzaffargarh District, Lahore 1882, pp. 13-17, S.S.
Thorburn, First Regular Settlement of the Bannu District, Lahore 1879,
pp.94-98.
26
Foreign-Political Deptt., 4th-11th Aug., 1849, R.P. Napier’s, ‘Report on the
Shah Nahr or Husli Canal’, No.90, NAI, New Delhi.
27
Abha Singh, op.cit., p.59.

28
Lieut. Yule, op.cit., pp. 214-17.
29
Sirhindi, Tarikh-i-Mubarakshahi, op.cit., pp. 201-2.
30
Yule, op.cit., pp.216-17.
31
From all sources cited regarding Firuz Shah’s canals, this is the picture that
emerges on the point under discussion
32
Afif, op.cit., pp. 112-14. Sirhindi, op.cit., p.206. Due to a huge increase in
the number of slaves, the department of slaves (Diwan-i-Bandagan) was
separated from the Diwan-i-Vizarat, of which it was originally a part. See,
R.C. Jauhri, Firoz Tughluq (1351-1388), pp.126-27.
33
Foreign-Political Deptt., 4th-17th August, 1849, no.88, ‘Canals in the Baree
Doab’, para 6, NAI, New Delhi.
34
Foreign-Political Deptt., 28th February 1851, pp. 1-3, Annexure: ‘Detailed
Statement of the Canals’. In 1850 four out of ten canals of the Dera Ghazi
Khan district required new ‘mouths’.
35
‘Mooltan Canals’ op.cit., p.3
36
Ibid., pp. 3-4.
37
Foreign-Political Deptt., 4th-11th Aug., 1849, ‘Canals of the Baree Doab’.
Letter from Secretary to the Board of Administration to H.M. Elliot, Secre-
tary to the Govt. of India, ‘note’, NAI, New Delhi.
38
Yule, op.cit., p. 222.
39
Loc.cit.
40
J.S. Grewal and Indu Banga, Civil and Military Affairs of Maharaja Ranjit
Singh, Amritsar 1987, document no.109.
41
B.N. Goswamy and J.S. Grewal, The Mughal and Sikh Rulers and the Vaish-
navas of Pindori: A Historical Interpretation of 52 Persian Documents,
Simla 1969, Document No.III, pp.94-95.
42
Ain-i-Akbari, op.cit., II, ain IV, p.45.
43
Yule, op.cit., p.25.
44
See, for instance, ‘Mooltan Canals’, op.cit., p.4.
45
Yule, op.cit., p.217; Ain-i-Akbari, op.cit., II, p.45.
46
Afif, op.cit., pp.75-76.
47
Ibid., p.76.
48
See, for instance, Thorburn, op.cit., pp. 98-101.
49
Stability in agriculture was in direct proportion to human intervention in
water. See, Tripta Wahi, op.cit., p.282.
50
Afif, op.cit., pp. 74-75.
51
Ibid., p.75.
52
Loc.cit.
53
Loc-cit.
54
Sujan Rai Bhandari, op.cit., p.82.

55
Loc.cit. See also Bute Shah, Punjab di Geographical Tawarikh (Geograph-
ical Description of The Punjab in Panjabi), translated from the Persian of
Bute Shah by Munshi Bahlol in 1850, reprint, Chandigarh 2007, p.113.
56
Loc.cit.
57
Foreign-Political, 31st Dec., 1847, No.2351-52, ‘Regarding the Revenues
obtained at present by irrigation’, pp.42-43.
58
59
Afif, op.cit., p.75. See also Futuhat-i-Firuz Shahi, op.cit., p.334.
60
It may be noted that Dhatrat finds a mention in the context of the increased
revenues from the region. See, Afif, ibid., p. 75.
61
‘Mooltan Canals’, op.cit. See also Dera Ghazi Khan Canals.
62
Ibid., Annexure.
63
Yule, ‘A Canal Act of Akbar’, op.cit., pp. 213-14. Italics mine.
64
Ibid., pp. 214-15.
65
Ibid., p.214.
66
Ibid., p.222, fn.3.
* The portion on the wells is substantially a reproduction my article ‘Rights
to Sink and Repair Wells and Accruing Rights in Land and its Produce’,
Proceedings Indian History Congress, 72nd Session, Patiala, December
2011, pp. 378-391.
67
Notably B.D. Chattopadhyaya, The Making of Early Medieval India, Delhi
1997 and Aspects of Rural Settlements and Rural Society in Early Medieval
India, 1990 and David Ludden, particularly his article ‘Patronage and Irri-
gation in Tamil Nadu : A Long-term View’. IESHR, XVI, No.3, pp. 347-65.
James, Heitzman, op.cit., T.M. Srinivasan’s Irrigation and Water Supply
: South India, 200 BC-1600 AD, Madras 1991, is a monumental work on
irrigation, but it is not much within the discourse of the agrarian system.
68
Even when ‘brain-storming’ was done to go deeper into the agrarian system,
it took into consideration three basic elements : ‘land, labour and lord’.
Water as a parallel component to land in the agrarian system escaped their
notice. See, Land Control and Social Structure in Indian History, Robert
Eric Frykenberg (ed.), pp. viii, xx. Water rights as a distinct entity have es-
caped even the notice of historians who have otherwise included irrigation
as an important component in agrarian production and power structures and
relations.
69
‘Rights of Tenants To Sink Wells’, Selections from the Records of the Office
of the Financial Commissioner, Punjab, 1874, pp. 236-240.
70
A few examples would suffice. G. Ousley and Capt. W.G. Davies, Report on
the Revised Settlement of the Shah Poor District in the Rawulpindi Divi-
sion, Lahore 1866, pp. 111-12, no. 283 for shares in wells; S.S. Thorburn,

op.cit., pp. 95-97. See also J.H. Morris, Report on the Revised Settlement
of the Mooltan Division, pp. 3, 5-6; ‘Mozzuffurghur Settlement’, Selections
from the Public Correspondence of the Administration, for the Affairs of the
Punjab, Vol. I, no.2, Lahore 1853, p. 21.
71
See, for instance, ‘Mozzuffurghur Settlement’, ibid., p. 21. Similarly all
settlements recorded property in wells.
72
See, for Instance, J.H. Morris, Report on the Revised Settlement of Goojaran-
walah District in the Lahore Division, 1860, p. 54, no.82.
73
Srinivasan, op.cit., p. 163.
74
B.N. Goswamy and J.S. Grewal, op.cit.
75
These documents are numbers, I, II, IV, V, XXVII, XLIV, XLIX.
76
Document No. XLIX.
77
Ibid., p.78.
78
Italics mine. Ibid., p. 86.
79
Loc.cit.
80
Ibid., p. 103.
81
Ibid., p. 111.
82
Ibid., p. 240.
83
Ibid., p. 312.
84
Loc.cit.
85
Tripta Wahi, ‘Nature of Land Rights in the Pre-Colonial Punjab : A Study of
the Tenancy Documents’, The Panjab Past and Present, Vol. XXXVI, Part
II, October 2005, pp.2, 7-8.
86
Tarapada Mukherjee and Irfan Habib, ‘Land Rights in the Reign of Akbar :
The Evidence of the sale-deeds of Vrindaband and Aritha’, PIHC, Gorakh-
pur Session 1989-90, document nos. 9-10, p. 247.
87
Ibid., p. 248.
88
Ibid., document no.6, p. 246.
89
B.R. Grover, op.cit., p. 234, fn.9.
90
Srinivasan, op.cit., p.182. See also p. 163 for the sale of land with trees, well
and tank.
91
Insha-i-Mahru, Tughluq Kalin Bharat, Vol. II, S.A.A. Rizvi, (tr.) document
no. 4, p. 376.
92
Loc.cit.
93
Ibid., document no.5, p. 376.
94
Annual Report on the Working of the Rajputana Museum, Ajmer, for the year
ending 31st March 1939, no. 4 of the ‘inscriptions inscribed’, p.4. Hence-
forth this series would be referred to as ARWRM.
95
‘Irrigation in Early Medieval Rajasthan’, JESHO, Vol. XVI, Parts II-III, pp.
307-08.

96
See, for instance, Srinivasan, op.cit., pp. 101, 153, 163, 177-8, 183. Infact,
the whole work is based primarily on inscriptions connected with irrigation.
97
Annual Report of the Sardar Museum and Sumer Public Library, Jodhpur for
the year ending 30th September 1925, p. 2. This inscriptions was fixed in a
well.
98
T.V. Mahalingam, Inscriptions of the Pallavas, Delhi 1988, No.89, Tandan-
tottam Plates of Nandi Varman II, p. 305, No.121, Velurpalaiyam Plates of
Nandi Varman III, p. 379. See also Srinivasan, op.cit., pp. 177-78.
99
Epigraphica Indo-Moslemica (EIM), 1911-12 ed. J. Horovitz, no. XXIII, p.
25.
100
EIM, 1937-38, ed. G. Yazdani, pp. 5-6.
101
Ibid., p.5.
102
EIM, 1917-18, No.2, pp. 17-18.
103
EIM, 1919-20, ed. Horovitz, pp. 8-9.
104
EIM, 1937-38, pp. 22-26.
105
ARWRM Ajmer for the year ending 31st March 1935, Delhi 1936, ‘Inscrip-
tions copied’, No. XIV. See also inscription No. XV.
106
ARWRM Ajmer, ending 31st March 1937, ‘Inscription Copied, Nos. XVII,
XVIII, pp. 6-7.
107
108
B.D. Chattopadhyaya, op.cit., pp. 312, 315.
109
ARWRM Ajmer, year ending 31st March 1935. Inscriptions copied : No. X,
pp. 4-5.
110
Ibid., no. XII, pp. 5-6.
111
Mahalingam, op.cit., inscription nos. 89 and 121. pp.305, 379. See also
Srinivasan, op.cit., pp. 177, 194.
112
Srinivasan, op.cit., pp. 152-53, 177-78.
113
Ibid., pp. 152-53.
114
Mahalingam, op.cit., p. 448.
115
116
Ibid., Glossary, p. 232.
117
Dasharatha Sharma (ed.), Rajasthan through the Ages, Bikaner 1966, I, p.
330 (d).
118
B.D. Chattopadhyaya, op.cit., pp. 309, 311 and 314.
119
J.S. Grewal and Indu Banga, op.cit., document no. 58, p. 110.
120
R.K. Saxena, Peasant and the State : A Study of 18th Century Rajputana,
Jaipur 1999, p. 291.
121
Literally meaning from head to foot; a dress of honour; an installation fee
paid for permission to sink a well. Indu Banga, Agrarian System of the
Sikhs, Delhi 1978, ‘Glossary’, p. 210; Charles A. Roe, Customary Law of
the Multan District, Lahore 1883, pp. lxxxii-iii.

122
V. Venkayya, ‘Irrigation in Southern India in Ancient Times’, Archeological
Survey of India Annual Report 1903-04 (reprint New Delhi 2002), p. 210.
123
In the Chaj Doab in the Punjab, the British officer L. Bowring received nu-
merous applications for permission to repair wells. Foreign Miscellaneous
H.M. Elliot Revenue etc. of the Punjab 1849, No. 352, p. 53, National
Archives of India, New Delhi.
124
One has just to read Srinivasan’s book or even Venkayya’s article to see how
tightly controlled irrigation was.
125
A kachcha well as distinct from a ‘pucca’ well which has a wooden frame at
the bottom, known as the chak in the Punjab, on which a bricked cylindrical
wall is raised.
126
Debate in the Legislative Council following the judgement of the Agra High
Court in July 1867: Home: Gazette of India Supplement: July to December
1868, pp. 722-23.
127
E.B. Steedman, Report on the Revised Settlement of the Jhang District
(1874-1880), pp. 75-76.
128
Tripta Wahi, ‘Nature of Land Rights in the Pre-Colonial Punjab’, op.cit., p.
11.
129
Frykenberg, op.cit., Introduction, p. xiv.
130
Papers connected with the Question of Tenant Rights in the Punjab : Selec-
tions from the Records of the Government of the Punjab, Lahore 1869, pp.
94-95, 107, 276. Henceforth abbreviated as Tenancy Documents. See also
Tripta Wahi, ‘Nature of Land Rights’, op.cit., p. 11.
131
T. Gordon Walker, Punjab Customary Law, Vol. V, The Customary Law of
the Ludhiana District, Calcutta 1886, p.91, no.182.
132
Tenancy Documents, Anjuman’s Comments, No. 5, p. 569. See also T. Wahi,
‘Nature of Land Rights’, op.cit., p. 11.
133
Tenancy Documents, no.1, p. 132.
134
Srinivasan, op.cit., pp. 177-8, f.n. 111, p. 194.
135
‘Right of Tenants to Sink Wells’, op.cit., p. 395.
136
Loc.cit.
137
Ibid., pp. 397-98.
138
Home : Gazette of India Supplement: July to December 1868, Oudh Rent
Bill, discussion in the Legislative Council on the judgement, pp. 720-31.
139
Tenancy Document., p. 286.
140
‘Mozzoffurghur Settlement’, op.cit., p.15.
141
Tripta Wahi, ‘Land Rights’, p. 11.
142
Ibid., pp. 9-13.
143
Tenancy Documents, see, for instance, p. 570; Tripta Wahi, ‘Nature of Land
Rights’, op.cit., pp. 11-15.

144
Ibid., see, for instance, exception no.1, p. 133, no.14, p. 133, no.32, p. 136.
145
Ibid. Byj Nath’s reply, p. 96.
146
T. Wahi, ‘Nature of Land Rights’, op.cit., pp. 5-6.
147
Loc.cit.
148
J.H. Morris, Report on the Revised Settlement of the Mooltan District,
Lahore 1856-7, pp. 6-8, 28, Appendix H.No.7; A.R. Roe, Report on the
Revised Settlement of the Multan District of the Punjab, pp.40-41, Henry
Monckton, Report on the Revised Settlement of the Jhung District, p.4,
nos. 27-28; see also Indu Banga, ‘Ecology and Land Rights in the Punjab’,
op.cit., pp. 64-65.
149
Loc.cit.
150
Charles A. Roe, Customary Law of the Multan District Regarding Inheri-
tance, the Enjoyment of Property, Land Tenures and Alluvion and Diluvi-
sion, Lahore 1883, pp. lxxxii-ix; see also, Indu Banga, ibid., pp. 64-65.
151
See, Dilbagh Singh, The State Landlords and Peasants: Rajasthan in the
18th Century, Manohar 1990, p. 53; R.K. Saxena, op.cit., p. 11.
152
Tenancy Document, pp. 72, 81, 95.
153
Irfan Habib, A People’s History of India 28: Indian Economy, 1858-1914,
Tulika Books, 2006, p.51.
154
Tripta Wahi, ‘Land Rights in the Pre-Colonial Punjab’, op.cit., pp. 7-8, 13.
155
Ain XI, ‘Land and its Classification and the Proportionate Dues of Sover-
eignty’, Ain-i-Akbari, II, p.68.
156
Loc.cit. See also, B.R. Grover, ‘Classification of Agrarian Land Under Culti-
vation’, op.cit., pp.241-42.
157
Loc.cit.
158
Ibid., ain VII on Khazandar, pp. 58-59.
159
Irfan Habit, An Atlas of the Mughal Empire, Delhi 1982, Punjab; Political
1595, Sheet No. 4A.
160
Ibid., Notes on Sheet No. 4A, p.8.
161
J.S. Grewal and Indu Banga, op.cit., See, for instance, document nos. 123,
124, 144, 183, 197, 199, 238, 244, 262, 274, 287, 372. All have varying
values or contexts. Document no.287 besides giving the total value, men-
tions the value of the well for kharif and rabi crops separately.
162
See, Tripta Wahi, ‘Socio-Political Structures in Interaction with a Seasonal
River : A Case Study of the Ghaggar in the Mid-Nineteenth Century’, Pro-
ceedings of the Punjab History Conference, 39th Session, 2007, pp.291-95.
See also J.D. Cunningham, op.cit.
163
Purananuru, No.18, lines 13-30, quoted, David Ludden, An Agrarian His-
tory of South Asia, The New Cambridge History of India, IV, CUP 1999,
p.78.

164
The Kautiliya Arthasastra, Part II, R.P. Kangle (tr.), Bombay 1963, p. 64,
2.1.20, p, 209, 2.34.8.
165
Ibid., 2.1.20, p.64.
166
Ibid., p.173, 2.24.18.
167
Ibid., p.210, 2.35.3, p.217, 2.36.45.
168
Ibid., pp.249, 253, 255-56.
169
Quoted, K.L. Rao, ‘India’s Water Wealth : Its Assessment, Uses and Projec-
tions, New Delhi 1975, p.114.
170
Sujan Rai Bhandari, op.cit, pp.39,87; B.R. Grover, ‘Extension and Adminis-
tration of the Irrigation System under Shah Jahan and Aurangzeb’ Collected
Works of Professor B.R. Gorver, Vol. I : Delhi 2005, pp 223-4, 227-91.
171
Leslie S. Saunders, Revised Land Revenue Settlement of the District of La-
hore,(1865-69), Lahore 1873, p.42, no.150.
172
Ahsan Jan Qaisar, ‘Agricultural Technology Depicted in Mughal Paintings’,
Medieval India 3, ed. B.L. Bhadani, Manohar, Delhi 2012, item nos ‘C’ and
‘D’ pp 84-87.
173
A Gazetteer of Delhi, (1883-4), Vintage Books, Delhi 1988 reprint, pp 104-5.
174
See, Hamida Khatoon Naqvi, ‘Leather Crafts in Medieval India-1206-1803’.
Scientific and Technological Exchanges Between India and Soviet Central
Asia: Proceedings (Medieval Period) B.V. Subharayappa (ed.), Indian
National Science Academy, New Delhi 1985, pp 232-33.
175
Ibid, p.233.
176
For a detailed description of the components of the two, see the booklet
Living Traditions: Local Water and Land Management Systems in the
Bagdundra Region of the Mewar Aravallis, Ubeshwar Vikas Mandal Ihar,
Udaipur n.d. pp.5-14, 23-25.
177
Ibid. pp.6-15; see also, Delhi Gazetteer, op.cit pp.105-107.
178
Leslie Saunders, op.cit, pp.61-62.
179
See illustration and description, Ahsan Jan Qaisar, op.cit., pp.84-86.
180
Invariably there were multiple pairs of draught amials for a single rahat.
181
F.W.R. Fryer, First Regular Settlement of the Dera Ghazi Khan (1869-74),
Lahore 1876, p.10.
182
Memoirs of Zehir-ed-Din Muhammed Babur, written by himself, translated
by John Leyden and William Erkine, ed., By Lucas King, London 1921, II,
pp. 205-6.
183
Tripta Wahi, ‘Canals, State and Society in Pre-British Punjab’, PIHC, 73rd
session, 2013, pp. 272-74.
184
See, for instance, Lt. R. Baird Smith, Agricultural Resources of the Punjab :
being a memorandum on the application of the Waste Waters of the Punjab
for purposes of irrigation, London 1849, p.7

185
Muhammad Salih Kamboh, Amal-i-Salih, text along with translation, Mu-
hammad Baqir, Lahore : Past and Present, Lahore 1952, pp. 384-85, see
also, Shah Nawaz Khan, Maathir-ul-Umara, tr. A. Beveridge, revised by
Baini Prasad, Patna 1979, I, p.551.
186
Lieut. Yule, ‘A Canal Act of Emperor Akbar with some notes and remarks on
the History of the Western Jumna Canal’, JASB, 1846. Vol. XV, p.215
187
See, for instance, the map of the canals of the Muzaffargarh District, E.O’
Brien, Settlement Report, 1882.
188
See, T. Wahi, ‘Shah Nahr: Its History, Technology and Socio-Political Impli-
cations’ PIHC, Cuttack Session, 2013, pp.288-89.
189
Lt. R. Baird Smith, op.cit., p.7
190
Loc.cit and T. Wahi, ‘Shah Nahr’ op.cit. pp 287-288
191
T. Wahi, ‘Canals, State and Society in the Pre-British Punjab’, op.cit,p.276.
192
Foreign-Politcal Deptt, 4th-17th August, 1848, no.88, ‘Canals in the Baree
Doab’, para 6, NAI, New Delhi.
193
When the British acquired power in the Punjab they found that upper
portions of the Hasli were already filling up in such a short period. For
some information on the Western Jamuna canal, see Major Colvin, ‘On the
Restoration of the Ancient Canals in the Delhi Territory’, JASB, 2, 1838, pp
113, 115, 116-7.
194
Colvin, ibid., p.125.
195
Leslie Saunders, op.cit, p.42, no.150.
196
Lt. Yule, ‘A Canal Act of Akbar’, op.cit, pp 213-23.
197
Ibid., p.216.
198
Ibid, p.217.
199
See Tripta Wahi, ‘Nature of Land Rights in the Pre-Colonial Punjab; A Study
of the Tenancy Documents’, Panjab Past and Present, XXXVI, Part II, p.4.
200
See, Tripta Wahi, ‘Rights to Sink and Repair Wells and Accruing Rights in Land
and its Produce’, PIHC, Patiala, 2011, p.385, also T.Wahi, ibid, p.5.
201
Shams Siraj Afif, Tarikh-iFiruz Shahi, the Tughluq Kalin Bharat, tr. R.A.A.
Rizvi, Delhi 2008 (reprint), II, pp. 74-75. Yahya Ibn Sirhindi, Tarikh-i-
Mubarak Shahi, ibid., p.199.
202
Afif, ibid., pp 112-14, Sirhindi, ibid., p.206, R.C. Jauhri, Firoz Shah Tughluq
(1351-1388), pp 126-27.
203
Abul Fazl Allami, Ain-i-Akbari, tr. H. Blochmann, second edition by D.C.
Phillott, The Asralic Society, Kolkata, 2011 (reprint), I, Ain 87, p.235.
204
Yule, op.cit, p.222, Tripta Wahi, ‘Canals, State and Society’, op.cit, p.276.
205
This is based on my own field-work with the Od community settled in San-
jay Colony in South Delhi.
206
Denzil Ibbetson, Panjab Castes: Races, Castes and Tribes of the People of
Punjab, reprint of the first edition of 1916, Delhi 1981, no.573, p.274.

207
Based on my own field work. They maintain that among many other, they
have dug the Bhakhra and Indira Gandhi canals. Those settled in Sanjay
Colony, quarry in the Bhatti mines and they have also been doing the work
of subterraneous digging for the Delhi Metro.
208
Ibbetson, op.ct, Abstract No. 96 showing wandering and criminal tribes,
p.272.
209
Ibid., p.275.
210
J. Mark Baker, The Kuhls of Kangra, Permanent Black, Delhi 2005, pp.109-
10.
211
See, for instance, the maintenance of the Multan Canals, ‘Canals of the
Mooltan District’, Selections from the Public Correspondence of the Board
of Administration for the Affairs of the Punjab, I, Lahore 1852, No.1, pp.3-
4.
212
Yule, op.cit, p.222.
213
Foreign-Secret, 28th April 1848, nos.57-66, no.60, p.31, NAI, New Delhi.
214
Loc.cit.
215
S.S. Thorburn, Report of the First Regular Land Settlement of the Bannu
District in the Derajat Division of the Punjab, Lahore 1879, p.97, no.105.
216
Correspondence Connected with Summary Settlement of a tract of Coun-
try Trans Indus formerly included in the Dera Ismail Khan District and
now comprised partly in that and partly in the District of Bunnoo, Punjab
Printing Press, Lahore (British Library, IOR No.V/27/314/480A). Pargana
Isakhail, p.10.no.44.
217
Ibid, pp.10-11.
218
F.W.R. Fryer, First Regular Settlement of the Dera Ghazi Khan (1869-74),
Lahore 1876, p.123, No.358.
219
Gazetteer of Delhi, (1883-4), op.cit, p.107
220
Loc.cit
221
Saunders, op.cit., p.42, no.152.
222
Ain-i-Akbari, op.cit, Ain 87, p.235
223
Gazetteer of Delhi, op.cit., p.107.
224
Prem Sumarag The Testimony of a Sanatan Sikh W.H. Mcleod (tr), OUP
2006, p.66.
225
Gazetteer of Delhi, op.cit., p.107. In the khadir the water level is never very
deep. See also, Saunders, op.cit., p.42, no.150.
226
Ibbetson, op.cit., p.275 and my field work with the Od community in Delhi.
227
Himadri Banerjee, Agrarian Society of the Punjab (1849-1901), Manohar,
Delhi 1982, p.177.
228
This was always a matter of discussion among the British Officers as to how
much food and in which form it was to be given, discussion was invariably
in relation to earlier practices.

229
The Chola King Karikal employed about 12,000 captives from Sri Lanka in
the construction of irrigation works on the river Kaveri, see, T.M. Srini-
vasan, Irrigation and Water Supply in South India, 200 BC – 1600 A.D.,
Madras 1991, p.85.
230
See, for instance, Yusuf Mirak’s Mazhar-i-Shahjahani translated by
Muhammad Saleem Akhtar in his work Sind Under the Mughuls, Karachi
1990, pp 174-5, 196, passim.
231
Ain-i-Akbari, I, Ain 87, p.235.
232
Loc.cit.
233
234
Foreign Secret 28th April, 1848, nos.57-66., no.60 p.7, no.17.
235
Fryer, op.cit, p.123, no.58.
236
Ain-i-Akbari, I, Ain 87, p.236.
237
Saunders, op.cit., p.42, no.153.
238
Ain-i-Akbari, I, p.236.
239
See, for instance, lists of things and quantities given to the sepidars in a
kamil well, ‘Agriculture of the Rechna Doab’, Selections from the Public
Correspondence of the Punjab Administration 1854-55, Vol.II, Appendices,
pp.88-98.
240
See, for instance, ibid, no.2, p.105.
241
T. Gordon Walker, Customary Law of the Ludhiana District, Calcutta 1885,
p.12, no.25
242
Tripta Wahi, ‘Canals, State and Society’, op.cit, pp.277-80.
243
Foreign Political 31st December 1847, nos. 2351-2352, John Lawrence’s
letter of 22nd Feb. 1847, no.2. NAI
244
For details see Tripta Wahi, ‘Canals, State and Society’, op.cit, pp.277-79
245
Afif, Tarikh-i-Firuz Shahi, Tughluq Kalin Bharat, tr. R.A.A. Rizvi, Delhi
2008 (reprint), II, pp. 74-75. Yahya bn Sirhindi, Tarikh-i-Mubarak Shahi,
ibid., p.199. See also, Tripta Wahi, ibid. pp.277-80.
246
Tripta Wahi,’ Shah Nahr’, op.cit, p.293
247
Tripta Wahi, ibid, p.293.
248
Abdul Hamid Lahori, Badshash Namah, original text and translation in
Baqir’s Lahore op.cit., Kamboh, Amal-i-Salih, ibid, pp.383-84. See also,
Tripta Wahi, ‘Shah Nahr, : ibid, pp.293-94.
249
Tripta Wahi, ‘Rights to Sink and Repair Wells’, op.cit., pp.378-91.
250
Tripta Wahi, ‘Nature of Land Rights, op.cit.,p.8.

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uct of some Indian newspapers. Yes, this is also a fairy tale, but there is
no charm in it. Yes, this is fiction, but there is not a single gram of poetry
in it - but there are tons of vile forgery.
This tale was told on December 31 in English in India by the news-
paper National Herald (Delhi), and this tale was told by the Lahore cor-
respondent of the newspaper Nationalist, also in English. And a certain
unknown soldier told this tale to the Lahore correspondent. Apparently,
he speaks the language of Hearst. This language of the newspaper tribe
of shameless liars, as we see, is beginning to penetrate into the politi-
cal jungle of India. We deplore such a decline in the level of spiritual
nourishment of the Indian reading public: they are being bundled with
utter nonsense, they are being fed with rotten canned food of anti-Soviet
propaganda.
The story goes basically like this.
The famous underbaked quisling of India, the notorious Subhas
Chandra Bose, who was first kept by the Nazis in Berlin, and then by
the Japanese imperialists in Tokyo, allegedly fled to Russia! Here he
allegedly has been since the surrender of Japan, along with “his soldiers
of the Indian National Army, who were captured by the Russian armies.”
This fascist rogue allegedly freely roams the Soviet country and inspects
his 300,000-strong army!
The invention doesn’t stop there. The unknown soldier, it turns out,
“knows” that responsible representatives of the Soviet government
spoke to Bose, who allegedly gave the Hindu-fascist adventurer mythi-
cal “concrete promises”.
Such is the silly tale of an unnamed soldier and two named newspa-
pers. The tale will not enter into Indian folklore, because it has nothing
in common with folk art. This is the handicraft of dishonest newspaper
buffoons, endowed with not so much ardent as dirty fantasy.

The miserable comedians from the booths of the press themselves
know very well that Bose and the Bose-likes can find refuge and accli-
matize under any reactionary latitude, only the Soviet climate cannot
be endured by any fascist aftermath. It is known that the Nazis tried to
escape to almost all countries of the world - if only to get away from
Moscow!
Fans of fairy tales say: don’t like it - don’t listen, but do not interfere
with lying. But fairy tales are different. It is not pleasant for honest peo-
ple to listen to a fairy tale-slander. In the interests of peace and friendship
between peoples, it is necessary to interfere with newspaper lies.
We contribute to the dissemination of useful information for the Indi-
an reading public when we establish with perfect accuracy that the news-
papers National Herald and Nationalist under the guise of a newspaper
establishment sell shameless anti-Soviet lies.
International law, although not on paper, punishes the contraband
poisoning of the peoples of the East with opium. Unfortunately, the poi-
soning of peoples with paper lies has not yet been banned by peace-lov-
ing nations. Meanwhile, it would be necessary to strictly and even more
strictly judge the newspaper gangsters exposed in lies and forgery.
Pravda, January 7th, 1946

Translated by P. Brik

TOP SECRET
RECORD OF COMRADE I.V. STALIN’S

CONVERSATION WITH THE DELEGATION
OF THE BRITISH LABOUR PARTY
(7 August 1946)
(from 21:00 till 23:20)
Laski says that he was Roosevelt’s and Churchill’s friend and that he is
very happy to now meet the third great leader of the United Nations who
had won the war.
Phillips says that he, on behalf of the Labour movement, expresses
his delight with the fact that the delegation met with Comrade Stalin. The
delegation arrived here in order to seek, as representatives of the Labour
Party, the establishment of friendly relations with the Soviet Union and
the Soviet people, this being done not only on commission of the party
governing bodies, but the entire Labour movement.
British workers, united by the Labour movement, have been follow-
ing the great Russian experiment with much interest and demonstrated
their friendly disposition, expressing the hope that the experiment would
be a success. During the war the friendship had been strengthened by the
blood shed by both nations. Presently there are many causes to seek mu-
tual understanding, and not least of which is the fact that both countries
strive for building of a new world.
Lasting friendship will be the contribution from the British side, as
well as fulfillment of the programme of the socialist economy, which is
the result of the 1945 elections. Britain, as well as the USSR, has to re-
store the damage caused by the war; it also has to increase productivity,
maintain the distribution system and carry out nationalisation of main
industries; in other industries, to control, inter alia, capital investment,
credits and prices for agricultural produce. Furthermore, Labour wants
to carry out reforms in the field of housing construction, social welfare,
and public health services, - these are steps that will lead to a change in
the British society.
All of the above represents a huge challenge, especially in a country
where there is a Parliament based on traditions, which means the Labour

government has to fulfill certain constitutional requirements. Notwith-
standing this, Labour are sure that they will fulfill, and already are fulfill-
ing, their first programme, with support from the people. They are sure
that during the next elections the people will support them and will adopt
the second five-year plan of Labour.
Labour believe preservation of international peace to be a prerequi-
site for the implementation of their programme. This means develop-
ment of mutual understanding between the countries, and within this
mutual understanding there should be a special mutual understanding of
the countries pursuing similar goals.
Phillips then expresses his thanks for the opportunity given to the
delegation to visit the Soviet Union and the reception it has been shown;
he also says that he would like to underline the fact that the delegation is
a mission of good will, whose aim is to build, as a result of its visit and
discussions with the Soviet people and the leaders of the Soviet Union, a
strong foundation for close friendly relations between the two countries.
Bacon speaks of the satisfaction which she experiences from meeting
Comrade Stalin. She says she is representing the new parliament elect-
ed the previous year. The new Parliament, according to her, is different
from all the previous ones, in that its members are younger, more enthu-
siastic, and about 400 places out of over 600 are Labour. This fact makes
her sure that the Labour programme will be fulfilled in record time. This
Parliament also has more female MPs than the previous ones.
British women, says Bacon, were amazed by the tenacity and behav-
ior of Russian women during the war. Over the last few weeks I have
seen many ruined European cities. Women of Britain, as well as women
of Russia, believe that this should never happen again. The work we are
doing now must not be destroyed by the war again.
Bacon further says that during her stay in the USSR she learnt about
the activities of Soviet women, the education system, the system of so-
cial welfare and public health in the USSR. Bacon says that it is her opin-
ion that Britain and the USSR may learn from each other. Bacon says
that it has especially impressed her that many women in the USSR, who
started their life at the lower levels of society, could reach high manage-
rial posts. Bacon says the same holds for Britain nowadays, and says she
herself is an example for this: a miner’s daughter who became an MP.
Stalin says that it is truly pleasant that there are two large countries
in Europe, the USSR and Great Britain, which advance towards social-
ism. Comrade Stalin further says that the Soviet Union advances towards
socialism via its own, Russian way, which is the shorter one, while the

British advance towards socialism by a longer, roundabout, way, both of
these ways being appropriate. We are Marxist-Leninists, says Comrade
Stalin, and we do not think that our way is the only one, we believe that
socialism can be attained not only through Soviets; the difference is that
our way is shorter, albeit more bloody; the way through Parliament is
slower, but with less blood. You and we, Comrade Stalin says further, we
all advance to the same goal, which is socialism. Therefore it would be
surprising if our two countries were not friends.
The sympathy of the British people towards the Soviet Union is well
known; the fact that the Russian people are compassionate with the Brit-
ish may not be so well known, but after the war it does not require further
proof. About fifteen years ago during a strike1 Russian workers helped
British workers with money, thus demonstrating their friendship.
Laski notes that the generosity of the Russians will never be forgot-
ten in Britain.
Phillips says he was one of the workers on strike.
Stalin asks whether any actions are planned in the field of trade.
Phillips replies that the Labour government nationalised the Bank
of England and the coal mines; there are plans for the nationalisation of
transport, including civil aviation, gas-, electricity-, steel-, and iron-pro-
ducing industries. There are plans for rationing and control over country
supplies; a ministry has been set up which will control manufacturing of
bricks and other construction materials and their distribution in the coun-
try; actions in the field of trade will be carried out in subsequent stages.
Stalin explains his question saying that he knows from the Russian
experience that if the trade is in the hands of the state and the profits are
retained by the state, more opportunities arise for maintaining and keep-
ing the wages. We have been greatly helped by such system in terms of
decreasing prices and raising real wages. Comrade Stalin further speaks
about the importance of actions in the field of trade even in the period
when the state has not yet taken over the trade: as soon as the state enter-
prises start selling cheaper products, this immediately affects the market,
the prices go down, which is beneficial for the working class.
Stalin then asks a question whether there is a threat in Britain that the
industrial capacity will grow, while the inner market turns out insolvent.
Phillips replies that the market demand is so high that a long time is
needed to meet it; he offers an example with housing construction saying
that Britain cannot produce itself all the construction materials and will
be forced to import them; for example it would be desirable to import
timber from Russia, which would open, in its turn, the opportunities for
other industries to export to Russia in exchange for timber.
Furthermore Phillips says that Labour intend to raise the living stan-
dards for the working class not only in the metropolis but also in the
colonies; they also hope that the countries, inspired by the spirit of so-
cialism, would organise world production based on total employment.
Phillips further discusses the actions of the Labour government as re-
gards paying pensions to retired people, increasing the term of mandato-
ry secondary education, decreasing the use of 16-18 years old teenagers’
labour in order to allow them to study without leaving employment. With
all these examples Phillips aims to demonstrate that not only will there
not be any excess workforce in Britain, but on the contrary, there will be
a labour shortage.
Stalin speaks of the role of women in building of socialism, indicat-
ing that, as soon as women’s energy had been activated in the USSR,
it immediately produced appropriate results; the same will be achieved
in other countries, says Comrade Stalin. Comrade Stalin further refers
to the words of the delegation members regarding the complete mutual
understanding that must be maintained between the two countries on
the issues of socialist construction, and says that he hopes that mutual
understanding will be achieved in the field of external relations, too, un-
derstanding, which is nonexistent nowadays, but which he hopes will be
in future.
Laski notes that all the influence of the Labour party, same as in the
first days of the October Revolution, will be employed to improve the
relations between the two countries.
Stalin says that it would be great if the Labour Party achieves this;
as regards the Soviet Union, it is fully prepared for an amicable relation-
ship.
Laski says that Labour now implement the economic and political
ideas of the great pioneers of the 19th century, and to this end, friendship
with the great socialist country is indispensable for the country’s external
relations.
Stalin notes that it will be very good if this is achieved.
Laski replies that this must be achieved.
Clay says that he represents trade unions in the delegation and is
usually concerned with the issues of wages. He further says that, while
fulfilling their five-year plan, Labour in fact solve three problems simul-
taneously: production of means of production, production of means of
consumption, and ensuring the distribution of means of consumption.

Clay also says that they would be eager to know how prices are
decreased in socialised industry; he notes that all resources should be
tapped to improve the living standards of the working class, which re-
quires avoiding international complications. We believe, says Clay, that
if international co-operation defers the start of the war, the people will
be able to reap rewards from their labour, which will lead to an increase
in actual wages.
We in Britain believe, continues Clay, that there are two types of
wages: wages expressed in monetary terms, and socialist wages, set in
legislation; Clay gives an example of benefit payouts to families with
more than one child.
Phillips gives another example: there is a law in Britain according to
which a person who becomes disabled following an accident at work not
only receives a compensation for loss of ability to work, but is taught a
new vocation.
Stalin approves of such a law and notes that if the Labour Govern-
ment follows this route, Churchill will not be able to win the following
elections.
The delegates say as one, that Churchill will not be able to win the
next elections in any case, and Laski jokingly says that Churchill needs
a long rest after his labours during the war, and Labour intend to provide
him with such rest.
Phillips tells about the popularity of the Labour Government among
the people: Labour candidates won all Parliamentary by-elections, the
Labour party got 3000 places during the municipal elections, and the
new member intake to the Labour party is so big that there are not enough
Party membership cards.
Clay stipulates that he believes Churchill to be a great military leader,
to whom the British people owe a lot; Churchill’s misfortune is however
that he is not fit to be the country’s leader in the post-war period.
Stalin agrees with this.
Phillips says that there is a certain category of people who are only
good in certain circumstances; when the need is gone, it is better for
them to withdraw.
Stalin says that this issue must be treated with caution, and reminds
of the words of Lady Astor2, who had said in a conversation with him a
few years earlier that Churchill’s days were gone and he should not fur-
ther appear on political arena. Stalin had replied to this at the time that
whenever hard times come to Britain, Churchill would reappear.3
Clay says that it is the intention of both countries to eliminate the
causes leading to the need for Churchill or his likes.
Stalin says that when you go to war, you should count for the worse.
Returning to the issue of lowering prices, Stalin says that the Rus-
sians have empirically established that if the main industries, banking
system, and trade are nationalised, and if one part of the profits is used
to improve the life of the workers, and the other part, to expand produc-
tion, while profits from trade are used to decrease the prices, this meth-
od gives the opportunity to simultaneously decrease prices and expand
production.
Stalin says further that there is another means to decrease the ex-
penses, which is to cut the army; there is a threat to become the object of
aggression, however, agreements on mutual help against aggression and
agreements on mutual defence could be used. When such agreements are
in place, they represent a considerable source of increasing the wellbeing
of the people and growth of production.
Stalin further discusses the difficulties that Labour face and the dif-
ficulties that had taken place in Russia during the revolutionary years:
the Russians had faced difficulties that were different from the British
experience: low level of education among the people, a large propor-
tion of the small peasantry who did not believe in socialism; the British
difficulties are of a different scale: there is no such peasantry in Britain,
the working class is largely predominant, at least in the metropolis, the
educational level is higher than the one that had been in Russia in the first
Soviet years; however, the main difficulty is that the British bourgeoisie
are cleverer, richer, and more experienced than the Russian, and will be
a very strong opponent.
Laski says that they know they are facing a difficult task, and notes
that intelligentsia plays a significant role in changing the character of
bourgeoisie; he refers to Diderot’s and Voltaire’s influence on the bour-
geoisie of the French Revolution, mentioning also the Provisional Gov-
ernment in 1917, when even the members of the Government did not
trust it, and says that big changes have been taking place in Britain, espe-
cially over the last ten years, which was mainly intelligentsia becoming
more left-wing, leading to two outcomes: (1) the British literature started
reflecting socialist spirit, and (2) academics join trade unions and the
Labour party.
Stalin jokingly says that Diderot and Voltaire did not own coal mines;
and what about owners of railways, banks and mines in Britain, how do
they feel now?

Laski says once more that they are aware of the difficult task facing
them, and that construction of socialism is like approaching war: you
hope for the better, apply all resources to preserve peace, and are ready
for the worse.
Clay notes that those who follow closely the Russian experience are
mostly astonished by the quick rise of the educational level of the people.
Laski says that it is also necessary to mention the splendid resolution
of the national problem which is, as is common knowledge, due to the
Generalissimo.
Stalin says that the national problem was resolved according to a plan
devised by Lenin.
Laski agrees, but points out that the important issue is that Lenin
entrusted Stalin with implementation of the plan.
Stalin says that it was the Party’s assignment.
The members of the delegation thank Comrade Stalin for the honour
and assure him that upon their return to Britain they will apply all their
resources to achieve the goal for which they had come to the USSR; at
the same time Bacon expresses hope that the members of the delegation
will have the opportunity to once again visit the Soviet Union, and that
upon their return to Britain, there will be a reciprocal visit by the Soviet
delegation.
Stalin replies that if such desire would be expressed by the British
government, the Soviet delegation will come.
Stalin then says that he had seen many of Europe’s socialists who
promise a lot during elections, such as the radical-socialists in France,
and forget about their promises when the elections are over; he can see
that socialists in Britain are not like this.
Stalin says good-bye to the members of the delegation and wishes
them success in reaching their goals.
Recorded. [signature] (Pastoev)
www.lse.ac.uk>ideas>Documents>hsra
Translation checked with the text in the RGASPI by Tahir Asghar.

The archival source has been corrected here.
RGASPI, F.558, 11, D. 286, LL 3-10.

Endnotes:
1
This refers to the General Strike of 4–13 May 1926 in Great Britain during
which the USSR provided aid to British Trade Unions on strike.
2
Astor, Nancy Witcher Langhorne (1879 – 1964) – American-born British MP
(1919 – 1945), first female MP.
3
Lady Astor’s conversation with Stalin took place on 29 July 1931 during her
visit to the USSR in the company of George Bernard Shaw. Stalin’s words
on that occasion about Churchill’s return to politics have been confirmed by
British witnesses to the meeting, including a detail which Stalin preferred
to gloss over in 1946: he spoke of Churchill’s return to power leading to a
new intervention in the USSR, analogous to that of 1918-1919. See: Sykes
C. NANCY: The Life of Lady Astor. London, 1972.p. 340.

PREPARATION OF THE 1947 DRAFT OF THE
THIRD PROGRAMME OF THE CPSU (b)
Vijay Singh
The central objective of Lenin and the Bolsheviks was the formation of
a communist society.
This is evident from the programme adopted by the Russian Com-
munist Party in March 22, 1919. The document accepted that the dicta-
torship of the proletariat had been established in Russia having the sup-
port of the poorest peasantry and the semi-proletariat. It had in the main
expropriated the bourgeoisie so that means of production and exchange
became the common property of all the toilers.
It was imperative to establish a uniform national plan which could
engage in the rational and economic utilisation of the material resources
of the country
So far as the handicrafts were concerned producers’ co-operatives
were to be established which could carry out a painless transition to the
higher forms of big mechanised industry.
In the agrarian sector, private property in land had been abolished.
The state was inaugurating a number of measures to encourage large-
scale socialist agriculture: establishing cooperative farms, state farms
and agricultural communes.1
It was recognised that only the first steps had been taken for the tran-
sition from capitalism to communism so that until there had been a com-
plete organisation of communist production and distribution of products
it was impossible to abolish money. It was considered possible in the
meantime to extend the area of transactions without the use of cash by
the deposition of money compulsorily in the people’s bank; the replac-
ing of money by the use of cheques; and the issuing of short term notes
which entitled the possessor to receive products.
The programme of 1919 illuminates the economic policies of the pe-
riod of the civil war, known as ‘war communism’.
In those three years, from June 1918 through to March 1921, further
expropriations took place of the small sections of the industrial bour-
geoisie. Such was the case also in transport, communications and dis-
tribution.

In agriculture private property in land had already ceased to exist;
through the appropriation of agricultural surplus the socialist state con-
trolled a part of the surplus; an attempt was made to bring the peasant
farms under the purview of the plan.2
Some fifty industrial sectoral boards were established termed glavki
which controlled industry under the formal writ of the Supreme Council
for National Economy.
The attempt was made under war communism to abolish commod-
ity-money relations. The expenses of enterprises were decided by cen-
tralised planning and covered by the state budget. The products of the
enterprises were at the disposal of the central bodies.. Centralised fi-
nancing was replaced by the centralised supply in kind. Distribution of
products was conducted by the centralised allocation of goods. Com-
modity exchange was ended between town and country by decreeing the
compulsory delivery of surplus grain. Taxation was abolished. The state
distributed gratis housing, telephones, water, gas, electricity for workers
and employees. Similarly, the urban populace was supplied differentiat-
ed food rations on the basis of class with priority given to the industrial
workers performing dangerous and heavy labour.3
But commodity-money relations could not be abolished but they
were driven underground. The state continued print currency notes
whose value continued to shrink. Working people were compelled to use
the extensive black market for the bulk of their purchases.
It proved impossible to sustain the economic policies of military
communism once the civil war ended. In its place the policies of the
New Economic Policy were introduced which utilised widespread com-
modity-money relations until such time as the economy revived in the
period 1925-26 when industrial and agricultural production returned to
the levels of 1913. This laid the basis for the socialist offensives which
established directive centralised planning, incepted socialist industrial-
isation based on the production of the means of production (with the
lead being given to production of the means of production of production
of Department 1), and introduced socialist collectivisation based on the
poor and middle peasantry with the agricultural instruments and means
of production remaining in the socialised sector. Collectivisation ended
the existence of the last section of the most numerous class of the bour-
geoisie, the rich peasantry.
In such conditions Stalin argued in his Speech on the Draft Con-
stitution of the USSR in 1936 that the Soviet Union had achieved
the construction of the foundations of socialism in the main. Stalin had
earlier said in the 17th Congress of the CPSU (b) in 1934 that the task of
building a classless socialist society remained for the future.
Extensive discussions took place at the 18th Congress of the CPSU
(b) in 1939 on the building of the classless socialist society and the tran-
sition to the communist society.4 It was suggested by Voznesensky that
while it had taken two decades for the Soviet Union to construct social-
ism a lesser period would be required for the transition to communism.
Detailed discussions on this question were held at the congress and a
commission was set up to draft a new programme for the party.
In conjunction with this a new 15 year perspective plan was drawn up
by Gosplan in two volumes for the period 1947-1953. This considered
the need to surpass the per capita production of the capitalist countries
in pig iron, steel, oil, electricity, machinery and the means of production
and articles of necessity. In terms of social relations it was planned to
raise the level of the workers and collective farm workers to that of the
workers in the technical and engineering sectors.
The perspective plan for the transition to communism naturally had
to be ended with the Nazi invasion of the Soviet Union but it was imme-
diately resumed in 1945 on the lines suggested at the 18th Congress of the
party in 1939 and subsequently.
Instructively Stalin in September 1946 argued that it was possible to
construct communism in one country in the Soviet example.
At the foundation of the Informburo in Poland in September 1947
Malenkov stated that the CPSU b) was elaborating a new party pro-
gramme.5
That draft programme is published here in English for the first time.
The version selected here has the notes of Stalin.6
Aside from the detailed discussions on this draft by the party leader-
ship, Gosplan was involved in working out the implications of the new
programme for the planning mechanism. Voznesesnsky argued in the
Central Committee for a 20 year plan for establishing communism in the
Soviet Union. This was necessary bring the preparatory steps to commu-
nism to fruition and to expand the productive forces and the construction
of new, large construction work: railway lines, metallurgical factories.
These would lead to the Soviet Union overtaking the advanced capitalist
countries in terms of per capital industrial production.
The party authorised such a plan in August 1947. The Gosplan,
the Academy of Sciences and local Soviet and Party organizations
analysed the productive strength of the economic regions of the country
and formed the framework of a perspective for the economy for the pe-
riod 1951-70.
Gosplan was rightly concerned with the development of the forces
of production.7 The relations of production were discussed by Stalin in
Economic Problems of Socialism in the USSR. The significance of his
remarks is that he sought to concretise the gradual steps necessary for
the transition to a communist society in the Soviet Union. Stalin argued
that the existence of group property in the collective farms and therefore
of commodity circulation hampered the full extension of state planning
to the whole of the national economy especially in agriculture. It was
necessary to gradually convert collective farm property into public prop-
erty and replace commodity circulation with products-exchange between
town and country (which meant the end of Soviet trade). This would be
to the benefit of the collective farm peasantry as they would receive more
products from state industry.8
After March 1953 the CPSU was guided not by Marxism-Leninism
but the ideas fought by Stalin in Economic Problems and his related
writings: Bogdanovism, Bukharinism, Trotskyism; and specifically in
the realm of political economy the ‘market socialist’ notions of Notkin,
Venzher and Sanina. The ideological rupture with Marxism-Leninism
spread internationally in the bulk of the people’s democracies and the
majority of the international communist movement. The Soviet state no
longer carried out the functions of the dictatorship of the proletariat for-
mally positing this in 1961 when it was accepted that the Soviet Union
was now the ‘state of the whole people’. Parallel to this the majority of
the people’s democracies no longer carried out the functions of the dic-
tatorship of the proletariat after 1953.9
The programme for communist construction in the Soviet Union in-
volving the development of the productive forces and changes in the
production relations was ended. The question of having a higher rate of
expansion of Department 1 for the purposes of social reproduction was
downgraded. The perspective of the gradual conversion of collective
farms to agricultural communes was terminated. The plan of replacing
commodity circulation by products-exchange was swiftly discontinued.
The archives of the State Planning Commission, Gosplan, establish
unequivocally that the foundations of a system of generalised commod-
ity production was established in the years 1953 to 1958. Directive cen-
tralised planning which had constructed socialism and which was being
utilised for the transition to communism was terminated and replaced
from March 1953 by a system of “co-ordinated planning” involving the
economic negotiations between the central and union republic govern-
ments. The state planning commission itself was divided into two organ-
isations. The sphere of influence of Gosplan was reduced by expanding
the powers of the directors of the enterprises who were now required to
accept that the criterion of efficiency was the principle of profitability.
The commodification of the instruments and means of production was
enacted both in industry and agriculture. While under the socialist sys-
tem the products of industry were allocated under the plan after 1958
these products were now designated as commodities which circulated
in the state sector. Some twenty agencies were established under Gos-
plan to sell the commodities produced by Soviet industrial enterprises.
In agriculture following the example of Yugoslavia the instruments and
means of production, the Machine Tractor Stations, were sold to the col-
lective farms. This signified that in the Soviet Union (and in People’s
China) a section of the socialised means of production now became
part of the group property of the collective farms (and later the People’s
Communes) thereby massively expanding the area of commodity cir-
culation. In such a situation there was an inevitable reemergence in the
Soviet Union of such categories as labour power as a commodity, surplus
value, profit and the average rate of profit.
The programme for communist construction which was put forward
by the CPSU in 1961 in the time of Khrushchev envisaged the further
deepened expansion of commodity-money relations including wide in-
dependence of the enterprises and profit until such time as there was a
single communist form of property when commodity-money relations
would become outdated. No concrete steps were proposed to bring about
a single communist property as had been in evidence in the 1919 party
programme or right through to Economic Problems and the 19th party
congress in 1952. Indeed it was considered necessary that farming on
the collective farms had to be based on the principle of profitability. As
in People’s China in the People’s Communes it was to proposed to sub-
merge social property in the state sector into the semi-socialist group
property of the collective farms. Earlier the Machine Tractor Stations,
which Stalin had defended from the Venzher and Sanina suggestion to
commodify them by selling them to the collective farms, had been vend-
ed to the collective farms in 1958. It was now the policy to merge the col-
lective farms, the state farms and the industrial enterprises which would
have at a wider level reduced the social property of the state farms and
industry to group property.10 It contradicted the programme advocated
by Khrushchev of building up a single communist property in the Soviet
Union.
The CPSU and Khrushchev made the transition from the construc-
tion of commodity ‘socialism’ in the period 1953-1958 to projecting a
commodity ‘communism’ in 1961.
Endnotes:
1. Programma i ustava VKP (b), (1919), Partizdat TsK VKP (b), Moscow 1936,
64 pp. This publication was printed in an edition of two hundred thousand
copies.
2. László Szamuely, First Models of the Socialist Economic Systems: Principles
and Theories, Akademiai Kiadó, Budapest, 1974. p.11.
3. Ibid., 15, 17.
4. Vijay Singh, The CPSU (b), Gosplan and the Question of the Transition to
Communist Society in the Soviet Union 1939-1953, Revolutionary Democ-
racy, Vol. III, No. 1, April 1997. https://www.revolutionarydemocracy.org/
rdv3n1/gosplan.htm
5. Informatsionnoe soveshchanie predstaviteleye nekotorykh kompartiye, v
Pol”she v kontse Septyabrya 1947 goda, Ogiz Gosizpollit, Moscow,1948,
p.153.
6. Stalinskoe ekonomicheskoe nasledstvo: plany i diskussii 1947-1953gg. Doku-
menty i materialy, Compiled by V.V. Zhuravlev and L.N. Lazareva, Rosspen,
Moscow, 2017, 640 pages, pp. 118-138. See also the volume: V.V. Trushkov,
Neizvestnaya Programma VKP (b), Moscow, 2018, 288pp.
7. See also: M.I. Rubinstein, O sozdanii materialn”o- tekhnicheskoye bazy kom-
muniszma, Molodaya Guardia, Moscow,1952, 40pp, and his Soviet Science
and Technique in the Service of Building Communism in the USSR, FLPH,
Moscow 1954, 236pp.
8. I. Stalin, Economicheskie problem sotsializma v SSSR, Moscow, 1952, pp.
204-221. See also: N. Smolin, Rudimentary Forms of Products Exchange.
https://revolutionarydemocracy.org/rdv13n1/smolin.htm
9. Vijay Singh, Some Questions of the Dictatorship of the Proletariat and the
People’s Democracies, Revolutionary Democracy, Vol. I, No. 1, (New Se-
ries), April 2022.
10. Programma Communisticheskoi Partii Sovetskogo Soyuza in XXII S”ezd
Kommunisticheskoi Partii Sovetskogo Soyuza, 17-31 Oktyabrya 1961 goda,
Stenograficheskiye otchet, III, Gospolitizdat, Moscow, 1962, pp. 229-335.

MATERIALS FOR THE
DRAFT PROGRAMME OF THE
ALL-UNION COMMUNIST
PARTY OF BOLSHEVIKS
WITH NOTES BY J. V. STALIN
Abstracts for the preparation of the programme of the CPSU(b)
1. The significance of the October Revolution in historical human

development
The Great October Socialist Revolution of November 7 (October 25),
1917, brought about the dictatorship of the proletariat in Russia. The
working class, with the support of the bulk of the peasantry, began to
build the foundations of a communist society.
This revolution was the inevitable result of the development of in-
ternational capitalism, where Russia was the weakest link and the focal
point of all the contradictions of imperialism.
The Russian working class was the first to enter into a decisive strug-
gle against capitalism and won a complete victory over the Russian bour-
geoisie and landlords1.
The October Revolution opened a new era in world history. It was the
beginning of a radical turn in the development of mankind from the old
capitalist world to the new socialist world.
2. [For the first time]2 in history the workers and peasants deprived
the bourgeoisie [and landlords]3 political power, destroyed the old bour-
geois state apparatus to the ground and created a new type of state –the
Soviet state.
The creation of the Soviet state was a world-historic step forward in
the struggle of the working class for its emancipation. The Soviet state
has realized genuine freedom for the working people, a new, people’s,
socialist democracy. The state of the working people was opposed to the
bourgeois state, and Soviet socialist democracy was opposed to capitalist
democracy.

3. The October Revolution dealt a death blow to the exploitative the-
ories that the working class was incapable of running the state.
The thirty-year existence of the Soviet state has convincingly proved
that the people themselves, without capitalists and landlords4can not
only successfully manage the state, build industry, manage the economy,
but can also create the most durable and most powerful state that has
ever existed in history.
4. The entire experience of historical development over the past de-

cades shows that the bourgeois form of ownership5 of the instruments
and the means of production has outlived itself, that the transformation
of the means of production into public, socialist property is a historical
necessity, a condition for the further progress of mankind.
The Soviet revolution destroyed the bourgeois and landlord6 own-
ership of the means of production and established the dominance of so-
cialist property in our country, which was the decisive condition for the
growth of the productive forces of Soviet society, unprecedented in its
scope and pace.
For the first time in history, the economy of a vast country was orga-
nized on a scientific, planned basis. The dominance of socialist property
made possible a reasonable combination of science and economy. [New
patterns of social development emerged]7.
The victorious development of the socialist economy of the USSR
led to the complete ousting of capitalist elements from all spheres of eco-
nomic and social life, to the liquidation of the exploiting classes, to the
abolition of the exploitation of man by man. The Soviet people are now
forever freed from economic crises, unemployment, poverty and ruin8.
The socialist form of economy has shown its greatest advantages
compared with capitalism as the highest historical stage of organization
and development of production.
The Great October Socialist Revolution and the victory of socialism
in the USSR confirmed that great9 Marxist-Leninist truth that capitalism
is a transitory mode of production and that, due to the laws of historical
development, it will inevitably be replaced by socialism.
5. The victory of the socialist revolution in the USSR freed the peo-
ples of Russia from economic and spiritual enslavement by foreign
capital and ensured their state and national independence. The October
Revolution raised the broad masses of the country to conscious historical
creativity. The people became the true creators of a new social and state
system, a new socialist culture10.
6. The October Socialist Revolution completely broke the chains of
national oppression in Russia and established the Soviet multinational
state, built on the principles of the brotherhood of peoples. The Soviet
state ensured economic and cultural flourishing for all the peoples of
Russia. It raised the formerly oppressed peoples to the position of truly
free and truly equal11.
The October Revolution dealt a crushing blow to bourgeois racial
theory by showing that the most backward peoples, drawn into the main-
stream of Soviet development, are capable of advancing a truly advanced
culture and a truly advanced civilization. It exposed the lie that has been
spreading for centuries about the inequality of peoples, about the superi-
ority of some races and nations12 over others.
7. The October Revolution served as a signal and an example for the

working people of the whole world in their liberation struggle, instilling
in them confidence in their strength and hope for liberation from oppres-
sion and exploitation.
Among the broad masses of the people in the capitalist countries, in
the colonies and dependent countries, faith in the inviolability and eter-
nity13 of capitalism has been shaken. Under the influence of the October
Revolution, a powerful wave of national liberation movements and a
wave of revolutionary uprisings14 took place. The struggle of the work-
ing people against capitalist oppression after the October Revolution
rose to a [higher]15 historical level16.
8. The October Revolution dealt a mortal blow to the social demo-

cratic reformist ideology. It proved that [only the Communist Party]17,
only Bolshevism18 is a true representative of revolutionary Marxism. The
October Revolution showed the working class of the whole world that
social-democratic reformism is the ideological support of capitalism, a
faithful defender and a servant of imperialism.
9. The leader and organizer of the masses of the people, who carried
out the socialist revolution and the victorious building of socialism in
the USSR, is the All-Union Communist Party of Bolsheviks, the party
of Lenin-Stalin.

The Bolshevik Party, armed with the theory of scientific commu-
nism, the theory of Marxism-Leninism, educated the working class and
the working people in the spirit of the ideas of the socialist revolution
and showed them the right path to victory.
10. The Second World War, which ended with the complete victory
of the Soviet Union over German19 fascism and Japanese imperialism20
proved to the whole world that only thanks to the Soviet state and the
selfless struggle of the peoples of the USSR, who bore the main burden
of this war on their shoulders, humanity was saved from the danger of
fascist enslavement. The USSR acted as the saviour of world culture and
civilization from fascist barbarism.
The Soviet state in the new, post-war conditions continues to wage
a consistent struggle to the end for the complete eradication of the ide-
ology of fascism throughout the world, for a lasting democratic peace,
for the freedom and independence of peoples, tirelessly exposing the
instigators and provocateurs of a new world war.
11. The Great October Socialist Revolution placed the working peo-
ple of the USSR at the head of all advanced and progressive mankind.
The Union of Soviet Socialist Republics is a bulwark of the culture
and civilization of modern man: On the basis of victorious socialism
in the USSR, a new world culture, the culture of communism, is being
built.
II. The current international environment
1. The Second World War brought significant changes to the modern
international situation.
As a result of the defeat of German fascism and Japanese imperial-
ism, the two most aggressive imperialist powers, Germany and Japan,
broke out of the world capitalist system. There was a serious weakening
of the British Empire, which lost some of its economic and political po-
sitions and turned into a junior partner of the United States.
The centre of gravity of world reaction has shifted to the United
States. The economic, financial and military strengthening of the United
States is pushing the American monopoly and financial oligarchy to fight
for the establishment of world domination, to abandon traditional iso-
lationism and move to unrestrained expansionist21 foreign policy22. The
collapsed German fascist imperialism, which was striving to win world
domination, is being replaced by American imperialism with its aspira-
tions to establish US world domination. After the failure of the German
fascist racial theory, the Anglo-Saxon racial theory was brought to light
as a new ideological weapon of American and British imperialism.
2. British imperialism does not have the strength and means to

maintain its old positions in the capitalist world, as a result of which
the British were pushed out23 by the American imperialists from China,
are being ousted from Canada, lost their position in Greece and Turkey,
etc. The United States stakes on the economic mastery of foreign colo-
nies, [on overcoming the colonial monopoly]24 European powers and the
mastery of foreign markets and sources of raw materials. With falsely
demagogic declarations against colonial oppression, the American im-
perialists cover up their desire for a general redistribution of the colonial
world in their favour.
3. Modern imperialist reaction does not want to and [cannot get rid of
with fascism to the end]25 because it needs fascism as a counterbalance to
the growth of the labour and people’s democratic movement. The ruling
circles of the USA and England condone the fascists everywhere. The
governments of the imperialist states (Britain and the USA) are pursuing
a policy of supporting reactionary elements all over the world (in China,
Greece, Italy, France, Iran, Germany, Austria, etc.), a policy of suppress-
ing the national liberation movement in the colonial countries26.
4. In the post-war [US domestic policy, the process of militarization

of the country was sharply defined: and the bureaucratization of the state
apparatus]27, strengthening the military, the transition to methods of di-
rect violence against progressive organizations.
Extreme reactionary circles in the USA are openly pushing the coun-
try towards fascism. The passage of anti-union laws, the testing of US
civil servants and the dismissal of all “disloyal”, the purge of the state
apparatus of communist and democratic elements, racial discrimination,
the widespread political and ideological campaign against the labour
movement, trade unions, and the Communist Party testify to the serious
danger of US fascism28.
5. One of the manifestations of the US struggle for world domina-

tion is touching the national sovereignty of many European countries.
Relying on the strength of the US dollar, using the needs and calamities
of the population of many European countries after the Second World
War, seeking to unite a number of European states under their auspices,
reactionary circles in the United States are trying to arbitrarily interfere
in their economic and political life. Reaction[ary] elements29 of these
countries are openly betraying the national interests of their peoples in
favour of the rich and fat masters from the United States30.
6. As a reflection of the growth of the forces of imperialist reaction,
there is a further decline and decay of modern bourgeois culture and ide-
ology. In the countries of the bourgeois world, primarily in the USA and
England, new variations of the old racial theories are widely preached.
Once again imperialist reaction is raising the weapon of zoological na-
tionalism. The preaching of “impotence of reason”, the individualism
of the “proud personality”, intellectual anarchy, philosophical idealism
and mysticism has become extremely intensified in the post-war period.
7. The growth of reaction, the intensifying processes of militariza-

tion and fascisisation of the countries of the old bourgeois democracy,
the reactionary course in their domestic and foreign policy aggravate
class contradictions and intensify the struggle between progressive and
reactionary elements in these countries. There is a process of growth of
the forces of progress, democracy; ever broader masses of the people are
drawn into the struggle against reaction31.
8. After the Second World War, an upswing in the working-class

movement was clearly marked in all capitalist countries. During the peri-
od of the liberation war against fascism, the working class of the capital-
ist countries acted as the most consistent fighter for the defeat of fascism,
as the most patriotic force in the struggle against the fascist aggressors
and oppressors. Today the working class of the capitalist countries is
fighting against international and national reaction, and is acting as the
true bearer of the interests of the whole people and of the whole nation.
The working class of the capitalist countries is increasingly uniting all
democratic elements around itself32.
9. One of the regularities of the present stage of historical develop-

ment is the growth of the forces of communism in all countries. During
the Second World War, the Communist parties played the main organiz-
ing role in creating the resistance movement and uniting the masses in
the countries under German and Japanese occupation. As a result, the
communist parties have grown in numbers, strengthened politically and
ideologically, won great prestige among the masses of the people, and
are now a mighty force opposing internal and external reaction.
10. As a result33, the defeat of German fascism and Japanese imperi-

alism aggravated the crisis of the entire colonial system of the capitalist
world. An upsurge of the national-colonial liberation movement is taking
place, never before seen in history. Not only do the colonial peoples no
longer want to live in the old way, but the ruling classes of the metro-
politan countries can no longer govern the colonies in the old way34. The
colonial peoples oppose the attempts of imperialist reaction to find a
way out of the crisis of the colonial system through reforms and conces-
sions with their own path, the revolutionary, national liberation fight35.
Under the flag of granting all kinds of “autonomies”, “independence”,
through partial concessions, the use of tactics of inciting ethnic and re-
ligious hatred among the colonial peoples, as well as through economic
and political pressure, and if all this does not help – through direct mili-
tary suppression of the national liberation movements – the imperialists
are striving in every way to preserve their old colonial positions. The
peoples of the colonial countries ([India], Burma, Indonesia, Indochina,
etc.)36 are increasingly developing a struggle for their national indepen-
dence, establishing ties with democratic, progressive forces throughout
the capitalist world, including in the metropolitan countries.
11. After the First World War, as a result of the victory of the Great
October Socialist Revolution, Russia broke the chains of imperialism,
and the Soviet state and social system was established in it. After the
Second World War, as a result of the unfolding people’s liberation strug-
gle against fascist oppression, thanks to the historical role played by the
Soviet Union in the defeat of German fascism, in a number of countries
of Eastern and South-Eastern Europe (Yugoslavia37, Bulgaria, Roma-
nia, Albania, Czechoslovakia, Poland) a new democracy has grown and
strengthened.
The peoples of these countries, having liberated themselves from
Hitler’s yoke with the help of the Soviet Army, began to build new dem-
ocratic orders, abandoning the old models of bourgeois-parliamentary
democracy, such as British or North American. New forms of state struc-
ture arose that ensured the real involvement of workers, peasants, and
labour[ing] intelligentsia in state administration. In the countries of the
new democracies, a land reform has been carried out, large-scale land
ownership has been abolished, large-scale industry has been national-
ized, and the foundations have been laid for the planned development
of the economy. A new path of economic and political development has
opened up for the countries of the new democracy in the direction of
socialism.
12. In the post-war period, the reactionary role of contemporary
right-wing Social Democracy as the clerk and squire of imperialism is
once again revealed with all clarity. Social Democracy [after the First]
World War saved capitalism by its opportunistic and treacherous policy;
as a result of the split of the labour movement, it paved the way for the
victory of fascism in Germany, Italy, Spain and other countries. Now, af-
ter the second war, right-wing socialists are playing a no less reactionary
role, being direct accomplices of the aggressive imperialist forces; they
are active assistants, propagandists and conductors of the US policy of
economic and political enslavement of a number of European countries,
active preachers of the creation of a Western bloc of European states
[directed against the Soviet Union]38.
Exposing their policies and isolating them from the working class
and the masses is an urgent task of all truly democratic, progressive forc-
es.
13. Two trends have been clearly defined in the international situa-
tion – the tendency of imperialist reaction and aggression, provocation
and preparation of a new war, denial of the national sovereignty of small
countries, represented by reactionary imperialist circles – and another
tendency, represented by the Soviet Union – the spokesman for the true
interests of the peoples, consistently fighting for a lasting democratic
peace, upholding the rights of peoples and the sovereignty of small states.
14. The development of the productive forces of the capitalist world,

primarily in the USA, the concentration of enormous wealth in the hands
of a handful of monopolists and magnates of finance capital, and the
ever-growing impoverishment of the masses of the people places the
capitalist system before new economic upheavals and crises. Uneven de-
velopment of the capitalist countries, [disturbance of balance within the
bourgeois economic system]39 – fraught with the danger of new military
clashes.
The more the progress of science advances, the more opportunities
open up for the use of new sources of energy, new great technical
discoveries, the stronger the main contradiction of capitalism, the
contradiction between the social character of labour and the private cap-
italist form of appropriation, becomes more pronounced. The higher the
level of modern technology, the more majestic the productive forces of
mankind become, the more inevitably the question of the need to replace
the old bourgeois system with a new socialist system is placed on the or-
der of the day. Imperialism is unable to cope with the modern productive
forces of society. [The only way to avoid new military clashes and crises
is transition to socialism]40.
III. The results of the achievements of Soviet society

1. Having won political power in Russia, the workers and peasants
created the basic conditions for the fundamental socialist transformation
of the country.
After the defeat of foreign intervention and internal counter-revolu-
tion, the Communist Party directed all the forces of the Soviet people to
the restoration of the national economy and the socialist reorganization
of the life of the country along all lines. It was necessary to start creating
our own industrial base for the national economy, it was necessary to
prepare and carry out the transformation of agriculture on a socialist ba-
sis, it was necessary to do a lot of work for the comprehensive develop-
ment and strengthening of the socialist state, it was necessary to unfold a
whole cultural revolution in the country.
2. The implementation of these tasks was associated with enormous

difficulties, flowing from the age-old economic and cultural backward-
ness of old Russia. It was necessary to overcome the desperate resis-
tance of the exploiting classes, to crush the Trotsky-Zinoviev-Bukharin
traitors, to strengthen the country’s defence in the face of unceasing at-
tempts by the bourgeois states to interfere in the internal affairs of the
Soviet Union.
The Communist Party and the Soviet government rallied the Soviet
people, directed their efforts towards a common goal, overcoming all
obstacles and difficulties.
As a result of the titanic work of the Soviet people, a socialist society
was built in the USSR.
3. Guided by the teachings of Lenin and Stalin, the Communist Party

and the Soviet government developed a strictly scientific programme for
the industrialization of the country.
Unlike the capitalist method of industrialization, the Soviet method
of industrialization is based on social ownership of the means of produc-
tion, on the accumulation and saving of wealth created by the labour of
workers and peasants. The Soviet method of industrialization assumed
a steady increase in the material well-being of the masses. The clarity
of the goal and the grandeur of the prospects for socialist construction
aroused the greatest labour enthusiasm of the Soviet people. The con-
struction of socialist industry gave rise to new forms of communist con-
struction—socialist emulation and ‘shock work’.
All this led to an unprecedented increase in production. It was a leap,
with the help of which our homeland, in the shortest historical period,
turned from a backward country into an advanced one, from an agrarian
into an industrial one.
Soviet industry has grown into a huge force based on new, advanced
modern technology with a highly developed heavy industry and an even
more developed machine building.
4. Consistently and successfully solving the problem of creating a

large modern mechanized industry, the Soviet state carried out Lenin’s
testament to transform our country into a country economically indepen-
dent of the capitalist economy.
As a result of industrialization, a powerful and solid defence base of
the country was created, which made it possible to prepare for organiz-
ing a rebuff in the event of a military attack from outside.
5. The most difficult task of the socialist revolution was to introduce

the many millions of Soviet peasants to socialism. In order to put an
end to backwardness in the field of agriculture and transfer it to social-
ist lines, it was necessary to organize the transition from small peasant
farming to large-scale collective farming.
6. Large-scale socialist industry made it possible to provide the most

advanced technical base for the reconstruction of agriculture. For a num-
ber of years the Bolshevik Party and the Soviet government created new
productive forces in the countryside and equipped agriculture with new
machinery. A large army of people who mastered the new technique was
trained.
As a result of all this, a profound revolutionary upheaval took place
in the Soviet countryside, a leap from the old qualitative state of society
to a new qualitative state, equivalent in its consequences to the revolu-
tionary upheaval in October 191741.
In the process of the transition of the peasantry to the collective
farms, the last exploiting class, the kulaks, was liquidated.
7. The creation of the foundation of a socialist economy in industry

and agriculture was accompanied by the expulsion of the bourgeoisie
from the sphere of commodity circulation as well. A Soviet state and
cooperative trade were created, which ensured the supply of the working
people of the city and the countryside with consumer goods, and estab-
lished correct economic relations between different branches of industry.
8. As a result of the victory of socialist industrialization and the col-

lectivization of agriculture, the exploiting classes were eliminated and
the exploitation of man by man was completely abolished. The class
structure of Soviet society changed radically. Only the working class
and the peasant class, as well as the Soviet intelligentsia, remained in the
USSR. The working class and the peasantry of the USSR are new classes
that have changed their social nature. The intelligentsia of the USSR also
changed. The alliance of the working class, the peasantry and the Soviet
intelligentsia is strong and unshakable.
9. On the basis of the great historical victories of socialism, the Sovi-

et socialist state was consolidated and Soviet socialist democracy devel-
oped. The Soviet people have achieved unprecedented successes in all
areas of economic, political and cultural life.
The Stalinist Constitution expressed and legislated the victory of so-
cialism in our country.
The introduction of the new Constitution of the USSR meant a turn
in the entire political life of the country.
10. The building of socialism in the USSR meant the modification

of the old ones and the emergence [of new laws of social development].
Instead of the antagonistic contradiction that has existed for centuries
between the productive forces and production relations, which expresses
the antagonism of the exploiting and the exploited classes, in the USSR
there is a complete correspondence between the productive forces and
production relations.
Instead of the anarchy of capitalist production, which gives rise to
economic crises and unemployment, the USSR has a planned economy

that ensures the rational use of all social and natural opportunities for the
all-round development of the productive forces.
The Soviet economy is developing on the basis of high rates of ex-
panded socialist reproduction of industry and agriculture.
The high rates of development of the socialist economy ensure the
continuous growth of the material and cultural well-being of the Soviet
people.
In the USSR, the socialist principle has been fully established and
dominates: from each according to his ability, to each according to his
work.
The development of production is based on such a combination of
the personal and social interests of Soviet citizens that ensures the de-
velopment of the social economy and creates a solid foundation for the
ever-increasing satisfaction of the personal needs of citizens.
11. The flourishing of the socialist system created new driving forces
in Soviet society, which did not exist and could not have existed before
socialism. These new driving forces are: the moral and political unity of
the Soviet people, the friendship of peoples, Soviet patriotism. Socialism
created not only new social conditions, but also a new, socialist man. In
the USSR, the people and communism merged into a single and inde-
structible force.
12. The Soviet social and political system has strengthened to such
an extent and has become such a vital need of the Soviet people that the
entire people, as one person, rose up to fight against the fascist invasion
and defended their gains in an unprecedentedly difficult war against Nazi
Germany. The heroism and courage shown by the Soviet people in the
Great Patriotic War were a vivid expression of the fact that the Soviet
system is a truly people’s system, close to every Soviet citizen.
13. In the process of socialist construction, the Leninist-Stalinist

national policy won a complete victory. The former national inequality
of the peoples of old Russia was completely destroyed and the Lenin-
ist-Stalinist idea of a state based on the fraternal community and unity
of all the nations and peoples of the USSR was put into practice. The
selfless participation of all the peoples of the Soviet socialist republics in
the Great Patriotic War further consolidated the indestructible friendship
and brotherhood of the multinational Soviet people.
A new, socialist patriotism arose and developed in Soviet society, the
essence of which lies in the combination of the national traditions of the
peoples of the USSR with the common interests of the working masses.
14. The creative and constructive nature of Soviet society found its
expression in the construction of a new socialist culture42.
In terms of [its ideological content], Soviet culture is permeated from
beginning to end with the spirit of the great communist doctrine, the
ideas of Marxism-Leninism. Although national in its form, Soviet cul-
ture is socialist in its content43. It is a new type of world culture, it is
not conciliatory [while not oppressive], with no [demeaning] of human
dignity and reason, [with no cultivation of animal instincts in man]44.
In its deep ideological spirit, in its popular character, in its noble
purpose of serving the interests of the working masses fighting for com-
munist life, it rises immeasurably above bourgeois culture.
15. The greatest achievement of the Soviet revolution is the solution

of the problem of cadres of state and economic leaders. During the 30
years of Soviet power, major statesmen emerged from among the people,
who proved their ability to successfully lead the great socialist state. The
Soviet people have created their own cadre of scientists, writers, artists,
military leaders, engineers, technicians – the builders of the new society.
A new, Soviet intelligentsia has been created, closely connected with the
people, ready in its mass to serve it faithfully45.
16. The Soviet revolution created its powerful armed forces, whose
historic victories in the civil war of 1917-1920 and especially in the Great
Patriotic War proved the invincibility of the Soviet socialist system. The
victory over the powerful military machine of fascist Germany was a
vivid demonstration of the superiority of the Soviet military [ideology]
and [military art over military strategy] and the tactics of the enemies of
the Soviet state. The Soviet army managed to fulfill its historical liber-
ation mission in the war against the German46 imperialists and deserved
the universal love and recognition of all the freedom-loving peoples of
the world.
17. A particularly prominent role in the family of Soviet peoples has

been and is played by the great Russian people, who were the first to
raise the banner of the socialist revolution, collaborating throughout the
entire period of building socialism, the peoples of the USSR and with
their selfless and disinterested help to the previously oppressed nations
won the respect and love of all the peoples of the Soviet Union. The Rus-
sian people rightfully occupy a leading position in the Soviet community
of nations. The great advanced culture created by the Russian people
and its highest achievement, Leninism, are the most important source of
development of the culture of all other peoples of the USSR47.
18. During the thirty years of the October Socialist Revolution, the
Soviet people have achieved world-historic successes. The Soviet Union
is rightfully at the forefront of all modern progressive humanity.
The Soviet people achieved all their victories and achievements un-
der the leadership of the Communist Party. The Party inspired the people
to great historical daring and exploits. Its policy is the lifeblood of the
Soviet system.
The Communist Party of Bolsheviks, the Lenin-Stalin Party, is the
vanguard of the working class, the vanguard of the Soviet people. It is
the leading and organizing force of the Soviet state.
The outlook of the Communist Party became the outlook of the So-
viet people. This is the great irresistible strength of Soviet society, the
guarantee of the further victories of the Soviet people on the path to
building a [complete] communist society in the USSR.
IV. The main tasks of the transition of

Soviet society from socialism to communism
1. Having achieved the victory of the lower phase of communism,
socialism, the CPSU(b) sets as its task the completion of the building
of socialist society and the gradual transition from socialism to commu-
nism, building a complete communist society in our country.
The gradual transition from socialism to communism will be carried
out through a series of stages as the national economy develops, labour
productivity grows, the communist consciousness of the masses grows,
and as the might of the Soviet state further strengthens.
Communism is the highest stage in the development of the new sys-
tem, in which not only social ownership of the instruments and means
of production dominates and there is no exploitation of man by man, but
also all remnants of old class distinctions are finally erased, the remnants
of capitalism in the economy and people’s consciousness are overcome,
the opposition between the city and village, the difference between peo-
ple of mental and people of physical labour, and all citizens are workers
of a single communist society48.
Under communism, such a high productivity of people’s labour and
such a powerful development of the productive forces of society are
achieved that they ensure an abundance of all consumer goods and make
it possible to put into practice the communist principle: “From each ac-
cording to his abilities, to each according to his needs.”
2. Under communism, a higher type [of social organization of labour]

is realized, based on the free and conscious discipline of the members of
communist society.
Labour ceases to be only a means of life and becomes a habit and a
vital need of people.
Until labour becomes a matter of habit for every person and until all
people begin to work voluntarily according to their abilities, the strictest
[recording and control over the measure of labor and the measure of
consumption is the first duty of society and the state].
3. On the basis of the planned development of the productive forces

and the rational disposal of material resources, communism creates every
opportunity for the unprecedented, progressive raising of the well-being
of the masses and ensuring the full satisfaction of all the rapidly growing
needs of society.
The implementation of the communist principle [of distribution ac-
cording to needs] leads to the final destruction of any kind of economic
[inequality] between people49.
Communism does not eliminate personal ownership of personal con-
sumption items, household items.
4. Communism means an unprecedented flourishing of science and

technology, flourishing and abundance of the material and spiritual cul-
ture of society. In communist society, for the first time, people become
the real masters of the forces of nature.
All the necessary conditions are being created for the all-round, har-
monious development of the personality, for the development of all the
abilities and talents inherent in a person. All the wonders of technology,
all the achievements of culture, all the fruits of the thousand-year devel-
opment of civilization go to all the working people, members of com-
munist society. The human mind and genius create for the benefit of the
masses. The time is coming for a joyful and happy life for all the people.

5. The USSR has everything possible and necessary to build a com-
plete communist society. Having fulfilled the testament of V.I. Lenin,
having translated into reality under the leadership of J.V. Stalin about a
[possibility]50 of the victories of socialism in the USSR, the All-Union
Communist Party (Bolsheviks) and the Soviet government set them-
selves the immediate practical task of completing the building of a so-
cialist society and organizing a gradual transition from the lower phase
of the new system to its higher phase.
6. After the destruction of classes in general and any remnants of the

old class differences, as people get used to the voluntary [observance of
the elementary conditions of human society] and [the need for any kind
of violence against people] disappears, the state ceases to be necessary
and dies.
The withering away of the state is a long process and can begin in
the second phase of communism only if the capitalist encirclement is
eliminated and the danger of military attacks from outside is eliminated.
As long as the communist society, which has won in one country,
coexists with the world of capitalism and the danger of a violent invasion
of its external enemies with the aim of restoring capitalism has not been
removed, the most important task of the communist party and the whole
people is the all-round strengthening of the Soviet state, all its organs
and, first of all, its permanent military force.
The implementation of communism in our country requires the fol-
lowing basic transformations:
A. In the field of general political and state building

1. In the transition from socialism to communism, it is necessary to
further develop Soviet democracy, to continue and expand in every pos-
sible way measures that contribute to the maximum intensification of the
political activity of the masses, to strengthen the control of the masses in
relation to the organs of the Soviet state, and to strengthen the responsi-
bility of the organs of Soviet power to the people.
2. In order to further strengthen the Soviet state, along with strength-

ening the centralized management of state affairs and the economy, the
maximum development of the initiative of all grass-roots state, econom-
ic and public organizations is required, the actual involvement in their
work of the entire population of each district, city, village and countryside.
3. By attaching decisive importance to criticism and self-criticism as
one of the driving forces of the Soviet socialist society51 it is necessary
to ensure that the activities of Party, Soviet, economic and public orga-
nizations are organized in such a way that criticism and self-criticism
become the main method of work, that the broad masses of the people
fully criticize the activities of all organizations, both local and central,
as well as individuals, regardless of their position and social position.
4. On the basis of the complete moral and political unity of Soviet

society that has been achieved, in the future it will become possible (ex-
pedient) to compete during elections to the Soviets of Working People’s
Deputies (from top to bottom) of several candidates nominated by the
bloc of communists and non-party people in order to choose from among
them the most worthy and most capable.
5. In order to further involve the broad masses of the people in the

active work of Soviet, economic and public organizations, in order to
intensify the fight against theft of socialist property and the negligent
attitude of individual workers to the task assigned to them, to combat
the elements of bureaucracy in the organs of the state apparatus – to turn
the State Control into an organization, which would rely in its work on
a broad active of the workers, peasants, and intelligentsia, drawing the
masses of the people into systematic participation in the work of audits,
control and verification.
6. As the construction of a socialist society is completed and the tran-

sition to communism is gradual, more and more direct state functions
will be transferred to voluntary public organizations on the basis of the
growth of the culture of the masses and the growth of their communist
consciousness.
7. For the further development of Soviet people’s democracy, it is

necessary to consider:
a) a gradual transition to the organization of a nationwide vote on
the most important issues of state life, both of a general political and
economic order, and on issues of everyday life, housing and cultural con-
struction;
b) a broad development of legislative initiative from below by grant-
ing public organizations the right to submit proposals to the Supreme
Soviet of the USSR and the Supreme Soviets of the union republics on
the issuance of new laws;
c) the right of citizens and public organizations to directly submit
requests to the Supreme Soviets on the most important issues of interna-
tional and domestic politics.
8. The transition to communism requires the further strengthening

of the Soviet multinational state in every possible way, the expansion of
the functions and rights of the union republics and, at the same time, the
strengthening of the centralized management of all-union affairs; further
strengthening the fraternal ties and cooperation of all the peoples of the
USSR; raising the economy and culture of the national republics and
regions to the level of the most advanced regions of the USSR, thereby
finally achieving the complete elimination of the former economic, tech-
nical and cultural backwardness of the national outlying districts.
9. In order to prepare the conditions for the future merger of national

cultures into one common, both in form and content, communist cul-
ture, it is necessary to do everything possible to ensure that all national
cultures under the conditions of the Soviet system fully and completely
reveal all their internal possibilities and creative powers.
10. In order to more and more familiarize all the peoples of the USSR
with advanced socialist culture, it is necessary to encourage the study
of Russian culture and the Russian language by all the peoples of the
USSR in every possible way. At the same time, the systematic study and
development of the achievements of the culture of all the peoples of the
USSR should be considered the most important task of each republic52.
11. In order to maintain the defence capability of the socialist home-

land at the proper level, a permanent army built on the basis of universal
military service is needed. Military service in the Soviet Army is an hon-
ourable duty of citizens of the USSR. Defence of the fatherland is the
sacred duty of every citizen of the USSR. Along with the Soviet Army,
it is necessary to develop the widest and most widespread training of the
population in modern military art, ensuring the proper level of teaching
of relevant subjects in higher and secondary schools, expanding in every
possible way the activity in this direction of all kinds of amateur military
and sports organizations that help train personnel for the Soviet Army.
It is the duty of honour and the duty of every citizen of the USSR to be
constantly ready, in case of need, to join the ranks of the Soviet Army
and defend the gains of communism with arms in hand.
12. The all-round strengthening of the might of the Soviet Army is

the most important task of the Soviet state and all the working people
of the USSR. In the construction of the Soviet Army, it must be ensured
that its technical equipment and fighting qualities will far exceed the
technical equipment and fighting qualities of the armies of any bourgeois
state and any possible association of them directed against communism.
13. The Red Army is built on the basis of unity of command, strict
military discipline, the authority of the command and political staff, with
the widest development of public organizations in it.
14. The building of a complete communist society presupposes the

conscientious and conscious observance of the rules of communist coex-
istence by all citizens of Soviet society.
15. As long as Soviet society is in a capitalist environment, as long as

hostile and malicious acts of individuals or groups directed against the
communist system or against individual members of communist society
take place in state life, the Soviet state must resort to measures to sup-
press criminal acts, to measures of severe punishment of persons causing
harm to society or its individual members.
16. The Soviet judicial and punitive bodies are charged with protect-
ing state and public property as the sacred and inviolable foundation of
the Soviet system, as a source of wealth and power for the motherland, as
a source of a prosperous and cultural life for all working people, and also
to protect the personal property of citizens; monitor the strict observance
of state laws by all living on the territory of the USSR.
17. Along with harsh punishments against the enemies of commu-

nism and their accomplices, the Soviet court on an ever-larger scale
should apply conditional punishment, public censure, the replacement
of imprisonment with compulsory labour, a system of educational mea-
sures in relation to persons who commit crimes not from anti-state and
anti-people motives, but from lingering backwardness and insufficient
communist consciousness.

18. In defending the further development of the court in the direction
of its greatest democratization, we must strive to ensure that the broad
masses of the people are more and more involved in the exercise of ju-
dicial duties.
19. Along with state judicial bodies, it is necessary to develop courts

of honour elected in state and public central institutions, at enterprises,
on collective farms, in institutions that should help educate citizens in
the spirit of Soviet patriotism, influence members of society who allow
anti-patriotic and anti-state offences that violate the rules of the commu-
nist community and communist labour discipline.
20. As a school of communism, trade unions have educated many

thousands of leaders in all areas of the national economy and state ad-
ministration. In the transition from socialism to communism, the role of
the trade unions as a school of communism becomes even more signif-
icant.
21. The tasks facing the trade unions are:

a) education of communist labour discipline among workers and em-
ployees. The trade unions are fighting against all types of violations of
labour discipline and negligent attitudes towards work, they are striving
for an all-round increase in labour productivity and, on this basis, an
increase in real wages and an increase in the material standard of living
of the working people, they organize and encourage the initiative of the
masses to develop all forms of communist emulation;
b) the trade unions, together with state and economic bodies, orga-
nize an extensive network of courses, schools, institutes and technical
schools, covering all workers and employees;
c) further expansion of the state functions performed by the trade
unions for cultural and community services for workers;
d) in order to train workers and employees in the management of
the economy, public and state affairs, the trade unions take a direct part
in the development of economic plans, technical and other measures to
increase labour productivity and organize the economy, widely practice
the promotion of trade union members to responsible economic, public
and state posts, providing all possible assistance in mastering the work
entrusted to them.

22. The basis of all the work of the trade unions must be a broadly
developed socialist democracy, the resolute expulsion of all elements of
bureaucracy and a formal attitude to business is necessary.
23. As communism consolidates, the trade unions will increasing-

ly turn into amateur cultural and other associations of working people,
which will become one of the forms of communist management of pub-
lic affairs.
C53. In the field of economy
1. The decisive economic task of the USSR for the transition to com-
munism is the task of catching up and overtaking economically the most
developed capitalist countries of the world, including the USA54.
Ensuring this basic task primarily depends on the further develop-
ment of heavy industry and, above all, metallurgy, mechanical engineer-
ing, chemistry, fuel, and the energy base, without which the rapid devel-
opment of the entire national economy is impossible.
2. The further development of socialist industry and technology will

lead to the completion of the great technical revolution, to the creation
of the mighty technology of communism, to the saving of an enormous
mass of human labour and to the abundance of material goods of com-
munist society.
3. The main way to solve these problems is the electrification of the

entire country according to a single plan. Communism is, according to
Lenin, Soviet power plus the electrification of the whole country.
4. For the implementation of the electrification of the entire country,

it is necessary:
a) to expand the construction of large power plants using local energy
resources and primarily hydropower and local fuels;
b) the use for the purposes of electrification, as well as for the devel-
opment of the chemical industry of underground coal gasification;
c) the unification of all large power plants by a single network of
high-voltage transmissions, covering, according to the general plan, the
whole country with branches in each region;
d) the use of electrical energy for the gradual transfer of the national
economy of the country, including agriculture, to a new technical base,
directly or indirectly connected with the matter of electrification;
e) lighting with electricity of every house in the Soviet Union, both in
the city and in the countryside; the introduction of all kinds of electrical
household appliances, contributing to the final liberation of millions of
women from hard domestic work.
The electrification of the entire country, while ensuring an unprece-
dented centralization of the management of the national economy, at the
same time opens up the possibility of dispersing and correctly distribut-
ing industry, bringing it closer to sources of raw materials and areas of
consumption.
It makes it possible in medium and small enterprises to ensure the
use of a number of advantages of large-scale production and the achieve-
ments of technology, and at the same time makes it possible to achieve
the highest labour productivity.
5. It is necessary to develop in every possible way the work of mech-

anizing production processes in all sectors of the national economy, es-
pecially auxiliary and the most labour-intensive and difficult work, and,
thus, to achieve the elimination of difficult and unproductive physical
labor.
6. It is necessary to carry out a broad and systematic development

of the automation of production on an electrical basis, which opens up
completely unlimited possibilities for increasing labour productivity and
leads to a sharp change in the nature of labour, raising it to a higher level,
eliminating unskilled labour. Automation is one of the main points in the
development of the new technology of communism and one of the im-
portant technical levers for eliminating the opposition between physical
and intellectual labour.
The most important task in creating the technical basis of commu-
nism is the widest development of all types of the latest technology and
new types of energy sources, atomic energy, radar, photocells, jet tech-
nology, and so on.
It is necessary to ensure the development of invention and rational-
ization on the widest scale, to involve in this work the broad masses of
engineers and technicians, foremen and workers.
One of the central tasks, on the solution of which the further growth
of the productive forces of Soviet society depends, is the comprehensive
development of geological exploration and the use of the inexhaustible
riches of the bowels of our country.
7. Modern chemistry is one of the main factors in the development
of the productive forces of the national economy, a source of new means
of material culture, and also a powerful means of national defence. The
CPSU (b) sets the task of developing the chemical industry in every pos-
sible way, especially the production of new synthetic materials, obtain-
ing from the simplest materials numerous complex substances that serve
the most diverse needs of industry and defence.
8. Mechanical engineering retains its leading role in the further tech-

nical development of the country. It must fully ensure the technical prog-
ress of all branches of the national economy through the production of
the most advanced, constantly improving types of machines, apparatus-
es, instruments and other equipment necessary for mechanization, auto-
mation and chemicalization production processes.
9. The mass production of motor vehicles must be of particular im-

portance in order to ensure the free and unhindered use of motor vehicles
by every citizen.
10. In order to ensure the level of production of consumer goods

necessary for the transition to communism, the CPSU (b) sets the task of
ever-accelerating development of the light and food industries. All these
branches of production must provide high quality products that satisfy
the diverse needs of communist society.
11. The USSR, as a great railway power, should take first place in
the world in terms of length and density, freight turnover and technical
equipment of railways.
12. It is necessary: a) to complete the technical reconstruction of

railway transport based on the introduction of diesel locomotives and
steam locomotives with steam condensation, the development of high-
speed railway communication and a number of other technical improve-
ments55; b) to expand the construction of major new railway lines, espe-
cially those serving the east and north of the country.
13. It is necessary to significantly increase the role of water transport

in servicing the national economy of the USSR, to raise the technical
level of sea and river navigation, and to expand the further construction
of large artificial waterways and canals. To expand in every possible way
the use of the country’s richest river systems for goods and passenger
traffic.
14. There is a need for the broadest development of air transport on a

scale that will make it possible to cover the entire country with a network
of regular air lines, to constantly improve aircraft and the equipment of
air routes.
15. Road construction must be developed on such a scale as to en-

velop the entire country with a dense network of improved motor roads.
16. Comprehensive development and improvement of all types of

communications, especially radio communications. It is necessary to
provide every apartment, both in the city and the countryside, with a ra-
dio receiver. Much attention should be paid to improving and spreading
television technology.
17. The following tasks are in the field of agriculture:

a) further strengthening in every possible way the artel form of col-
lective-farm production as the most appropriate for the given stage of
development of socialism and as the only correct path to higher forms of
organization of agricultural production;
b) further growth of the technical equipment of agriculture and the
comprehensive mechanization of all agricultural production processes.
Along with the development and improvement of existing agricultural
machinery based on a tractor and a combine, it is necessary to increas-
ingly introduce electrification into all agricultural production processes;
c) the use of all the achievements of agricultural science and tech-
nology, the dissemination of grassland crop rotation, selection and cul-
tivation of new varieties, irrigation of arid regions of the Volga region,
the Centre and other regions of the country, melioration and drainage of
marshy soils for the purpose of elimination of agricultural dependency
on natural disasters and ensuring a steady increase in productivity;
d) to achieve high productivity of agricultural labour, such a signifi-
cant increase in the yield of agricultural crops, the development of grass
cultivation and the productivity of animal husbandry, which would en-
sure the full abundance of agricultural products.

18. It is necessary to develop on a large scale work on the improve-
ment and cultural and everyday services of small towns and villages: the
reconstruction of dwellings, the construction of water pipes, the con-
struction of schools, children’s institutions, clubs, cinemas, canteens,
laundries and the development of motor transport. All these measures
should make the cultural and living conditions in the countryside in no
way different from those in the cities, and thus, from this side, to prepare
for the elimination of the difference between city and countryside.
19. The transition to the agricultural commune, as the highest form of

the collective-farm movement, will take place as the existing agricultural
artel is further strengthened and the productivity of agricultural labour
grows, when the fields and farms of the artel will have an abundance
of grain, livestock, poultry, vegetables and all other kinds of products,
when mechanical laundries, modern kitchens, canteens, bakeries, etc.,
will become widespread in the countryside. The process of developing
an artel into a commune must proceed gradually, as all collective farmers
become convinced of the need for such a transformation. The commune,
in turn, will create new opportunities for higher productivity and cultural
life.
20. At the highest stage of communism, as the abundance of products

grows, there will be a transition to the principle of “from each according
to his ability, to each according to his needs.”
The entire material and technical apparatus of Soviet trade (ware-
houses, shops, etc.), greatly strengthened and multiplied many times
over, will become the basis for the future organization of communist
distribution.
21. Until the principle of communist distribution is fully realized, the

all-round development of Soviet trade, both in the city and in the coun-
tryside, is essential; establishing cultural customer service; expansion
of the construction of commercial establishments, shops, warehouses,
shops, taking into account the latest achievements in technology and
sanitation; the creation of an ideally organized Soviet trade that fully
satisfies the most diverse needs of the population of town and country.
22. The CPSU(b) sets as its task such an increase in the quantity of
consumer products produced and such a constant reduction in prices,
with a corresponding increase in real wages, that a situation will gradual-
ly be created in which every citizen of the USSR will be able to actually
purchase all types of products according to his needs.
Thus, the transition to communist distribution must be seen as a
gradual process taking place on the basis of an increasing abundance of
consumer goods and the policy of constant price reduction pursued by
the Soviet state, on the basis of a steady increase in the productivity of
social labour.
23. In order to further strengthen the economic power of the USSR,

it is necessary to pursue a policy of strengthening the monetary system
of the USSR, striving for the establishment of the Soviet currency as the
most durable and stable currency in the world, surpassing dollars and
pounds in this respect.
D56. In the field of culture and education

1. In the field of urban construction, the following programme must
be adhered to:
a) to limit the further growth of the largest cities of the Soviet Union
by stopping the construction of new industrial enterprises in these cities;
b) to carry out the reconstruction of cities according to scientifically
developed plans. The planning of streets and squares, the placement of
dwellings, industrial buildings and transport, planting of greenery and
watering, the architectural design of cities must meet the high standards
of improvement;
c) the creation of cultural and living conditions that meet the require-
ments of communism, implies the provision of all houses in cities with
electricity, heating, water supply, sewerage, gas and all the achievements
of advanced municipal technology;
d) reconstruction and expansion of urban transport in order to fully
meet the needs of the population for fast and convenient movement.
2. The task of the transition to communism requires a radical solution

of the housing problem. It is necessary to develop new housing construc-
tion on a large scale in order to provide each worker with a completely
comfortable separate room and each family a separate apartment.
3. Further tasks in the field of public education are:

a) strengthening and developing the Soviet school as a conductor of
the ideological, organizational and educational influence of the Commu-
nist Party on all sections of the working people in order to build a com-
plete communist society and abolish the distinction between intellectual
and physical labor;
b) covering all children with free education;
c) implementation of the principles of the political school, preparing
comprehensively developed members of communist society;
d) the introduction of compulsory secondary general and polytechnic
education for the entire younger generation up to 18 years of age;
e) supplying all students of lower and secondary schools with food,
clothing, footwear and teaching aids at the expense of the state;
f) further development of a network of higher education institutions
that can cover all citizens who wish to receive higher education;
g) development of a network of industrial technical and agronomic
education, ensuring the cultural and technical upsurge of the working
class and peasantry. For these purposes, it is necessary to organize poly-
technic institutes for workers who do not have a higher education, to
ensure wide access to the classrooms of a higher school for everyone
who wants to listen to the corresponding courses of lectures.
4. Expand a network of cinemas, theatres, clubs, museums, palaces

of culture and recreation, stadiums, providing for the comprehensively
growing cultural demands of the entire people.
5. One of the decisive conditions for the broad coverage of the com-
munist education of the entire people and the rapid growth of communist
culture is the printed word.
It is necessary to achieve in the coming years such a development of
the paper industry and printing technology that would ensure full satis-
faction of the needs for all types of printing (newspapers, books, maga-
zines) of all citizens of the Soviet Union.
6. It is necessary to develop a wide network of research institutions in

all fields of knowledge, to achieve in the near future the solution of the
problem of surpassing the achievements of science outside our country.
7. The whole set of state measures for public education, cultural and
educational work, the activities of all kinds of public educational and
cultural organizations, the work of general education and special schools
and courses have as their main goal – to solve the problem of raising the
cultural and technical level of workers to the level of engineering and
technical workers.
8. In the field of public health protection, it is necessary:

a) to further implement extensive sanitary measures protecting the
health of the people (improvement of all populated areas, purification of
water, air, etc.);
b) sanatorium-resort care for all those who need it; further develop-
ment of a wide network of rest houses, sanatoriums;
c) provision of qualified medical assistance to the entire population;
d) complete destruction of the conditions that give rise to contagious
diseases;
e) complete destruction of social diseases (venereal, tuberculosis, al-
coholism).
9. It is required:
a) to provide all citizens with at least one month’s annual paid leave
or vacation at the expense of the state;
b) to achieve the elimination of accidents in production, the elimina-
tion of occupational diseases and the complete improvement of working
conditions in hazardous industries;
c) full provision of everything necessary for disabled members of
society (old people, war veterans, labour handicaps).
***
These, in brief, are the main measures in the field of state building,
economics and culture, which are to ensure the completion of the
building of a socialist society and the gradual transition from socialism
to communism.
RGASPI. F. 558. Op. 11. D. 123. LL 4-43. Typescript
A. Zhdanov, July 29, 1947, all the materials of the working groups, sub-
mission to the Commission of the Central Committee of the All-Union
Communist Party of Bolsheviks, sent for consideration to J. V. Stalin,
L. P. Beria, G. M. Malenkov, N. A. Voznesensky. The largest number of
Stalin’s notes contains a project compiled by M. B. Mitin and P. F. Yudin.
On the cover of the theses of the programme of L. A. Leontiev and O. V.
Kuusinen, Stalin’s note: This isn’t it.

Stalinskoe ekonomicheskoe nasledstvo: plany i diskussii 1947-
1953gg. Dokumenty i materialy, Compiled by V.V. Zhuravlev and
L.N. Lazareva, Rosspen, Moscow, 2017, pp. 118-138.
Translated from the Russian by Polina Brik.

Endnotes:
1
On the left margin in red pencil: P; the words “and landlords” are bracketed in
red pencil
2
Underlined in red pencil. Opposite, on the left margin, a note in red pencil:
First? And the French rev?
3
The words “and landlords” are underlined and bracketed in red pencil
4
The words “and landlords” are in brackets in red pencil
5
The words “bourgeois form” are crossed out, inscribed at the top: private
6
The words “and landlord” are in brackets in red pencil
7
On the left margin, in red pencil, a note: What’s this? Underlined and brack-
eted in red pencil
8
After the word “poverty” above the line, inscribed in red pencil: people; after
“ruin”: peasantry
9
Crossed out in pencil
10
On the left margin, in red pencil, a note: More about the people
11
On the left margin, opposite paragraph 6, a vertical line in red pencil
12
After “and nations” with a red pencil, a dot, from it an arrow to the top field
to the mark: “eternal”
13
14
15
Underlined in red pencil
16
On the left margin, in red pencil, a note: P.
17
Marked in pencil on the left margin: P.
18
Crossed out in red pencil
19
Crossed out in red pencil, above the line is written: and Japanese
20
Crossed out in red pencil
21
Crossed out in red pencil, arrow to the top field, there is a note in red pencil:
predatory
22
In the upper field there is an arrow in red pencil, there is a note: and liberal-
ism
23
Crossed out with blue pencil
24
Marked in pencil on the left margin: P.
25
“to the end” is crossed out in blue pencil, in the left margin there is a pencil
mark: This isn’t it/rethink.
26
On the left margin in blue pencil mark: In South America
27
Underlined in red pencil, “militarization”, “bureaucratization of the state
apparatus” circled. On the left margin with a red pencil two crosses
28
On the left margin in blue pencil opposite the paragraph mark: This isn’t it.
29
Above the line in blue pencil inserted: bourgeoisie
30
In the left margin, opposite the first sentence of paragraph 5, a note in blue
pencil: About world government, continued on the top field in red pencil:
The theory of “cosmopolitanism” and the United States of Europe with
a single government. Further in blue pencil: world government
31
On the left margin, two vertical short lines are made with a pencil
32
On the left margin, two vertical lines are made with a blue pencil
33
Above the line in blue pencil is written: military
34
On the left margin, a vertical line in pencil, followed by a mark: P.
35
On the left margin, a short vertical line in pencil, followed by a mark: P.
36
On the left margin in pencil mark: P.
37
Crossed out in pencil, opposite on the left margin of the note : P.
38
On the left margin, in blue pencil, from the beginning of paragraph 12 to the
last underline, two vertical lines. Opposite the last underline on the field
with a pencil mark: P.
39
On the left margin in pencil mark: P.This is not it. The underlined is in
brackets
40
On the left margin, the underlined sentence is highlighted with two vertical
and two horizontal lines in pencil
41
On the left margin in pencil mark: P.
42
On the left margin in pencil opposite paragraph 14 mark: About socialist
nations
43
On the left margin, in pencil opposite the sentence, two short vertical lines
44
On the left margin, in pencil opposite the sentence, two short vertical lines.
On the top margin in pencil above “...demeaning of human dignity”, note:
About morality
45
On the left margin in pencil opposite paragraph 15 is a vertical line, followed
by a note in pencil in the margin: This isn’t it.
46
Above the line, written in pencil: and Japanese
47
Point 17 is marked with a vertical line in the upper field in pencil, followed
by a note in pencil in the field: This isn’t it.
48
On the left margin in pencil opposite the paragraph mark: Subjective atti-
tudes of victory
49
On the left margin in pencil opposite the paragraph mark: This isn’t it.
50
On the left margin in pencil opposite the underlined in the textmark: It’s not
enough
51
It is crossed out; a note is inscribed above the line in pencil: democracy
52
On the left margin, in pencil opposite paragraph 10, a note: This isn’t it.
53
“C” crossed out in pencil, with red pencil inscribed:”B”
54
On the right margin, in pencil opposite the paragraph, a vertical line, fol-
lowed by a pencil mark: This isn’t it.
55
On point 12 is marked with a vertical line in the left field with a pencil, on the
line and to the left there is a note: railway electrification
56
“D” crossed out in pencil, “B” written in pencil to the left; in the heading,
“and” is crossed out in red pencil, after the word “enlightenment” is added
in red pencil: and public health

SUGGESTIONS AND CRITICISMS
ON THE DRAFT PROGRAMME
AND POLICY STATEMENT OF THE CPI, 1951
For Members only
INNER-PARTY
DISCUSSION PAMPHLET
No. 1
Suggestions & Criticisms
on
DRAFT PROGRAMME
and
POLICY STATEMENT
Issued by
Communist Party of India
3 Annas
The discussions in Moscow rejected the right wing views of PC Joshi

as well as the ‘Trotskyite views of the B T Ranadive group. The views
of Andhra Committee were severely corrected for having excluded the
necessary role of the industrial working class in the revolution. After
the discussions in Moscow on the question of the Party Programme and
the Tactical Line the CPI leadership issued the Draft Programme and
reworked the Tactical Line into an open draft document entitled ‘State-
ment of Policy’. These were circulated within the CPI in April 1951. This
document shows the reactions of some sections of the CPI to the two
draft documents.

[Criticism by Kerala POC]
The following note is the result of preliminary discussions by the
Kerala POC of the Draft Programme of the CPI issued by the PB on
April 24.
1. Our discussions were based on the copy of the Draft Programme
received at the Viswakeralam office. This copy contains many obscure
passages and often sentences which have no meaning. It is quite likely
therefore that our criticism, based as it is on such a copy, may sometimes
be misconceived or beside the point.
2. Our opinion is that on the whole this document is satisfactory and
gives us immense relief. It reflects the true idea of the LPPD editorial
more than any other document till now issued by the Centre either jointly
or otherwise. It thus carries us a long step forward in our political dis-
cussions.
3. The Mountbatten Award, the policies of imperialism and Indian
big bourgeoisie following the Award, their repercussions, political and
economic, on different sections of the Indian people, the position at pres-
ent of the Government of India—are all dealt with in a popular manner
and on the whole correctly.
4. The character of the revolution that is to take place in India is
People’s Democratic. The state structure corresponding to it has been
described in a manner suited to the present level and consciousness of
our movement. In the Chinese Peoples’ Consultative Conference, the
principle of democratic centralism has been openly proclaimed as the
principle of state structure. Only such a state structure can carry out Peo-
ple’s Democratic Dictatorship. But in India it is not advisable to use that
term although that principle has to be accepted. And the document puts
it in a concrete and acceptable manner.
5. In the economic sphere the document aims at the destruction of the
imperialist big bourgeois monopoly, industrialisation and land reform.
The programme sets forth land reform (land to the tiller), the raising
of the standard of living of the working people, social insurance, living
wage, etc.) and ending the competition of foreign capital (the confisca-
tion and nationalisation of the capital of imperialism and under the sign-
board of Indian’ companies). This programme helps greatly to mobilise
all sections of the people opposed to imperialism and feudalism.
6. The policy of uprooting from the military, from industry and from
the cultural sphere of all foreign imperialist influence, of quitting the
Commonwealth, of building a firm alliance with our brother people of
Pakistan and with all peace-loving, democratic powers, is the path of
national independence and freedom.
These are the good points of the documents. But at the same time it
also contains certain very grave defects. It introduces very serious op-
portunistic tendencies which if not corrected at once are likely to lead to
all sorts of deviations.
7. The LPPD journal carries several articles of Communist Parties all
the world over defining the perspectives of revolution in their respective
countries in the light of the national and international situation. In all
these the clear warning is given of how American imperialism is going
to enslave and is at present enslaving their peoples. The main enemy of
the world peoples is American imperialism, the leader of the reactionary
camp. Hence unless the spearhead of the anti-imperialist struggle is di-
rected against America, the forces of peace, democracy, socialism and
freedom cannot advance an inch.
8. Lack of this outlook is a grave defect of this document. American
imperialism was trying to penetrate into India .even while the war was
on and afterwards (the honeyed words of America about Indian freedom,
Chiang’s visit, etc.). American interests have come into close economic
relations with a section of the Indian big bourgeoisie. Today they are
making an open bid for influence. American influence is penetrating In-
dia in the guise of food-aid, loans for irrigation projects, etc.) There was
formerly in India a sentiment of sympathy for America. Of course there
has been a big change in this after the outbreak of the Korean war. This
document does not even touch upon any of these things. In the last sec-
tion there is a passing reference to the fact that America is the main en-
emy. Nothing more. The document most emphatically and outspokenly
gives the slogan of confiscation of British capital and dismissal of British
advisers, but is silent about American capital and American advisers. (It
was only recently that concessions for opening a manganese mine in
Orissa were given to America.) American imperialism is also utilising
and penetrating through the French and Portuguese possessions in India.
Immediate merger of these possessions in India should he demanded.
This question also is ignored in the document.
9. The failure of the document in this respect, that is, emphasising
British imperialism to the exclusion of American imperialism which re-
ceives only a passing reference, has two serious consequences:(i) fail-
ure to expose the sinister activities of American imperialists and their
attempts at penetrating and enslaving this country; (ii) preparing the
ground for American spies and agents to have a free play.
10. The document does not seem to have taken into account careful-
ly the objective situation in India. For instance, it has omitted to bring
out the significance of the role played by the organisation of the Indian
big bourgeoisie, viz., the Indian National Congress. Hence it ignores the
machinations of. the Congress. The reactionary leadership of the ISP
encourages these machinations as well as the machinations of American
imperialism, through its anti-Soviet and anti-Communist propaganda
and activities. This too the document has missed. This is a grave defect.
11. The portion dealing with the present stage of the revolution is
such as is likely to lead to deviations. The document says: “In the pres-
ent stage of our development the Communist Party is not demanding the
establishment of socialism in our country”. It is wrong to pose it like this.
We must say that the Party’s ultimate aim is no doubt socialism, but that
the present stage of revolution in India is People’s Democratic, India can
attain socialism only through People’s Democracy and hence to raise
the slogan of immediate socialism is to betray the People’s Democratic
revolution and thereby to betray socialism itself.
12. Nehru’s foreign policy is described as spurious. It is not the cor-
rect way of putting it. We must show the duality of Nehru’s foreign pol-
icy, assess it at its real worth in developing the peace movement and
expose those aspects of it which are opposed to peace and national inde-
pendence and which are pro-imperialist. The Party must adopt the line of
exposure best suited to create public opinion in order to force the hands
of Nehru to take steps for friendly alliance with China and Russia and for
protecting India’s interests. The growth of the peace movement and pow-
erful anti-British, anti-American propaganda are factors helping this. To
ignore the penetration of American imperialism and to expose Nehru’s
foreign policy negatively as spurious will result, we feel, in indirectly
encouraging the American machinations. Hence we are of the opinion
that the understanding and outlook and method of exposure contained in
this passage should be corrected.
— The influence of American imperialism is increasing in India
through its native agents, the big bourgeoisie, we must expose it thor-
oughly.
— Show up the weaknesses of Nehru’s foreign policy. Show how it
helps Anglo-American domination in India and sacrifices Indian inter-
ests.
— Thus show how even Nehru’s opposition to war and atom bomb
and friendship with China will founder.
13. We must also emphatically declare that People’s Democratic
India will establish a firm alliance with People’s China and the Soviet
Union. The age-old friendship with China, geographical affinity and the
common traditions of anti-imperialist struggle are well established facts.
The People’s Democratic revolution in India is of course closely bound
up with the revolution in Britain. The friendship of People’s Britain will
be of immense help to us also. Even in that perspective, the slogan of
firm friendship and alliance with China will not be wrong. The omission
to emphasise strong friendship with China together with the omission to
expose American aggression has led to the blunting of the anti-imperial-
ist edge of this document. That is positively dangerous.
14. The paragraph dealing with the- question of how the Indian big
bourgeoisie suppresses the development of different nationalities by us-
ing partition, is not clear. To say that Hindi is the language of one prov-
ince is not true. It is as the commercial language of the Marwari-Gujerati
monopolists that Hindi is imposed upon other nationalities. It is also as
the servitors of these big bourgeois-feudal rulers that officials belonging
to one nationality are imposed upon another nationality, thereby delib-
erately fanning quarrels. Not to bring out these facts sharply is to fail in
exposing the big bourgeois tactics.
15. To state in a loose manner that Ceylon is a part of India, that its
economy is complementary to that of India, etc., is wrong. What that
passage in the Draft Programme which deals with Ceylon actually pur-
ports, is not clear to us. That a free India must have friendly relations
with Ceylon is true. But from the way in which the relations between
India and Ceylon are stated in the document it would seem although the
CPI is moved by imperialistic motives towards Ceylon. The peoples of
India and Ceylon must unite today in the struggle against America and
after the attainment of freedom must cooperate as free peoples in the
interests of both countries.
16. Another thing. The relations between India and Ceylon are not
on a par with the relations between India and Pakistan. The feelings and
sentiments of the people, the common life through the centuries, the his-
torical associations thereby engendered, cultural relations, the family
connections between thousands of families in both the Punjabs and Ben-
gals—all these bestow a special quality upon India-Pakistan relations.
This cannot be said of relations with Ceylon. The document however
deals with both these together.
17. When dealing with land reform, abolition, of feudal levies and of
slave labour, should have been emphasised- That is missed. The question
of assuring a fair price to the producer for agricultural products is also
ignored. This will not help to cement the anti-feudal alliance of all the
peasantry.
18. An emphatic and clear declaration that religions will be protected
in People’s Democratic India should be included in the Programme.

19. In like manner there should be a declaration with regard to wom-
en’s right to equality.
So far is the Kerala POC’s unanimous opinion about the Draft Pro-
gramme. Separate notes will be put in by those who have other points
about which there was no unanimous agreement in the POC.
[May 14, 1951.]
ON THE DRAFT PROGRAMME AND

THE STATEMENT OF POLICY
[Communists working in CR]
1. The CR comrades have had a preliminary discussion on the Draft
Programme and the Statement of Policy. They will hold further more de-
tailed discussions on these very important and historic documents. Here
we are setting down our first reactions.
2. The two documents resolve the differences and controversies on
vital issues which so long kept the Party virtually in a state of paralysis
and even isolated it from the masses owing to the wrong policies pur-
sued.
Now, for the first time, in clear-cut terms, the aims and objects of our
revolution have been stated; the basic class alliances, the strategy, de-
fined; and the correct path, the tactics, outlined. The understanding given
is, in its essence, fundamentally new and will enable us to go forward.
avoiding the costly errors—both Left and Right— of the past.
Today the Party has a line, which we did not have for the last year
and a half with such disastrous results. The possibilities thus open out
for re-activising and reuniting the Party in the process of understanding,
implementing and enriching the new line on the basis of concrete expe-
rience.
This will demand of us utmost initiative and alertness; persistent ef-
forts to raise our ideological level; a readiness to self-critically examine
our past activity and learn from it; free and frank discussions, in a dis-
ciplined manner, to fully grasp the implications of the new line; raising
questions and doubts unhesitatingly for clarification; making sugges-
tions, pointing out what we feel needs amending or correcting.
3. In what direction have we to make a break from our old under-
standing?
a) Nature of our Revolution: It has now been unambiguously stated
that India is still a semi-colony, tied to British imperialism, with the in-
terests of foreign capital and parasitic landlords and Princes protected,
the development of national industries thwarted. Thus, the first phase of
our revolution will be anti-imperialist and anti-feudal.
b) From this it follows that our approach to the national bourgeoi-
sie must change. After the Second Party Congress, the thesis was put
forward that the bourgeoisie as a whole had gone collaborationist and
become the spearhead, the leader, of the attack on the popular forces.
Therefore, it had to be fought as Enemy No. 1. Later, it was thought that
it was the big bourgeoisie which had gone over and a united front with
the middle bourgeoisie was visualised.
The understanding which now emerges is that the bourgeoisie—big
and. small—as a class, has not gone over and can be made to play a pos-
itive role. It has not to be fought as a class, though small sections of it.
may be collaborating with imperialism.
c) It has been emphasised that the axis of our democratic revolution
will be the agrarian revolution, making the struggle of the peasantry of
prime importance. For the achievement of this, actions of the peasantry
alone are not enough. Joint actions of the working class and the peasant-
ry are necessary. “The leadership of the working class is not realised only
through the working class leadership of the peasant struggles but actual-
ly, in deeds through the working class boldly championing the demands
of the peasantry and coming to the assistance of the peasant struggles
through its own action.”
d) One of the most significant contributions of the documents is to
correct the two mistakes of the past: (i) regarding the working class ac-
tions alone as important (described as the Russian path); (ii) regarding
the peasant actions alone as possible (described as the China path).
The path now defined for us is neither, but a combination of the
two—a grand alliance of workers and peasants in action — the path of
Leninism, applied to Indian conditions.
The core of our National Democratic Front will be worker-peasant
alliance, with the working class leading in action the struggle of the
peasantry’ and of the whole people and assuming the leadership of the
liberation struggle.
e) The futile controversies over immediate armed struggle or not,
which derailed the Party so long, over violence or non-violence, have
been set at rest. It is the people who decide the forms of struggle; there-
fore, no form of struggle in which the people participate is ruled out.
“All action of the masses in defence of their interests to achieve their
liberation is sacrosanct.”

f) The Statement of Policy gives a sharp warning against individual
and squad terrorism, which was being advocated by a section of the
Party and whose practice was discrediting the Party, as being alien to
Marxism for the simple reason that in it the masses are not in action,
it leads to passivity of the masses and, therefore, harms the revolution.
g) In regard to the assessment of the present situation, important cor-
rections have been made which will enable us to steer clear of both sec-
tarian and reformist mistakes.
On the one hand, it is made clear that though the crisis of the Gov-
ernment is deep, it is not yet thoroughly isolated, with the people ready
to rise in revolt; conditions of civil war do not yet obtain in the country,
nor is Fascism already installed in power or inevitable. • Failure to see
this would lead us to adventurism, to giving slogans ahead of the con-
sciousness of the people, of the degree of their preparedness for struggle.
It would lead to neglecting the fight for civil liberties for which broad
sections can be mobilised, refusing to participate and take advantage of
the elections, refusing to do the day- to-day tasks of running and building
mass organisations.
On the other hand, it would also be wrong to come to the conclu-
sion that the people are retreating, reaction is on the offensive and that,
because the popular forces are disunited, we should abjure all militant
actions. Such an appraisal of the situation will lead to betrayal of the
masses, because the crisis is deepening, people getting fast disillusioned
and big struggles are looming ahead, which the Party must lead, over-
coming the weakness of mass organisations and the disunity of demo-
cratic forces.
h) While it is true that supporting the positive steps of Nehru’s for-
eign policy has enabled the peace movement to mobilise broader sec-
tions of the people against the Anglo-American warmongers, it has to be
recognised that there has been a failure (at least by CR) to sufficiently
expose this policy as inconsistent and dishonest.
Features of this policy—such as recruitment of Gurkha troops in In-
dia to crush the liberation struggle of the Malayan people, the facilities
granted to the imperialists to transport war material to Viet Nam through
India, the sending of the medical mission to Korea, refusal to vote for
the declaration of America as the aggressor in Formosa — which directly
aid the war-makers have not been systematically campaigned against,
though they have been referred to now and again.
4. The above are the major points on which, in the opinion of the CR
comrades, we have to revise our earlier understanding.

In the CR we have tended to forget that India is yet tied to British im-
perialism, we have not shown the British capitalist hold over our econ-
omy, we have not exposed British imperialism and its aims as different
from .American imperialism though acting with it against the Peace
Camp.
Again, we have not sufficiently stressed the key task of achieving
agrarian reforms as the main link in winning our national freedom, solv-
ing the food crisis, industrialising the country. We have not explained the
need for worker-peasant alliance as the core of the Democratic Front.
We have not, for want of proper study, taken a positive approach to-
wards the national bourgeoisie, showing how India’s industries are being
denied scope for development, taking up such questions as difficulties of
raw materials and markets, of importing machine tools, foreign compe-
tition, etc.
The CR comrades will make the general understanding contained in
the Draft Programme and the Statement of Policy as the basis for their
work and will review in detail the past issues of CR in the light of the
new understanding.
5. However, there are a number of points on which clarification is
needed. It is surprising that the Party has not yet issued any detailed doc-
ument for its members or written articles to explain the various points of
the Draft Programme, stating how exactly the new understanding arises,
what are its implications, applying it to different fronts, etc. It is over six
weeks now’ since the Programme was issued and explanatory articles
or documents on it should be immediately released. Some of the points
which we think should be clarified are:
A) Class Composition of the Government: While, in the main, the
present Indian Government is pledged to the protection of foreign Brit-
ish capital and the interests of the landlords and the Princes, certain
sections of Big Business also benefit from it. But how exactly are we to
characterise this Government in our agitation and propaganda?
The Draft Programme seems to have a number of definitions some of
which appear to be contradictory. Thus, in Section 2, it is stated:
“...because it was a Government already pledged to the protection
and preservation of foreign British capital in India, to protection of the
parasitic landlords and the wealth of the princes...
According to this definition, only the imperialists and the feudals
benefit from this Government.
But Section 6 says something different:
“...This Government which is totally in the grip of monopoly finan-
ciers, landlords and Princes and the foreign British advisers working be-
hind the scenes.”
At the start, this Section says that “Even the industrialists. manufac-
turers and traders are hit by the policies of the Government”, but later, a
distinction is made between the small industrialists and traders and the
big monopolists.
“Allocation of capital issues, raw material, transport, import and ex-
port licences, etc. is carried out by the bureaucrats in the Government
machinery in such a way as to hit the small industrialists and traders
and benefit the big monopolists in league with the banks and syndicates
of foreign firms.”
Sections 10 and 11 define the Government as follows:
“...this Government of landlords and Princes, this Government of fi-
nancial sharks and speculators, this Government hanging on the will of
the British Commonwealth, the British imperialists ”
“ this Government of landlords and Princes and Big Business, collab-
orating with the British imperialists....”
Section 16 describes the present rule as “landlord- capitalist rule.”
Similarly Section 17 calls the present State a “landlord-capitalist State,
tied to foreign imperialist interests—mainly British.”
To avoid confusion, it is necessary to have a precise characterisation
of the present Government. Which capitalist sections are collaborating
with the imperialists?
B) Nationalisation of Key Industries: This demand has figured in our

earlier programmes. It figures in the programmes of the Left parties also.
Even the Congress, at its Karachi session, had adopted it. Our present
Programme, however, drops it. It is true that it is necessary to explain
the anti-imperialist and anti-feudal character of our revolution and our
concern for the development of national industries, but the demand has
already become popular among, radical sections, and a proper explana-
tion for dropping it is necessary. Also what happens to the industries and
the businesses of collaborating section of the bourgeoisie? Are they, at
least, to be nationalised?
C) Is it strictly correct to say that at this stage, foreign manufacturers

“pursuing dumping policies”, are flooding our country with cheap goods
(as is stated in the Programme under the section entitled “In the Field
of Industry and the Labour Problem”?) The common experience would
seem to be that, owing to high import duties, etc., foreign goods are quite
expensive.
The concrete manner in which Indian industries suffer from foreign
competition needs to be properly worked out.
D) What exactly is meant by a Police State? Section 9 of the Pro-

gramme says:
“On the top of all this comes the fact that this tottering Government
in order to keep itself in saddle, faced with the rising discontent of the
masses, suppresses all civil liberties of the people, outlaws political par-
ties and groups, bans trade unions and other people’s organisations, im-
prisons thousands of workers, students, men and women in prisons and
concentration camps. The supreme ruler becomes the police official and
the bureaucrat, helped by the local Congress leader and landlord in the
whole countryside. No wonder that to maintain such a Police State, the
burden of taxes increases and more than 50 per cent of the State Budget
is spent on military and police ”
Will not the conclusion be drawn from this that we already have Fas-
cism in India—an understanding which is repudiated in the Statement
of Policy?
E) Hindi is not the language of one province (as is stated in Sec. 14

of the Programme); it is spoken in U.P., Bihar, parts of C.P., E. Punjab,
Rajasthan, etc. Also, while we oppose the imposition of any language as
an obligatory language on other nationalities and stand for equality of
all languages, shall we not advocate making’ Hindi or Hindustani — the
most commonly understood language—as the language for the inter-pro-
vincial intercourse replacing English?
F) Section 19 of the Programme reads:

“Faced with these facts, the Communist Party of India feels it its duty
to come to the aid of the people and to outline the practical tasks, the
practical programme which the Communist Party of India upholds and
which should be put into effect by the working class of India if they wish
to come out of the deadlock into which they have been forced by the
present Government, if they wish to attain their freedom and happiness.”
This paragraph, to say the least, appears to be badly drafted. Is it
only now that we are coming to the aid of the people? Further, the whole
posing smacks of a patronising approach making the Party as something
apart from the working class, sermonising from above— the Party has
given the line and it is for the working class to accept it or not!
G) We do not advocate the immediate building of Socialism- because

of the backwardness of our economy, which is still basically feudal and
colonial, and as such we cannot skip the democratic stage of the rev-
olution. But para 2 of Sec. 19 of the Programme adds another reason,
viz., the weakness of mass organisations of workers, peasants and toiling
intelligentsia. Is this correct? For even if we are able at a later stage to
overcome this weakness, as we must if we have to accomplish the dem-
ocratic revolution, our immediate objective will not alter. It would be
wrong to give the slogan of building Socialism once the mass organisa-
tions become strong till we have overthrown feudalism and imperialism.
H) Foreign Policy: There seems to be a difference in approach on

India’s foreign policy in the Draft Programme and the Statement of
’Policy. From the Programme it would appear that this policy is whol-
ly reactionary. We are “not interested” in the “spurious play” between
peace and war, the “suspicious play” between the two camps, the flirting
with the U.S.A.—all this facilitates the struggle of aggressors against the
peace-loving countries. From this understanding the task that naturally
emerges is to expose the Government’s foreign policy as a policy of ma-
noeuvre; we cannot take advantage of any steps taken by it which may
appear to be for -peace as essentially such steps are dishonest and help
British imperialism or facilitate the game of the aggressors.
How then do we explain the support which has been given by inter-
national Communist leaders to some of the steps taken by Nehru ? Did
not, for instance, India’s refusal to support the branding of China as an
aggressor help the peace camp? Have not some of the war plans of the
imperialists being upset because of the Nehru Government’s stand? For
example, the New Times (No. 21. dated May 23, 1951) states:
“But the heaviest blow to British and American diplomacy was the
refusal of Nehru’s Government to join the aggressive (Pacific) bloc. For,
as the Indian National Herald pointed out, a Pacific Pact without India
would be equivalent to an Atlantic Pact without Britain.” (Page 5.)
The Statement of Policy does recognise, even though indirectly, that
even this Government may take some steps for preserving peace which
we must support. It also calls Nehru’s foreign policy as inconsistent, and
not wholly reactionary.

But the Statement of Policy does not assess how important Neh-
ru’s role has been in preserving peace. R.P. Dutt, for example, has at-
tached great significance to it. The CPGB Programme even calls India a
“peace-loving State.”
In his reply to a question by CR, RPD stated:
“The indications of divergence, even though still hesitant and limit-
ed, of Premier Nehru and the India Govt, representatives from the reck-
less aggressive war policy of the MacArthur-Truman-Attlee bloc in East-
ern Asia, are a very important development of the present international
situation.”
Again:
“Supporters of Peace in India, while welcoming every step towards
disentanglement of India from the Anglo-American war bloc, will press
forward with unsparing rigour for the further steps which are necessary
in order that India shall fulfil a firm and consistent peace policy,”
In his “Notes of the Month” in Labour Monthly of November, 1950,
R. P. D. wrote:
“Today the alignment of India, even under the Government which
was set up by imperialism to serve as its satellite and protege, can no
longer be counted on by the Anglo-American bloc, and has taken under
the overwhelming pressure of popular national anti-imperialist feeling,
the first hesitant steps towards association with China and the Soviet
Union in opposition to the latest decisions of the Anglo-American bloc
on Korea and on the Acheson Plan for wrecking the United Nations.”
Nehru’s foreign policy has undoubtedly aroused a great deal of in-
terest all over the world, some of his concrete steps have been hailed as
helping to preserve peace. It is very necessary, therefore, that a proper
assessment of India’s foreign policy should be made in order to avoid
both extremes of under-estimation and over-estimation which will lead
us to Left or Right mistakes. The Draft Programme and the Statement of
Policy have not attempted any such assessment without which a correct
approach cannot be determined.
I) Struggle For Peace: The section on the struggle for peace in the
Policy Statement is unsatisfactory, it does not emerge from an analysis of
the present international situation, which is missing from the Programme
also. The struggle for peace cannot be made, real unless an awareness of
the great danger of war is there. The Statement of Policy makes a general
formulation, which is true for all times, that “the ruling classes, in order
to preserve their power, will be ever ready to embroil us, the people, in a
war, so that we may give up our war against them.”
How the Anglo-American imperialists, specially the American, are
desperately driving towards war, seeking to extend the Korean war to
other parts of Asia and attack China—without such an analysis a vigor-
ous struggle for peace cannot be conducted.
It is also essential that India’s place in the plans of warmongers be
studied in detail—to what extent .India is fulfilling that role, how the
imperialists are plotting to drag us into war. This will make the fight for
peace real to us. It will also enable us to assess correctly Nehru’s foreign
policy.
Since no analysis of the international situation is there, the major task
before the world peace movement today, viz., the collection of signatures
to the Appeal for a Pact of Peace is not even mentioned as one of the
tasks of the partisans of peace in India.
Further, lack of such an analysis makes our struggle for liberation as
something apart from the world-wide struggle for peace.
J) Fight against American Imperialists: American imperialism to-

day has become the greatest menace to mankind. It is madly driving the
world to war. It is the spearhead of world reaction. It is threatening the
independence of all countries. It is extending its influence in India also.
But the Programme and the Policy Statement do not lay down any tasks
of fighting American imperialism.
Further, the CPGB Programme visualises a joint strategy for the
countries of the British Empire not only against British imperialism hut
also against American imperialism. This is how R.P.D. explains it:
“The fight of the peoples of the Empire for national independence
can no longer be seen in isolation as a fight against British imperialism
alone, as in the days when British imperialism was the dominant and
most active world imperialist Power. It is now a fight against the bloc
of Anglo-American imperialism in which American imperialism is the
most powerful and aggressive world imperialist force and British impe-
rialism is the junior partner.
“American imperialism seeks to draw into its orbit the Dominions,
specially Australia, New Zealand, Canada and South Africa, to win in-
creasing economic and political influence in India, Pakistan, Ceylon and
Burma, to penetrate the colonial empire and to gain the upper hand in
the Middle East. The fight of the peoples of all these countries for their
national independence is necessarily a fight, not only against exploita-
tion and domination by British imperialist interests and their local allies,
but equally against penetration and domination by American imperial-
ism and its local backers. This fight requires close association and co-
operation for victory, not only in the winning of national independence
but also after liberation in preserving that national independence from
American imperialist aggression.”
The stand of our Party in regard to this important aspect needs to be
clarified.
K) Indo-Pak Relations: The basis on which friendly relations be-

tween India and Pakistan can be established and a Peace Pact signed, has
not been indicated either in the Programme or in the Statement of Policy.
To say: “Still less is India interested in the wrangling in which the Indian
Union and Pakistan are engaged and which is not counteracted on the
part of the present Indian Government”, as the Programme does, cannot
solve the problem. Also, we are interested in these wranglings insofar as
they have to be counteracted as they embitter the relations between the
countries.
In this connection, the question of Kashmir, which is the biggest sin-
gle factor standing in the way of Indo- Pak friendship and which the im-
perialists are exploiting for more direct intervention in our affairs, should
also have been taken up and a democratic solution suggested.
L) Past Policies: The Statement of Policy only acknowledges the

mistakes before the Second Party Congress— “the reformist policy pur-
sued by the former Party leadership.” What about the sectarian and ad-
venturist policies pursued after the Second Party Congress which did
inestimable damage to the Party and the movement and which created
misgivings in the minds of the people about the Party. A frank admission
of these mistakes would help us to reforge our links with the masses.
Secondly, to dismiss the period before the Second Party Congress in
the way it has been done would amount to ignoring the achievements
of that period. Does the sentence quoted above apply only to the period
immediately preceding the Second Congress or to the entire period un-
der Joshi’s leadership? Vague generalisations may well lead to harmful
results.
M) Attitude towards Bourgeoisie and Petty-Bourgeoisie: The

Statement of Policy confines itself mainly to the need to build

working class-peasant unity. It is certainly important to lay utmost em-
phasis on this. But a positive approach towards the other classes, which
will constitute the United National Front is also necessary. Nowhere in
the Statement of Policy, for example, has the national bourgeoisie been
mentioned as having a place in the National Front. Nor is the petty-bour-
geoisie regarded as having a role to play. Of course, they are there, in-
directly, by implication, as corning under anti-feudal, anti-imperialist
forces. But that is not enough.

[Bihar Comrades]
A meeting of the thirty leading Kisan comrades of Bihar, held on 2nd
to 4th July, 1951, discussed, among other things, the Draft Programme
and Policy Statement of the Party, as adopted and released by the PB
and the CC. The meeting hailed the publication of these documents as
documents of historic significance in the life of the Party and the country
which have assessed anew and formulated the fundamental tasks of the
People’s Democratic Revolution in India and laid down the basic guid-
ing lines of the Party’s policy to achieve these tasks. The meeting noted
the unifying role that these documents were already playing inside the
Party and expressed the hope that they will enable the Party to overcome
its internal crisis, unify and consolidate its forces and take its honoured
place at the head of the national democratic forces struggling for free-
dom, democracy and peace.
While basically agreeing with the documents, a number of questions,
confusions and different views were expressed in course of the discus-
sion.
1. One of these points is the formulation that the “experience has led
them to the conclusion that the Government of the National Congress
that rose to power on the basis of the heroic struggles of the masses, was
installed there by the consent of the British imperialists and our country”
(pp. 3-4, Draft Programme). It was argued that so far as the existing con-
sciousness of the people in Bihar is concerned, it will be wrong to ascribe
to their experience that the Congress Government “was installed there
by the consent of the British imperialists.’ No doubt the people have
learnt out of their own experience that the Congress Government is the
Government of the rich—the Zamindars. the Tatas and Birlas. But they
continue to hold illusions that the British have gone, that the Congress
had driven out the Britishers, that the foreign rule has ended and an In-
dian Government, has been established, though it is equally bad. To say
that the people have learnt out of their own experience that the Congress
Government, has been installed by the British imperialists is an over-es-
timation of the popular consciousness and an under-estimation of the
capacity of Congress leaders to do freedom demagogy. But despite this
overstatement the slogan of replacing the Congress Government corre-
sponds to the present consciousness of the masses.
2. A few comrades suggested to formulate the aim of the Programme
differently. Instead of stating that “In the present stage of our develop-
ment, the Communist Party is not demanding the establishment of So-
cialism in our country”, they suggested to state that the present stage of
our development does not permit the building up of Socialism and Com-
munism, the maximum programme of the Communist Party. Its present
programme is the minimum programme “for the present stage of our de-
velopment which aims to create the prerequisites for building Socialism.
3. The point on which maximum confusion prevailed and questions
and differences were voiced in the discussion was regarding confiscation
and nationalisation of capital. Firstly, two interpretations were put to this
programme as formulated in point No. 46 of the Draft Programme. One
interpretation was that it means confiscation and nationalisation of Brit-
ish capital only. The other interpretation was that it means confiscation
and nationalisation of not only foreign capital but also Indian big busi-
ness capital if the latter is interested in the concerns owned by the British
“under the signboard of Indian companies.”
Some comrades expressed the opinion that the programme should
also include the confiscation and nationalisation of the capital of the col-
laborating sections of the big business. Some comrades expressed the
opinion that the programme should also include the confiscation and na-
tionalisation of the capital of the monopolist sections of the bourgeoisie.
A third opinion on it was that the programme should clearly lay down the
confiscation and nationalisation of all key industries. Yet another opinion
was to specifically mention the confiscation and nationalisation of Amer-
ican capital also.
4. Certain suggestions were made by some comrades in the discus-
sion of the programme of agrarian reforms.
Firstly, the programme should specifically mention that the Zamin-
dars’ land will be handed over to agricultural labourers also.
Secondly, peasant proprietorship will be established.
Thirdly, rent system will be abolished and the system of graduated
income tax will be established.
Fourthly, along with the programme of improving old and building
new irrigation system, the programme of harnessing rivers, protecting
from floods and building bunds should also be incorporated.
5. The next point on which questions were raised is the unity of Ki-
san organisations. It was pointed out that the task of TU unity has been
stressed in the Policy Statement but why has not the task of KS [Kisan
Sabha ed.] unity been laid down?
6. Different interpretations were put to the formulation: “rebuild
the mass peasant organisations, basing ourselves firmly on the agrarian
workers and poor peasants.” Discussion of this formulation brought out
the differences on the question of separate organisation of agricultural
labourers. . One view is in favour of separate organisation of agricultural
labourers affiliated to the KS. Another view is against setting up separate
organisation of agricultural labourers immediately.
7. Confusions were also voiced and contradictions were pointed out
by some comrades regarding the formulations made about the foreign
policy of Nehru Government in the Draft Programme and Policy State-
ment.
8. Discussion of the Policy Statement revealed a general opinion
that the specific features of Indian path as distinct from the Russian and
Chinese path should be more clearly and concretely brought out in the
Policy Statement.
The meeting decided to ask the POC to refer the above-mentioned
points to the CC for clarification and explanation. It also made the de-
mand that the CC should make available explanatory notes, articles and
reports to fully explain the Draft Programme and Policy Statement.
U.P.P.C. RESOLUTION ON THE DRAFT PROGRAMME

SECTION I
The Uttar Pradesh Committee of the Communist Party of India hails
the Draft Programme as a valuable Marxist document of great historic
importance which by defining in clear terms the aims and objectives of
Indian revolution in its present stage has facilitated the task of uniting
and mobilising the democratic forces of the country.
***

SECTION II
The Draft Programme, basing itself not on some abstract and general
principles but on analysis of concrete objective situation and existing
co-relation of class forces both nationally and internationally, corrects all
the major sectarian and reformist deviations prevailing inside the Party
and gives correct solutions to the most important problems of our revo-
lution.
After describing August 1947 change and the illusions it created, the
Programme gives a brilliant analysis of the experience of various class-
es and consequent development in the consciousness of the people and
points out:
A. That freeing of our peasant economy from the shackles of feu-
dalism and industrialising the country is the greatest need of the hour
and what the revolution has to destroy in its present stage is nothing but
imperialism and feudalism.
B. That the grand alliance of workers and peasants, forming the core
of anti-imperialist united front led by the working class, will be the main
weapon of the revolution.
C. That British capital is the main enemy which must be isolated
for attack and which must be expropriated, and that we must not only
differentiate between Indian capital and British capital but also between
British capital and capital of other foreign countries in this respect.
D. That all sections of peasantry including rich, peasants are ground
down as before and” our main task is to hand over landlords’ land to the
peasants without compensation.
E. That in the present stage of our revolution the entire big bour-
geoisie cannot be said to have gone over permanently to the camp of
imperialism, and that it is a section of the big bourgeoisie which is col-
laborating with imperialism at present.
F. That Nehru Government is totally in the grip of monopoly finan-
ciers, landlords and princes and their foreign British advisers working
behind the screen and as such is pursuing an extremely reactionary poli-
cy hitting all sections of the people.
G. Though the Nehru Government in certain circumstances plays
upon Anglo-American contradictions to its own advantage, it essentially
carries out the foreign policy of British imperialism.
***
Thus the Draft Programme does not only reject the basically wrong,
sectarian and adventurist line of the CC but also corrects the understand-
ing of those who on main points were rightly criticising the CC.

A. The June CC, forgetting that the whole of peasantry’ is ground
down as before, wrongly differentiated between various sections of peas-
antry, on the one hand, and, on the other hand, by preaching that work-
er-peasant alliance and the hegemony of the proletariat did not need the
physical participation of the working class, completely undermined the
basis of this alliance.
The Draft Programme not only corrects this sectarian and Narodnik
understanding but places an altogether new emphasis on the significance
of workers’ and peasants’ alliance.
B. The June CC not only permanently excluded the whole of big
bourgeoisie from anti-imperialist united front but made a present of con-
siderable sections of middle bourgeoisie to the enemy.
The Draft Programme corrects the understanding of the whole Party
regarding the role of big bourgeoisie by pointing out that sections of it,
mainly industrial, have an oppositional role.
C. The Draft Programme corrects a very serious mistake of the entire
Party which was forgetting that British capital and not American capital
is the main enemy of Indian people.
D. The Draft Programme corrects the understanding which demand-
ed nationalisation of all key industries by clearly pointing out that at
present confiscation and nationalisation of British capital alone is the
task.
E. It corrects the deviation of that section of the Party which forgot
the essential reactionary character of Nehru Government along with the
deviation of another section which regarded Nehru Government a puppet
Government, having no mass base and incapable of exercising any inde-
pendent pressure to its own advantage.
***
SECTION III
The Draft Programme does not confine itself only to the statement
that the present stage of our revolution is People’s Democratic revolution
and the present Government is to be replaced by a Government of Peo-
ple’s Democracy based on a coalition of all anti-imperialist and anti-feu-
dal classes. It elucidates as to what shall be the form of state structure
under People’s Democracy, how would people exercise their sovereignty
and what policies the new Government would adopt towards various
classes and their problems, and thus places a mighty weapon in the hands
of the Party for the mobilisation of all sections of the people.
***
The Draft Programme, though basically correct in all formulations,
needs a few elucidations, clarifications and amendments:
A. The Programme should give a clear reply to the question how the
world democratic forces concretely help Indian liberation struggle and
what is the significance of the latter for the final victory of world democ-
racy. The relation between the world struggle for peace, democracy, and
freedom and socialism, and the struggle for India’s liberation should be
clearly brought out in our programme.
B. Ours is an ancient country with a rich cultural background. Impe-
rialists with the help of all the reactionary forces of the country are trying
to stifle and strangulate our cultural advancement.
The Programme must not only point this out but should explain how
we propose to rescue our best cultural traditions from the stranglehold of
imperialist and feudal reaction and develop and carry forward our rich
heritage, defeating all the enemies of our culture.
C. In order to ward off any sectarian and adventurist interpretation of
the Programme, following amendments be made in the draft:
— In Section (2) “has led” should be followed by “and is leading” so
that the impression may be removed that what the Draft wants to point
out is not the process and the direction but the accomplished fact.
— Along with a clear exposition of the essential character of Nehru’s
foreign policy, an equally clear exposition of all the causes which cause
inconsistencies in his foreign policy is necessary.
[June, 25, 1951.]

[A Bengal Unit]
The unit while supporting the Draft Programme and the Policy State-
ment issued by the P.B. in the main, raises the following questions for
clarification. We appeal to the P.B. to clarify the points mentioned later
so that it be possible for us to take part fully in the discussions properly.
(1) In introducing our phase of the revolution the Draft Programme
on page 14, line 4, states: “In view of the backwardness of econom-
ic development of India and of the weakness of mass organisations...
.socialist transformation of our c o u n t r y. . . T h e question arises to the
inclusion of the words of the weakness of mass organisation, etc.’ Can
the weakness of mass organisations be one of the main factors in deter-
mining the phase of revolution? If India had strong mass organisations
led by the Party, the economic development being still backward, could
we raise the slogan of establishing socialism in India?
If in an economically developed capitalist country the mass organisa-
tions be weak, will the slogan of establishing socialism in that country be
inopportune? What will be the phase of revolution there?
(2) What were the main weak points in the political thesis adopted
at the Second Party Congress? If it be not stated clearly, there is every
chance of committing the same mistakes again.
(3) In characterisation of the class nature of the Nehru Govt, the Draft
uses different words in different places, viz.—
(a) “...this Government of landlords, Princes, big business collaborat-
ing with British imperialism...” (page 8, para 2).
(b) “...landlord-capitalist State tied to the foreign imperialists, mainly
British” (page 13, para 1).
(c) “...Govt, run by the landlords and profiteers” (page 13, para 1).
(d) “...Govt, which is totally in the grip of monopoly financiers, land-
lords, princes and their foreign British advisers” (page 5, para 3).
Summing up all these characterisations will it be right to say that it is
a Govt run by the landlords, princes, big business, monopoly financiers,
capitalist profiteers — tied to the British imperialists, the underlined
words to be affixed to every word from big business to profiteers?
(4) The Programme nowhere states of confiscating the capital of ‘big
business’—collaborating with the British imperialists. Why? Does it
indicate that the big business—collaborating with foreign imperialists,
mainly British—has got an oppositional role to play?
We do not think so. If we characterise the Govt, as mentioned above,
it seems to us that the big business or capitalists—tied to the foreign
imperialists—can have no interest in the industrialisation of India. This
section is our enemy because it does not and cannot fight feudalism and
foreign imperialism. So why be shy of raising the slogan of confiscat-
ing the capital belonging to this section of big business and monopoly
financiers?
(5) Why complete silence on the question of the penetration of Amer-
ican- capital in India? We understand that the exploitation by the British
capital is real. Yet we think that the masses should have been forewarned
about the American capital also.
(6) The Programme states of the reconstitution of the Provinces on
the basis of common language—but it does not touch the question of
Bengal and the Punjab. What will be our attitude towards the slogans of
‘United Bengal’ and ‘United Punjab’?

(7) Under the sub-heading “Agricultural Problem” ’the Programme
nowhere states clearly and explicitly that the land will be taken from the
landlords without any compensation. Why?
(8) Under the sub-heading “Industrial Problem” we nowhere find
the programme of nationalising the basic industries. By basic industries
we mean mines, power, communications. We think that any centralised
people’s govt cannot and must not leave these things in the hands of
individual owners. We do not think that the consciousness of the Indian
people is so low that this programme cannot be realised by the People’s
Democratic Govt.
(9) Why no programme of initiating the State sector of industry?
(10) The Programme nowhere gives promise to the small manufac-
turers and industrialists of its assistance. We think that this section will
be our ally.
(11) We do not clearly understand what the term “Progressive In-
come Tax” really means.
ON DRAFT PROGRAMME
[Prem Sagar Gupta, Delhi]
Basic formulations in the Draft Programme are correct and I accept
them unreservedly. But there are certain points which I would like to
raise.
1) Para 6: “Allocation of Capital Issues” is not in operation in India.
We have what is called the “Control of Capital Issues”, which also does
not apply to Companies to be floated with an Authorised Capital of less
than 5 lakhs. In practice, however, the bureaucrats do manage to infor-
mally suggest to the entrepreneurs coming to them to go and contact
their favourite big capitalists first and see if they are interested, but there
is no formal thing as Allocation of Capital Issues.
This should be amended appropriately.
2) Para 7: Re: the Schemes of “Reconstruction.” What is stated in the
Draft is that all are foundering except those that “feed war purposes”.
Facts on this point are needed. Practically all hydro-electric schemes are
no doubt foundering, but what is necessary to show is the relation to war
purposes of those schemes that are going ahead.
3) Para 18: The word “revolt” used in this para evidently is used as a
noun and not as a verb. Its meaning should be made clear by adding the
word “their” before “revolt” so as to read “their revolt”.
4) In the field of Industry and the Labour Problem: In the introduc-

tion to this section, it is stated that the foreign Governments pursuing
dumping policies flood the country with cheap goods. This is not true.
So far as one can see there is no dumping of goods in our country. What
our manufacturers suffer from is the foreign competition as such and not
dumping.
The words “dumping policies” should be appropriately changed so as
to convey the reality of competition alone, as indicated earlier in para 8.
5) On Foreign Policy: Para 12: The only reason given for Nehru
speaking up against the Atom Bomb etc., is the pressure of the people.
That I believe is oversimplification. There are various other factors
which play upon Nehru sometimes taking up such stands. His own class
interest is one. Fear of the most aggressive war-maniacs is there. Rise of
China in the East. Then, another factor must be taken account of, name-
ly, the disintegration in the imperialist camp as a result of the blows of
the people’s armies on the imperialist armies, inflicting crushing defeats
on them, and the consequent isolation of the most aggressive warmon-
gers. It is n o t ’ accidental that Nehru’s pro-peace stand on China and ‘
Korea came on two occasions when the North Korean armies and later
the Chinese Volunteers were rapidly pushing back the American armies,
threatening them with complete wipe-out.
Comrade RPD in his “Notes” in November Labour Monthly has enu-
merated three factors. The problem cannot be simplified merely by say-
ing that Nehru does this under pressure of the people.
The analysis of the Programme that Nehru plays between the war
camp and peace camp, and also b e t ween America and Britain, does ex-
plain the fact that arising out of the manoeuvres. Nehru can take stand
sometimes which is against Britain and pro-America or against the war
camp as such and in favour of the peace camp. The analysis does explain
Nehru’s stand on China and Korea, etc. The very play assumes such
possibilities. But this aspect should be categorically stated in the Draft
Programme, else the formulations as put at present are likely to be misin-
terpreted and even a wrong abstract understanding got. The implication
of the ‘‘play” should be categorically stated.
FIRST printed: august 1951
Printed by Jayant Bhatt at the New Age Printing Press, 190-B, Khetwadi
Main Road, Bombay 4 and published by him for the Communist Party of
India, Raj Bhuvan. Sandhurst Road, Bombay 4.

ON THE SITUATION IN AND FUNCTIONING
OF THE COMMUNIST PARTY OF INDIA AF-
TER THE PUBLICATION OF THE DRAFT OF
THE PARTY PROGRAMME
CPSU (b)
To Com. Stalin
The “Pre-election Manifesto of the Communist Party of India”
should be published fully in the forthcoming issue of the newspaper “For
Lasting Peace, For People’s Democracy” which will be out in print on
31 August of this year and later in Pravda with reference to “For Lasting
Peace, For People’s Democracy”.
The draft of the Decree of the CC AUCP(b) is attached.
Request you to go through it.
Chairman, Foreign Policy Committee CC AUCP(b)

V. Grigorian
27 August 1951
***
Towards the beginning of this year, the differences within the Commu-
nist Party of India took a turn for the worse. Various groups, though not
formalized organizationally, arose in the party. These did not obey the
Central Committee, independently established ties with grassroots party
organizations and pursued their own political line. The editorial board of
the central organ of the party refused to publish materials of the Central
Committee. The work of the communist party everywhere has fallen into
decay and the number of party members was reduced from 90,000 in
1948 to 20,000 by the beginning of 1951 and the influence of the party in
the mass organizations declined sharply.
On April 25, 1951, the draft programme of the Communist Party of
India was published in English. On 29 April it was printed in the news-
paper “Svadhinta” in the Bengali language, 14 May in the newspaper
“Naya Sabera”in Hindi and on the 8 June in English in the newspaper
“Crossroad”.
The draft of the programme was met with exceptional approval by
the party organizations, and its publication gave them hope that the in-
tra-party crisis will be overcome, that unity will be restored and it led to
a radical improvement in the activities of the party.
In a statement by the West Bengal Provincial Committee of the Com-
munist Party, published in a newspaper on May 24, 1951, it is stated:
“The West Bengal Committee of the Communist Party welcomes
without any hesitation the draft programme of the Politburo of the Cen-
tral Committee of the Communist Party of India...This program charts
the path for all activities of the party and will serve as a guide for its mass
movement at the present time.
Provincial Committee in all seriousness believes that this draft pro-
gramme will also serve as a basis for us to unite the ranks of the party.”
The draft of the programme was also positively received by other
democratic parties and mass organizations. The leadership of the Peas-
ant Workers’ Party of Maharashtra declared that it fully agreed with the
point of view of the Communist Party on questions about the nature of
the Indian revolution, the present stage of the Revolution and the forms
of struggle.
The reactionary press without even outlining the content of the draft
programme, printed slanderous articles against the Communist Par-
ty. The newspaper National Herald closely associated with Nehru de-
scribed the draft of the programme as unrealistic and a fantasy without
explaining the reasons for such a characterization.
In May 1951, a meeting of the CC of the Communist Party was held
at which the request of comrade Rajeshwara Rao to release him from the
duties of the general secretary was approved and it was decided to give
the Politburo the right to act as secretary of the Central Committee until
the convening of the party conference; leadership of the secretariat was
entrusted to comrade A. K. Ghosh.
At the same meeting of the Central Committee, the draft programme
of the party and the document on tactics were discussed. The Central
Committee instructed the Politburo to prepare and publish a policy
statement based on the document on tactics. While discussing the draft
programme and the document on tactics, some members of the Central
Committee felt that there was a lack of clarity on certain issues of pol-
icy and tactics of the party, especially on the issue of the party’s at-
titude towards the national bourgeoisie. Whether the big bourgeoisie
as a whole has gone over to the side of imperialism, whether all the
Indian monopolists cooperate with the imperialists and which of them
can be included in this category? Various points of view were expressed
on these issues during the discussion. The confusion on the question of
the attitude towards the national bourgeoisie some members explained
by the fact that the formulations of the draft programme on these ques-
tions diverge from the formulations of the Soviet orientalists -- Zhukov,
Dyakov, Balabushevich and others who hold the view that the big bour-
geoisie has totally crossed over to the imperialist camp.
Some members of the Central Committee considered it wrong to
abandon the slogan of nationalization of the main industries; they spoke
in favor of including, in the draft programme, a point for confiscation of
property of those who cooperate with imperialism.
Some controversy also occurred on the question of assessing Nehru’s
foreign policy. Party members in the peace committees said that the
characterization of the Nehru government given in the draft programme
underestimates the positive role played by Nehru which consists in hin-
dering the war plans of US imperialism.
Doubts were expressed about the correctness in some places of the
wording of the draft programme and on other issues as well. But as a
result of a detailed discussion, the CC unanimously approved both the
documents.
From the end of May to October, the draft programme was discussed
at the conferences of the provincial and city party organizations. The
draft programme and policy statement were met with deep interest ev-
erywhere. Yusuf, the leader of the provincial organization of the Com-
munist Party of Uttar Pradesh, described the significance of the draft
programme for the entire party as a whole:
“This programme is a new contribution and a powerful weapon in
the hands of the Communist Party. It will be a new source of strength
for the Communist Party and show the path along which it must lead the
country.”
All the party conferences unanimously approved the draft pro-
gramme and the policy statement, but at many of these conferences there
was uncertainty about certain formulations as well as there were some
amendments and statements of inclusion of other issues. The Provincial
Organization Committee of the party of Kerala province said that the
draft programme emphasizes the need to fight against British imperial-
ism and does not pay attention to American imperialism, does not raise
the question of confiscation of American capital and the dismissal of
American advisers. The decision of the provincial party committee of
Kerala declares that it would be necessary to conduct an intense struggle
against American imperialism which is the main enemy of the peoples
of the world; that the draft programme does not mention the role of the
National Congress as an organization of the big bourgeoisie; the re-
actionary role of the leadership of the Socialist Party is not exposed;
nothing is said about the abolition of feudal taxes, the elimination of
slave labour and about any guarantee regarding sufficient prices for ag-
ricultural produce. Comrades from the Kerala organisation opine that
it would be wrong to bracket India and Ceylon together as it may give
rise to misgivings about the imperialist ambitions of India. According to
Kerala comrades The projection of the programme should have includ-
ed an item on the immediate reunification with India of the French and
Portuguese possessions in India, on the freedom of religion, equality of
women in people’s democratic India. They also note that the Marwari
and Gujarati monopolists impose Hindi language on other nationalities,
thereby exacerbating national discord. Regarding the characterization of
Nehru’s government the party organization of Kerala makes a proposal
to assess the policies of the government by separately evaluating posi-
tively the measures serving the cause of peace while exposing the gov-
ernment’s pro- imperialist steps.
The conference of communist and leaders of the peasant movement
in the province of Bihar, in its decision, noted the historical significance
of the draft programme and the statements on the policy of the Commu-
nist Party, which have redefined the main tasks of the Communist Party.
The decision of the conference expressed confidence that the documents
of the Communist Party will help to overcome the intra-party crisis, rally
and strengthen its forces and allow it to take an honourable place at the
head of the national democratic forces fighting for freedom, democracy
and peace. The conference unanimously approved the documents, but
along with it separate comments and proposals were also added.
The decision of the conference indicates that the draft programme
overestimates the consciousness of the broad masses of the people and
expresses doubts that the people of India have already understood that
the current government has been put in power with the consent of Brit-
ish imperialists. Comrades from the Bihar party organization raise the
question of including in the programme the issue of confiscation and
nationalization of the capital of the big bourgeoisie that cooperates with
the imperialists, as well as the capital of all monopoly groups of the
bourgeoisie. They demand nationalisation of the main branches of indus-
try and also nationalisation of American capital in India. The conference
demanded that the question of the struggle for the unity of peasant orga-
nizations and the creation of independent organizations of agricultural
workers needs to be noted in the programme.
Comments on the draft programme and policy statement were also
made by the provincial committees of the United Provinces, of West
Bengal and many individual Communists. As the party organizations of
other provinces, they also expressed their perplexity on questions about
the attitude towards various groups of the national bourgeoisie, on the
struggle against American imperialists, nationalization of the main in-
dustries, characteristics of the class nature of the current Indian govern-
ment and on the evaluation of the foreign policy of Nehru’s government.
The Provincial Committee of West Bengal in its decision declares that
the characterization of the Nehru government is the weakest point of
the draft programme, since various expressions are used for it and, ac-
cording to the comrades from Bengal, it results in real confusion. This is
the government of the landowners, of princes and big business that are
cooperating with the British imperialists...
...A government run by landowners and speculators.
A government entirely in the grip of financier-monopolists, of the
landlords and princes and their foreign British advisers...
Some communists opposing the assessment of foreign policy of Neh-
ru’s government in the draft programme refer to the following statements
of Palme Dutt:
“In India, under the pressure of growing anti-imperialist sentiments,
the first tentative steps have already been taken towards establishing ties
with China and the Soviet Union in protest against the latest decisions
of the Anglo-American bloc on the issue of Korea and the Acheson plan
aimed at undermining the United Nations”.
This statement by comrade P. Dutt certainly makes it difficult for
some Indian communists to understand the manoeuvering of the Nehru
government between the camp of democracy and the camp of imperial-
ism.
Those communists who want to intensify the struggle against Ameri-
can imperialism as the main enemy and propagate confiscation of Amer-
ican capital in India also refer to the statements of comrade Dutt:
“The struggle of the peoples of the empire for national independence
can no longer be regarded in isolation as a struggle only against British
imperialism, as in the days when British imperialism was the dominant
and the most active imperialist force in the world. Now it is a fight against
the Anglo-American imperialism in which American imperialism is the
most powerful and aggressive imperialist force in the world and British
imperialism is just a junior partner.
Despite some ambiguities due to differences of opinion on certain is-
sues, all party organizations unanimously approved the draft programme
and policy statement. In the decision of the conference of provincial and
city party organizations it is noted that on the basis of a new programme
and a new political line, the party is restoring the unity of ties with mass
organizations in order to consolidate its strength.
In October, the All India Conference of the Communist Party of India
was held. In a statement of the Politburo of the Central Committee of the
Communist Party of India, published on October 28, 1951, it is stated
that the conference, with some amendments, unanimously approved the
draft programme and policy statement put forward by the Central Com-
mittee and the Politburo.
“The conference decided that since these two documents form the
basis of the strategy and tactics of the revolutionary movement in our
country and resolve all disputes and disagreements that have existed in
the party over the past few years, they should now become the basis for
agitation and propaganda as well as for the practical daily work of all
Party organizations and Party members. The whole party must re-edu-
cate itself and unite to ensure the implementation of the political line set
out in these documents.
The conference also resolved that all local organizations of the party
should devote their entire attention and energy to the forthcoming elec-
tions and to the cause of creating the broadest possible united front in or-
der to replace the present Congress government with a truly democratic
government”.
The conference unanimously elected a new Central Committee of
the Party, which in turn elected a seven-member Politburo. The Central
Committee elected Ajoy Ghosh as the General Secretary of the Party.
The speeches of the delegates and the decisions of the conference
show that the process of rallying the party, which began with the publi-
cation of the project and the programme, is moving forward and that a
solid foundation has been created for the ideological, political and orga-
nizational unity of the party.
Describing the situation within the party on the eve of the All Indian
Party Conference, comrade Ghosh notes that from the time of the publi-

cation of the draft programme, great changes have occurred in the party
and the intra party crisis has been resolved. “Dissatisfaction with the
National Congress has never been so strong as at the present time and the
popularity of our party has never been so widespread”.
Noting that the conference was a significant factor contributing to
the rallying of the rank and file of the party, comrade Ghosh nevertheless
points to a lack of unity among the members of the party on some points
of the draft programme, in particular on questions about the attitude to-
wards various groups of the national bourgeoisie and the assessment of
the class essence and foreign policy of the Nehru government, i.e. basi-
cally on the same issues that caused different opinions at the conferences
of provincial and city organizations.
The struggle of the Communist Party for the unity of the working
class, for the re-establishment of a united peasant organization, for the
unification of all democratic mass organizations, all of which intensified
after the publication of the draft programme, evoked a lively response
among the masses of the people.
The leadership of the All India Congress of Trade Unions, that is un-
der the influence of the communist party, puts forward the slogan. “ One
trade union for each branch of industry, one trade union organization for
all workers.”
A conference of the All India Union of Railway Workers, held in
April 1951, decided to dissolve itself and recommended that all unions of
railway workers should join the All India Federation of Railway Work-
ers. Contrary to the prohibition of the leadership of the Socialist Party,
the local organizations of the trade unions under its influence often act
together with the unions that are members of all the Indian Congress of
Trade Unions. The general secretary of the Congress of the United Trade
Unions (so called independent), Mrinol Kanti Bose made an appeal for
cooperation with the Communist Party. The trade unions headed by him
act everywhere together with the trade unions under the leadership of the
Communist Party.
In solidarity with the Communist Party in the struggle for the uni-
ty of democratic forces, Aruna Asif Ali, the leader of the left Socialist
group that broke away from the Socialist Party of India, said that the
unification of all the democratic forces of the country and their resolute
struggle for true independence is possible only under the leadership of
the Communist Party. As a result of the joint efforts of the All India
Congress of Trade Unions and the Left Socialist Group, in June 1951,
the two largest Bombay Textile Trade Unions merged into a single Union
uniting 250,000 workers.
The strengthening of the Communist Party and the growth of its in-
fluence among the broad masses of the Indian people contributed in end-
ing the fissures in the All Indian peasant organization of ‘Kisan Sabha
in 1945.
At the end of August 1951, a meeting of representatives of the All
Indian Kisan Sabha and the All India United Kisan Sabha, which had
existed in parallel since 1945, was held in Patna. The meeting decided
to unite both these peasant organizations and henceforth name the orga-
nization as All India Kisan Sabha or “Akhil Bhartiya Kisan Sabha”. As
a temporary measure till the convocation of the congress, a well-known
figure of the Communist Party Bankim Mukarji was elected the chair-
man of the Kisan Sabha.
Even more striking evidence that the Communist Party is restoring its
ties with the masses of the people, that its authority is constantly growing
and many progressive parties and political organizations are speaking
out for cooperation with the Communist Party, is provided by the elec-
tion campaign conducted by the Communist Party.
In early August 1951, the Communist Party of India published it’s
election manifesto in which it states that the future people’s democratic
government should break ties with the British Empire, remove British
officers from the armed forces, confiscate and nationalize all British
capital in India, take effective measures to crush the resistance of those
who stand together with the imperialists and the feudal lords against the
people, cancel the debts of the peasants, confiscate from the landlords
and princes without paying them any compensation and transfer free of
charge all the land and tools of production to those who cultivate the
land and make sure that the small landowner is provided means of live-
lihood and that the interests of rich peasants are not undermined...”The
people’s democratic government will develop industries in India using
nationalized capital and enlist the cooperation of private industrialists
who will be guaranteed statutory profits and their interests shall be pro-
tected.” It further states that the people’s democratic government will
create a people’s army, establish a regime of complete civil freedom in
the country, will protect the interests of national minorities, will put an
end to caste oppression and will provide women equal rights with men.
The leadership of the Communist Party achieved the official inclu-
sion of the Communist Party in the list of parties that are allowed to
nominate candidates for deputies on a separate list on behalf of the party.
The Communist Party is making great efforts to unite all the progres-
sive elements in the struggle for elections. The election manifesto of the
Communist Party states that united action is an urgent need and, only as
a result of the joint actions of the people, can the current government be
removed. On the initiative of the Communist Party and under its lead-
ership, pre-election blocs have been created in all states, principalities
and unions of principalities, and these have different names in different
states: “United Left Front”, “United Progressive Bloc” and so on. Local
organizations of the following parties established pre-election blocs with
the organizations of the Communist Party in the states and principalities:
The Marxist group of the party Forward Bloc, Workers and Peasants par-
ty, the left socialist group led by Aruna Asif Ali, of the United Socialist
organization1, All Indian Congress of Trade Unions, All Indian organiza-
tion of peasants “Kisan Sabha”. In some States, despite being prohibited
by the leadership of the Socialist Party of India, its local organizations
often participate in a bloc with the Communist Party. An All India elec-
toral bloc has not yet been established.
Election rallies by the progressive bloc attract tens of thousands of
participants. For example, about 150,000 people participated in the elec-
tion rally in the city of Calicut.
The growing influence of the Communist Party among the masses
has caused confusion and fear among the ruling circles of India, who
feed on repression against the Communist Party and make it difficult
for it to participate in the election campaign and, even more so, to pre-
vent a successful outcome for the Communist Party in the elections. The
position of the Communist Party is further complicated by the fact that
thousands of communists, including many important leaders of the party
organizations in the states, are in prison. In addition, in many States and
principalities, leading members of the Communist Party nominated as
candidates are arrested and the activities of progressive organizations
are prohibited.
In order to prevent the expansion of the influence of the Communist
parties among the masses, the authorities forbid the leaders of the Com-
munist Party to give speeches and even attend election rallies. Thus in
Travancore and Cochin, Ajay Ghosh, the secretary general of the CC
Communist Party, and Gopalan, another important Communist leader,
are not allowed to attend mass meetings. Thus the ruling National Con-
gress Party is using every means to prevent the leaders of the Communist
Party to get elected to the national parliament and state legislatures.

The beginning of the election campaign in India shows that the Com-
munist Party and the Left Front, led by them, are inflicting serious blows
to the National Congress. According to the election data, in the elections
to the legislative councils of a number of states, out of 275 electoral
constituencies, the National Congress won a total of 167 seats and the
United Front despite a police crackdown, still managed to win 32 seats,
which is more than any other party with the exception of the Congress.
Of this number the National Congress won 35 seats and the United Front
— 20. In the principality of Hyderabad out of 44 seats, the Congress won
21 seats and the Peoples’ Democratic Front under communist leadership
won 11.
The first successes of the joint performances of progressive parties
and organizations in the elections are the result of the struggle of the
Communist Party of India for the unity of the Indian people and evidence
of the growing influence of the Communist Party in the masses of the
growth, the trust of the progressive organizations and their recognition
of the leading role of the party.
All these factors, in turn, are evidence of the fact that the Indian
Communist Party is now creating a base for the transition to the next
stage of uniting the broad masses of the people towards the creation of
a United National Front for the fulfillment of the tasks outlined in the
programme of the Communist Party.
Translated from the Russian by Tahir Asghar
Endnote:
1
The United Socialist Organization includes the following political parties and
groups: Forward Bloc, Socialist Unity, East Punjab Organization “Servants
of the Peoples”, Workers and Peasant Party of Bombay, Praja Mandal of
Bengal, organisation of the veterans of the so called Indian National Army,
Socialist Republican Party, the Bihar peasants organisation, Peasants and
Workers Party of Maharashtra, Congress of United Trade Unions, Bolshevik
Party, Revolutionary Socialist Party, Revolutionary Communist Party, Bol-
shevik Workers Party. Most of these parties do not have all India presence
and their influence is limited to a few and often only one state.

Clara Zetkin: Rosa Luxemburg’s Views
on the Russian Revolution
Some of the writings of Rosa Luxemburg on the Russian

Revolution have been used to oppose Lenin, Stalin and the Great
October Socialist Revolution. Clara Zetkin wrote this book which
establishes that in the course of the German Revolution Rosa
Luxemburg modified her views in her last months prior to her
assassination so that they came to proximate to those of Lenin and
the Bolsheviks.
This book was originally written in German in 1922 and
translated into Russian. It has been now published in English for
the first time and published by Red Star Publishers in the United
States with the co-operation of the journal Revolutionary
Democracy, India.
Contact:
Red Star Publishers
P.O. Box 1641
Manhattanville Sta.
New York, NY 10027
USA
webmaster@RedStarPublishers.org
Price: $12 plus postage
220 pages
Checks must be made out to U.S. Friends of the Soviet People as

Red Star Publishers has no bank account.

RD 2023 October 3

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REVOLUTIONARY DEMOCRACY

Volume II, No. 2 (New Series) October, 2023

Manipur Crises – Towards a Just and Peaceful Solution...... 3

Views expressed in signed articles are those of authors and

Volume II, No. 2 (New Series) October, 2023. 3

Volume II, No. 2 (New Series) October, 2023. 5

15th July 2023

Single Issue: £ 6.00 US$ 6.00

Subscription may be remitted by M.O. only to:

Payment by cash, money order or check in the name of

Volume II, No. 2 (New Series) October, 2023. 7

Revolutionary Democracy is on sale at:

Bookculture Housman’s Bookshop,

Misdiagnosis of Slow Economic Recovery

Volume II, No. 2 (New Series) October, 2023. 11

Capital Expenditure Does Not Create Employment

Loud Claim of Inclusive Agriculture

De prioritization of Nutritional Support

Bias against Minorities

Volume II, No. 2 (New Series) October, 2023. 17

Old Recipe for Traditional Artisans

Dismantling of Affirmative Action

Discrimination and Violence Against Marginalised Groups

Volume II, No. 2 (New Series) October, 2023. 21

Mission on Particularly Vulnerable Tribes

Eklavya Residential Schools

Mission to Eliminate Sickle Cell Anemia

The Poor Languishing in Jail

Volume II, No. 2 (New Series) October, 2023. 25

Relentless Push of Technology: Digital Divide

Strengthening Health Services

Stifling of Rural Development

Volume II, No. 2 (New Series) October, 2023. 33

Volume II, No. 2 (New Series) October, 2023. 35

Kabhi o din bhiaayega jab hum swarajdekhenge

A day shall come when we will have self-rule

To understand India’s agrarian structure and society is to comprehend

India’s transformation into an equitable society is incomplete, its pro-

Before Colonial Rule

The Arrival of East India Company, A Systemic Change

Company Consumes India’s Forests

Taungya System and Bonded Labour

First Challenge to Colonial Rule: Adivasi (Tribal)

Statutes Passed Under Pressure from Adivasi& Peasant Movements

Volume II, No. 2 (New Series) October, 2023. 43

Women’s Land Rights Movement in Bodhgaya

Dalit Land Rights Movement in Tamil Nadu

The Dalit Struggle for Land

National Forum of Forest People, Forest Workers

Volume II, No. 2 (New Series) October, 2023. 49

These formed the basis of the 2002 Declaration of the NFFPFW at

Draconian Order From the Forest Department in 2002

2004 – Foundation for Change

Achievements of Forest Rights Act, 2006

Volume II, No. 2 (New Series) October, 2023. 51

Volume II, No. 2 (New Series) October, 2023. 53

Volume II, No. 2 (New Series) October, 2023. 55

Faiz Ahmed Faiz

Volume II, No. 2 (New Series) October, 2023. 57

Volume II, No. 2 (New Series) October, 2023. 59

Volume II, No. 2 (New Series) October, 2023. 61

Volume II, No. 2 (New Series) October, 2023. 63

This Land is Their Land

A brief, 130 pages, working people’s history of the United