Nadiad,
The Issue
In the district of Kaira, the crops for the year 1917-18 have, by common admission, proved a partial failure. Under the revenue rules, if the crops are under four annas, the cultivators are entitled to full suspension of the revenue assessment for the year ; if the crops are under six annas, half the amount of assessment is suspended. So far as I am aware, the Government have been pleased to grant full suspension with regard to one village out of nearly 600, and half-suspension in the case of over 103 villages. It is claimed on behalf of the ryots that the suspension is not at all adequate to the actuality. The Govern- ment contend that in the vast majority of villages, crops have been over six annas. The only question therefore at issue is, whether the crops have been under four annas or six annas, as the case may be, or over the latter figure.
Tyrannical Talatis
Government valuation is in the first instance made by the Talatis assisted by the chief men of the villages concerned. As a rule, no check on their figures is considered necessary, for it is only during partial failure of crops that Government valuation of crops may have to be challenged. The Talatis are as a class obsequious, unscrupulous and tyrannical. The chief men are especially selected for their docility. The Talatis, one aim is naturally to collect full assessment as promptly as possible. We sometimes read accounts of assiduous Talatis having been awarded 'pugree' for making full collection. In applying to the Talatis the adjectives I have given, I wish to cast no reflection on them as men. I merely state the fact. The Talatis are not born; they are made; and rent-collectors all the world over have to cultivate a callousness without which they could not do their work to the satisfaction of their masters. It is impossible for me to reproduce the graphic description given by the ryots of the rent-collectors which the Talatis chiefly are.
Government Estimate biased
My purpose in dealing with the Talatis is to show that the Government's valuation of the crops is derived in the first instance from the tainted source and is presumably biased against the ryots. As against their valuation, we have the universal testimony of ryots, high and low, some of whom are men of position and considerable wealth, who have a reputation to lose and who have nothing to gain by exaggeration except the odium of Talatis and possibly higher officials. I wish to state at once that behind this movement there is no desire to discredit the Government, or an individual official. The movement is intended to assert the right of the people to be effectively heard in matters concerning themselves.
Careful Inquiry
It is known to the public that the Hon'ble Mr. G. K. Parekh and Mr. V. J. Patel, invited and assisted by the Gujarat Sabha, carried on investigations, as also Messrs. Deodhar, Joshi and Thakkar of the Servants of India Society. Their investigation was necessarily preliminary and brief and, therefore, confined to a few villages only. But the result of their inquiry went to show that the crops in the majority of cases were under four annas. As their investigation, not being extensive enough, was capable of being challenged, and it was challenged, I undertook a full inquiry with the assistance of over 20 capable, experienced and impartial men of influence and status. I personally visited over 30 villages and met as many men in the villages as I could, inspected in these villages most of the fields belonging to them and after a searching cross-examination of the villagers, came to the conclusion that their crops were under four annas. I found that among the men who surrounded me there were present those who were ready to check exaggerations and wild statements. Men knew what was at stake if they departed from the truth. As to the rabi crops and the still standing kharif crops, I was able by the evidence of my own eyes to check the statements of the agriculturists. The methods adopted by my co-workers were exactly the same. In this manner 400 villages were examined and with but a few exceptions, crops were found to be under four annas, and only in three cases they were found to be over six annas. The method adopted by us was, so far as the kharif crops were concerned, to ascertain the actual yield of the whole of the crops of individual villages and the possible yield of the same village in a normal year. Assuming the truth of the statements made by them, this is admittedly an absolute test, and any other method that would bring about the same result must be rejected as untrue and unscientific; and as I have already remarked, all probability of exaggeration was avoided in the above-named investigation. As to the standing rabi crops, there was the eye estimate and it was tested by the method mentioned above.
The Government Method
The Government method is an eye estimate and, therefore, a matter largely of guess-work. It is moreover open to funda- mental objections which I have endeavoured to set forth in a letter to the Collector of the District. I requested him to treat Vadthal?a well-known and ordinarily well-to-do village of the district with the railway line passing by it and which is near a trade centre?as a test case and I suggested that if the crops were in that village proved to be under four annas, as I hold they were, it might be assumed that in the other villages less fortunately situated, crops were not likely to be more than four annas. I have added to my request a suggestion that I should be permitted to be present at the inquiry. He made the inquiry but rejected my suggestion and, therefore, it proved to be onesided. The Collector has made an elaborate report on the crops of that village which, in my opinion, I have successfully challenged. The original Government valuation, I understand, was twelve annas, the Collector's minimum valuation is seven annas. If the probably wrong methods of valuation to which I have drawn attention and which have been adopted by the Collector are allowed for, the valuation according to his own reckoning would come under six annas and according to the agriculturists it would be under four annas.
Need for Impartial Inquiry
Both the report and my answer are too technical to be of value to the public. But I have suggested that, as both the Government and the agriculturists hold themselves in the right, if the Government have any regard for popular opinion, they should appoint an impartial committee of inquiry with the cultivators' representatives upon it, or gracefully accept the popular view. The Government have rejected both the suggestions and insist upon applying coercive measures for the collection of revenue. It may be mentioned that these measures have never been totally suspended and in many cases the ryots have paid simply under pressure. The Talatis have taken away cattle and have returned them only after the payment of assessment. In one case I witnessed a painful incident?a man having his milch buffalo taken away from him; and it was only on my happening to go to the village that the buffalo was released; this buffalo was the most valuable property the man possessed and a source of daily bread for him. Scores of such cases have already happened and many more will no doubt happen hereafter, if the public opinion is not ranged on the side of the people. Every means of seeking redress by prayers has been exhausted. Interviews with the Collector, the Commissioner and His Excellency have taken place. The final suggestion that was made is this :
Proposals to the Government
Although in the majority of cases, people are entitled to full suspension, half suspension should be granted throughout the district except for the villages which show, by common consent, crops over six annas. Such a gracious concession may be accompanied by a declaration that the Government would expect those who have already means voluntarily to pay up the dues, we, the workers, on our part undertaking to persuade such people to pay up the Government dues. This will leave only the poorest people untouched. I venture to submit that acceptance of this suggestion can only bring credit and strength to the Government. Resistance of popular-will can only produce discontent which, in the case of fear-stricken peasantry such as of Kaira, can only find an underground passage and thus demoralize them. The present movement is an attempt to get out of such a false posi- tion, humiliating alike for the Government and the people.
Law Abused
And how do the Government propose to assert their position and so-called prestige? They have a Revenue Code giving them unlimited powers without a right of appeal to the ryots against the decisions of the Revenue Authorities. Exercise of these powers in a case like the one before us, in which the ryots are fighting for a principle and the authorities for prestige, would be a prostitution of justice, of a disavowal of all fair-play. These powers are :
- Right of summary execution.
- Right of exacting a quarter of the assessment as punishment.
- Right of confiscation of land, not merely Royatwari but even Inami or Sanadi.
- Right of keeping a man under lock-up.
These remedies may be applied singly or all together, and unbelievable though it may seem to the public, it may be mentioned that notices of the application of all these remedies but the last have been issued. Thus a man owning several hundred acres of land in perpetuity and valued at thousands of rupees, paying a small assessment rate, may at the will of the authority lose the whole of it, because for the sake of principle he respectfully refuses voluntarily to pay the assessment himself and is prepared meekly but under strong protest to penalities that may be inflicted by law. Surely vindictive confiscation of property ought not to be the reward for orderly disobedience which, properly handled, can only result in progress all round and in giving the Government a bold and a frank peasantry with a will of its own.
Appeal to the Public
I venture to invite the Press and the public to assist these cultivators of Kaira who have dared to enter on a fight for what they consider is just and right. Let the public remember this also that unprecedentally severe plague has decimated the population of Kaira. People are living outside their homes in specially prepared thatched cottages at considerable expense to themselves. In some villages mortality has been tremendous. Prices are ruling high of which, owing to the failure of crops, they can but take little advantage and have to suffer all the disadvantages thereof. It is not money they want so much as the voice of a strong, unanimous and emphatic public opinion.[1]
- ↑ The Hindu, 1-4-1918.
