62
Chapter 3
Agrarian Relations in Kerala
Agrarian relations refer to a pattern of relationship in which people are
related to the land as a productive resource by ownership or tenancy or by
any other form of relationship. It also refers to the historical nature of
land ownership system with its subsequent changes in its interaction and
reaction to the circumstances of ecology- natural and human – related to
creation of traditions of conflicting interests in land.
Many studies have focused on the agrarian problems like peasant revolts,
peasant movements, agrarian tensions, agrarian conflicts, and changes in
the agrarian structure. Many studies have analyzed peasantry in its
relationship with economic power structures and superstructures of the
village society. To the Marxist investigators agrarian relations are the
relationship between different classes of people engaged in the process of
production. But the Marxists failed to identify the differentiation within
peasantry as they delineated and analyzed the experiences of the agrarian
struggles (Vijayan, 1998).
Land reforms are back on the policy agenda of international development
institutions as well as of many nation states, although it never really
63
disappeared from the political agenda of rural social movements. Poverty
has remained largely a rural phenomenon globally, with three-fourths of
the world’s poor constituted by the rural poor despite efforts by national
governments, international institutions and civil society. Effective control
over productive resources, especially land and water, by the rural poor is
crucial to their autonomy and capacity to construct a rural livelihood and
to overcome poverty. This is largely because today in many countries a
significant portion of the income of the rural poor comes from farming,
despite far-reaching livelihood diversification processes occurring in
different places over the years. As a result, lack of control over land and
water resources is directly related to poverty and inequality(Nair and
Dhas,1989).
Moreover, land has a multidimensional character: it is important not only
for economic livelihoods, but also as a socio-political resource for poor
people to exercise their citizenship rights, and as a cultural factor crucial
for the preservation of people’s collective identity and dignity (Barros and
Schwartzman,2003). States have been driven by a variety of motives in
carrying out land reforms up to the 1980s. These can be broadly
differentiated between economic and socio-political ones.
64
The economic basis for land reform remains founded on the assumption
that large farms under-utilize land, while small farms are wasteful of
labor, resulting in low levels of land and labor productivity and
consequently leading to poverty. At the same time, most agrarian
societies are marked by un(der)employment of labor and scarcity of land.
From an economic consideration, it is deemed more logical to raise land
productivity than to try to increase labor productivity, at least as a first
radical step toward restructuring existing social and production relations
(Bernstein, 2002). There has thus been a broad consensus among scholars
and policymakers coming from diverse ideological perspectives on the
relevance of land reforms for economic development and rural poverty
eradication. Yet opinion is divided over the longer-term perspective - that
is, in what overall type of development paradigm does land reform figure,
or toward what developmental end should the rural surplus be directed.
This more fundamental issue has been linked to debates about what type
of organization of production should be adopted, i.e., individual or
collective farms, after the restructuring of landed property rights have
occurred. The neo-classical perspective of optimization of the farm
management through structuring of the land ownership or tenure system
and entitlement as a stimulus to the farm management set forth the
theoretical framework for the optimization models in countries like Japan.
Meanwhile, socio-political logic has been equally powerful in shaping the
65
rise (and fall) of land reforms in different countries over the years
(Borras, 2003).
First, the decolonization processes that were unleashed immediately after
World War II continued in some places until the 1980s, and have become
important contexts for land redistribution campaigns in many countries.
Second, geo-political and ideological imperatives in the context of the
Cold War provided another set of factors behind the rise of land reforms
in international and national policy agendas. Third, land reforms also held
a key place in alternative national projects heralded by victorious peasant-
based revolutions. Fourth, in reaction to external and internal political
pressures, land reforms were used by central states to ‘manage’
significant episodes of peasant unrest, whether communist-instigated or
otherwise. What later emerged as scattered patches of successful land
redistribution outcomes within these countries revealed the capacity of
central states to respond, albeit selectively and partially, to rural unrest.
Fifth, land reform was also often used to legitimize and/or consolidate the
claim to state power by one faction of the elite against another. Finally,
and perhaps more commonly, central authorities (capitalist or socialist)
almost always have used land reforms to further state-building agendas
(Borras, (2005). The administrative requirements of implementation of
the land reforms are multifarious. They have fed the desire of central state
66
authorities to extend their administrative, political and military-police
presence and authority into ‘untamed’ parts of state claimed territory and
to expand the central state’s tax base.
Thus fueled by different economic and socio-political reasoning, land
reforms were legislated and implemented in a wide variety of (sub)
national settings and with a variety of results (Borras et.al.,2005). In all
the postwar land redistribution campaigns, however, the outcome in terms
of redistributing all lands to all the poor households who needed them
ended up falling short or remained marked by only partial success.
Meanwhile, the changed global economic and socio-political context
emerging especially in the 1990’s resulted in a different context for land
reform. While there are many old economic and socio-political issues
around land reforms that have remained important up to the present, some
are clearly no longer relevant (such as the Cold War). Instead, new issues
emerged that have not really been part of the land reform discourse until
more recently, such as gender, the environment, human rights, ethnic
violence, and indigenous land rights (Carter and Mesbah ,1993).
Despite the series of agrarian reforms and rural development
interventions in the past, today, landlessness and rural poverty remain a
67
very significant problem in developing and transition-countries. The FAO
has forecasted, by 2006, three-fourths of the world’s poor, or about 900
million people would be living in rural areas and depending on access to
land and other natural resources for their livelihoods. For most of them,
insecure access to land is closely linked to poverty. The extent to which
the conditions of landed property rights and agrarian structure – in
convergence with other factors such as macroeconomic and socio-
political conditions – (re)shape the lives and livelihoods of the rural poor
vary significantly between and within regions. In Asia, amid rapid
economic development in China and India, national and sub-national
enclaves of agrarian problems have persisted, generally gravitating
around the issues concerning indigenous peoples’ land rights (e.g. India
and the Philippines), forestry lands (e.g. Indonesia and Thailand), land
degradation, greater control of the farming family over the terms of land
use (e.g. China and Vietnam), among others (de Janvry et.al,2001).
In Latin America, amid modest macroeconomic growth across the region
and uneven degrees of industrialization and urbanization, pockets of rural
poverty alongside a major cross-national poverty enclave – the Andes,
have persisted. This rural poverty is closely linked to land-related
problems, particularly the highly skewed distribution of landed property
rights in most countries.
68
In sub-Saharan Africa, the less vibrant macroeconomic development
processes in general have continued alongside low rural economic
productivity gains. Key problems remain connected to productivity issues
that in turn involve rural poor people’s control over water, capital, and
technology, while conflicts over the nature, pace and direction of property
rights reforms in settler-controlled farms and communal lands have
remain significant (Lorenzo et.al.2006).
Meanwhile, in the Near East and Northern Africa, the question of land is
always associated with the question of water and rural poverty is closely
linked to the poor people’s access to and control over available land and
water resources. Finally in the transitional economies of the former
USSR, Central Asia, and some parts of Eastern Europe, productivity
issues have remained central to the capacity of the rural poor and the
livelihoods after the land redistribution in the post-Cold War era. In short,
between and within regions today, the poverty of most rural households
have remained linked to the question of access to and control over land
and water resources.
Shaped partly by the diversity of socio-economic, political and cultural
conditions between and within countries, and partly by the varied
69
responses of different actors to the changing context, one can thus discern
four broadly distinct perspectives on achieving pro-poor land policies and
sustainable livelihoods. These are the market-led, state-led, poor people-
led and state- society driven perspectives, each of which is discussed
below.
From the state-led perspective, the reasons given for land reforms always
entail a convergence of many economic and socio-political considerations
and calculations. This view not only treats land mainly as an economic
factor of production, but also as a socio political and cultural resource and
sometimes even as a ‘territory’. It holds that strong political will by the
central state is necessary in order to defeat any opposition to reform, and
to employ expropriation methods for land redistribution. The state-led
view considers strong and independent peasant movements as critical to
the success of any land redistribution program in theory, even though
there is a strong tendency of states in practice to treat peasant
organizations as, or try to transform them into, subordinate administrative
adjuncts in carrying out land reforms.
In contrast to the state-led view, from the market-led perspective in land
reforms, the main consideration is economic efficiency and productivity
gains. Land is considered primarily as a commodity, a scarce resource
70
that is an important economic factor of production. Skewed distribution
of land resulting in lack of access to most rural households, is the key
cause of rural poverty. Thus there exists the need to secure access to land
for the rural poor. But because state intervention distorts (land) markets,
land distribution must be carried out via a combination of market-based
and market –oriented mechanisms: the ‘willing seller, willing buyer’ land
transfer scheme, the promotion of land rental markets, the privatization
and formalization of land titles, and the decentralization of land records
and management. This view banks on the existence of strong,
independent local peasant organizations that could directly negotiate with
landlords for land sales, as well as on the involvement of NGOs to assist
local peasant organizations in farm development requirements, such as
preparing farm plans acceptable to commercial banks (Deere and
Medeiros, 2005).
Meanwhile, many of the poor people-led perspectives’ most basic
assumptions are similar to those of the state-led. However, it is important
to note that the poor people-led view differs from the state-led
perspective in one crucial respect: it tends to assume that the state,
ultimately, is too captive to anti-reform elite interests in society to be able
to carry out significant redistributive reforms. In the end, the state is an
unreliable partner in this regard. The poor people—led perspective also
71
views market forces as basically dominated by elite interests, and hence
unable to bring about truly pro-poor reform gains. Thus, for adherents of
this perspective, the only way to ensure the achievement of pro-poor
agrarian reforms is for peasants and their organizations to take and retain
the initiative in implementing them, even if they must stand alone in
doing so(Deininger,1999).
Finally, in a state-society perspective, it is the interactions between state
and societal actors that actually push for land reforms. This view aims to
take the best arguments of the state-led and poor people-led views and
bring them together, with a nod as well, with a few issues usually raised
by market-led perspectives. The main assumptions here are notably
nuanced. On the one hand, peasant movements are viewed as a crucial
factor in successful land reforms, but they (peasants/beneficiaries and
their organizations) are not assumed to be omnipotent. On the other hand,
the state is deemed a critical actor in any successful land reform, but it
does not necessarily assume a commanding role. Meanwhile, for their
part, markets are indeed an important context within which peasants who
receive lands must be able to construct, maintain and sustain their
livelihoods, but markets are not the only factor in economic productivity-
enhancement issues. Although the state/society-driven perspective
recognizes the relevance of each, it analyzes state, peasant movements,
72
and market forces not as separate entities, but as interdependent ones,
inherently linked to one another by their association to the politics and
economics of land resources. Consequently, this view has three key
dimensions: ‘poor people-initiated’, ‘livelihood enhancing/ creating’, and
‘state-supported’.
Land tenure systems in India
Agrarian systems in modern India are marked by tremendous diversity.
Although the particular configuration of institutions that helps to make
progressive policy reforms possible in one state may not be present in
others, it is important to be aware of broad variations in the factors that
influence patterns of agrarian change (Binswanger and Deininger 1997;
Binswanger, Deininger and Feder 1995). Various types of institutions are
of relevance in understanding how contemporary agrarian systems have
evolved in India, including personal laws and customs regarding
inheritance, the significance of patron-client relations, collective action to
overcome ecological risk and missing markets, and other institutions in
village society (Sahu 1997).
Three broad types of land revenue system were introduced in India under
British rule (Baden-Powell 1892, Sharma 1992). The differences among
73
these systems account for the significant variations in the subsequent
evolution of land tenure systems throughout rural India. This is not to
suggest that these systems swept away pre-existing land relations. A
defining characteristic of each system was the attempt to incorporate
elements of the preceding agrarian structure, and the interaction of
colonial policy and existing systems produced widely different local
results and hybrid forms. Different areas came under British land
settlements at different times. Tribal areas, in particular, were not covered
by any of these systems, and some tribal areas remain to be ‘settled’ even
today.
Under the zamindari or ‘permanent settlement’ system, introduced
around 1793, feudal lords (zamindars, jagirdars etc) were declared
proprietors of the land on condition of fixed revenue payments to the
British regime. Peasants were transformed into tenant farmers, and rents
were collected by serried ranks of intermediaries below the level of
zamindars. This system prevailed over most of North India, including
present-day Uttar Pradesh (except Avadh and Agra), Bihar, West Bengal,
most of Orissa, and Rajasthan (except Jaipur and Jodhpur), and covered
around 57 per cent of the total cultivated area.
74
The other major system was the ryotwari system, introduced in Madras in
1792 and in Bombay in 1817-18. In this case, individual cultivators (ryots
or raiyats) were recognized as proprietors of their land with rights to sub-
let, mortgage, and transfer their land by gift or sale. Their tenure of land
was secure so long as revenue payments were made directly to the
collectors of the colonial administration. The ryotwari system held sway
over most of South India and most of Madhya Pradesh and Assam. The
princely states of Jaipur and Jodhpur in Rajasthan also fell under ryotwari
systems. Pockets of zamindari-type tenure existed within these ryotwari
areas, particularly where they were administered by local rajas or nawabs.
Ryotwari systems accounted for around 38 per cent of the total cultivated
area.
The third type of system was the mahalwari system, in which revenue
settlement was made with entire villages as collective units. Peasant
farmers contributed shares of the total revenue demand for the village
(mahal) in proportion to their respective holdings. The state was initially
entitled to as much as 83 per cent of gross produce in revenue, although
this was later lowered to 66 per cent. The mahalwari system was
introduced between 1820 and 1840 in Punjab (including both present-day
Punjabs in Pakistan and India, and the state of Haryana); parts of what are
now Madhya Pradesh and Orissa, and the princely states of Avadh and
75
Agra in Uttar Pradesh. This type of tenure system was much less
extensive, and accounted for some 5 per cent of the cultivated area.
A typology of the tenure system existent in the various states is presented
in Table 3.1
Table 3.1
Typology of tenure system in India
Sl. No. Tenure system State
1 Zamindari system (57% of
cultivated area)
Uttar Pradesh( except Avadh
& Agra)
Bihar
Orissa
West Bengal
Rajasthan
Andhra Pradesh (
Telengana)
2 Ryotwari system ( 38% of the
cultivated area)
Karnataka
Gujarat
Tamil Nadu
Kerala
Maharashtra
Madhya Pradesh (60% area)
Andhra Pradesh (except
Telengana)
Assam
Rajasthan (Jaipur &
Jodhpur)
3 Mahalwari (5% cultivated area)
Punlab
Haryana
Madhya Pradesh(40% area)
Orissa(9% area)
Uttarpradesh ( Avadh &
Agra)
Source: Sharma (1992)
76
Rural India was the theatre of a variety of struggles involving various
categories of rural population during the entire period of British
Domination. The agrarian movements that emerged in different parts of
the country pressed for various agrarian reforms. In Kerala effective
implementation of the regulation of agrarian relationship was possible
due to the strength of the Leftist movement.
Land reforms in Kerala
Kerala is a highly globalized regional economy. Kerala has been
integrated to the world economy so much so that all the convulsions and
vicissitudes of the major economic centers of the world have had their
repercussions and resonance in the state (Kunhaman, 2002).
Logically any land reform is part of a broad agrarian policy to entitle the
tiller of the land to organize agrarian production efficiently and
appropriate its surplus without the interference of the landlord or
moneylender or any other exploitative participant in production. It meant
to resolve the class conflicts in the appropriation of surplus in agricultural
production.
77
At the time of formation of the Kerala State, there existed bewilderingly
complex tenurial systems. In Travancore tenancy was abolished in 1865
by a Royal Proclamation. The Jenmikudian Proclamation of 1867 is
acclaimed as the Magna Carta of the feudal landlords of Kerala. But no
such reforms were enacted in the Malabar area. At the time of re-
organization of the state these disparities led to widespread discontent
among the peasants of Northern Kerala.
Kerala Land Reforms (Amendment) Act, 1969 implemented from 1
January 1970 was the most dramatic of any land reform legislation passed
by any state legislature. In India only Jammu and Kashmir, other than
Kerala thought of enacting such agrarian legislation. The term ‘tenant’
was defined broadly to include crop sharers, fugitive cultivators or any
other new types of tenancy. It enabled the tenants to become titleholders
of their leased holdings subject to government ceiling provisions and
payment of a purchase price. The Bill granted fixity of tenure to the
landless, occupants of homesteads known as ‘Kudikidappukar’. By this
legislation, fair rents were stipulated for all types of land and were made
uniform. The Bill also provided for help to small holders who were
defined as persons holding or owning below five acres of double crop
wetland or equivalent. Land Boards and Tribunals were entrusted with
the responsibility of implementing provisions of the Bill.
78
The dismissal of the Communist Ministry and subsequent invalidation of
the Bill by Kerala High Court in 1963 necessitated a diluted form of the
Bill to be passed as The Kerala Land Reform Act, 1963. The Act fixed
ceiling limit to be 12 standard acres but exempted certain types of land
from its coverage. This Act came into effect from 1st April, 1964.
As per the survey of Land Reforms in Kerala 1966-67, about 94 percent
of the leased land under all types of lands got fixity of tenure either
through sanction of Tribunal or mutual agreement between the landlord
and the tenant. The Table shows the total area of land under different
tenures and those which were granted fixity of tenure. Over 19.2 lakh
acres of land has been granted fixity of tenure and 17.49 lakh acres were
transferred through mutual agreement. The survey also revealed that very
few farmers could purchase landlord’s rights and only one percent of the
leased land was bought by the tenants.
79
Table 3.2
Type of tenure fixity of tenure and area involved
Types of
tenure
Total Throu
gh
Land
Tribun
al
Fixity of tenure & area involved (acres)
Fixity obtained Fixity not
obtained
Other
Throug
h
agreem
ent
Total Under
disput
es
Tot
al
(1) (2) (3) (4) (5) (6) (7) (8)
Kanam 496183 - 467523 467523 28660
Kuzhikanam 282568 1426 280701 282127 354 -
Kanamkuzhik
anam
100322 - 100222 100222 87
Verumpattam 849231 47219 731946 779165 20208 346
8
100
Mulgeni 49 - 49 49 46390
Chalgeni 9177 - 9177 9177
Vaidaeni - -
Kudiyiruppu 85829 6759 75396 82155 3414 103 157
Deemed
tenancy
54308 739 51245 51984 354 196
3
16
Others 43820 3718 33630 37348 6201 28 243
All 192148
7
59761 174988
9
1809750 59182 556
3
46993
Source: Survey of land Reforms, 1966-1967, Kerala
80
Prior to the abolition of tenancy, the lowest caste tenants did not have
security of tenancy and they could be evicted at any time at the will of the
landlord. To guard themselves against this malady the tenants had to pay
exorbitant rents. In 1940 it was recorded that the cultivator paid as much
as 50 per cent of the gross income as rent.
There existed tenancy in garden lands also. Here, the rent paid was not
directly accessible as they were paid in kind. Also, the returns from the
garden crops and hence the payments of rent were continuous, making its
monitoring difficult. So abolition of tenancy in these lands affected direct
wealth transfer to a lesser extent compared to the wetlands. But it had
implied political and economic importance for hutment dwellers. Its
importance in the cultivation aspects was that the tiller had greater stake
in the land improvement activities (Thomas ,1998).
However, with the introduction of the Agrarian Relations Bill, the
landlords commenced a hectic activity of bogus land transfers.
Consequently the target of acquiring and redistributing surplus lands
could not be achieved.
81
Effects of the land reforms
The three main objectives of Land Reforms were: (1) abolition of
intermediaries (b) tenancy reforms, and (3) imposition of ceilings on
holdings and redistribution of surplus land.
Prior to the 1969 Act, the land holding pattern was highly skewed in
Kerala. Roughly 8 per cent of the land owner households controlled 44.4
per cent of all rented lands and 61.8 per cent of the irrigated rented lands.
This showed the concentration of wealth and consequently power in the
landowner brahminical households. With the abolition of tenancy, most
of them utilizing their higher access to education, shifted professions and
became school teachers, administrators etc. Some continued as middle
farmers.
The abolition of feudal landlords did not automatically lead to capitalistic
mode of production in Kerala, as the land was not passed on to a class of
sturdy self-cultivating peasantry. Kerala has a good number of absentee
farmers whose main occupation is far from their cultivable lands. Also a
large number of the landlords circumvented the ceiling provisions, taking
advantage of the time lag between the deliberations, enactment and
enforcement of the Act. Thus the very essence of the land reforms got
vitiated (Krishnaji).
82
Despite the gain of title ownership, many of the former tenants did not
have the necessary capital or management skills to adapt themselves to
the changing price situations. Nearly 67 per cent of the tenant turned
owners held less than 0.5 Ha. and 88.5 per cent below 1Ha. Nearly 1
million had no other holding other than the leased in. So we cannot
categorically affirm that the land reforms brought forth a class of sturdy
peasant proprietors (Oommen, 1994)
Meanwhile, some of the relatively richer tenant peasants who had
substantial area of leased-in land got ownership rights of the whole land
operated by them and consequently emerged as a new class of capitalist
farmers. The distribution of surplus land did not make much difference to
the situation of the agricultural laborers either. Various agricultural
development programs also catered to the stronger large farmers and not
the small and marginal farmers.
Many of the new landowners had other significant income opportunities,
as well. Consequently they relied on hired labor. As their educational and
social status improved, they avoided making further investments in labor-
intensive agriculture. As the result, there occurred a shift towards
perennial crops that required less labor. The price- advantage catalyzed
83
this shift. Others opted to leave their land idle or leased it out illegally to
poor peasant cultivators (Easwaran, 1990). This phenomenon has now
reached alarming proportions warranting a re-look and re-examination of
the question of land reforms in Kerala.
The analysis of data on land holdings from 1960-61 to 1986-87 showed a
tendency towards marginal holdings. The average size of marginal
holdings declined from 0.29Ha in 1970-71 to 0.18Ha in 1986-87, the
lowest among different states of India. The average Keralite with a
mixture of contradictory sentiments of attachment towards ancestral
property and aversion towards laborious tasks of farming found real
estate a lucrative investment offer especially with investible earnings
from other sources. Thus, the market forces are asserting their might in
the land market contributing to social differentiation (Oommen, 1994)
When Agrarian Relations Bill was introduced in1959, it was estimated
that 72000Ha land would be available for re-distribution. But, only 39000
Ha was distributed to the beneficiaries by the end of 1978. The loopholes
in the Act added to the insensitivity and indifference of the bureaucracy
made the re-distribution system ineffective and the vulnerable sections of
the society did not benefit much from it (Thorner, 1978).
84
Many of these difficulties could be tackled with additional agrarian
reforms, on promotion of joint farming or group farming, irrigation,
development of new products, marketing and so on. All of them call for
popular initiatives at local level, comprehensive policy packages and
efficient public administration (Tonrquist and Tharakan, 1995). It is in the
absence of such supportive institutional arrangements, that the land
reforms in Kerala contributed to agricultural stagnation.
.The small farmers find it difficult to cultivate their holdings profitably.
This has led to a situation where people are leasing out the land
informally. This situation is leading us to a new set of problems of
uncontrolled exploitation of soil fertility.
Tenancy had declined in all the states in the seventies. The actual form of
tenancy also has undergone change. In a few states commercial tenancy
grew in prominence. At the All India level the break up of the holdings
based on the type of ownership revealed that 37 per cent of the operated
area was leased out by households self-employed in agriculture; about 19
percent by agricultural laborers while other households dominated with
46 per cent of operated area. Except Andhra Pradesh, Gujarat,
Maharashtra and Karnataka, in all other states self employed households
in agriculture and others dominated substantial area. A marked exception
85
to this pattern is Kerala where 30 per cent of the area was leased in by
others.
Table 3.3
State-wise distribution of leased in area and type of operations
State Percentage of area leased out by Percentage of area leased in by
Self-
employed
in
agriculture
Agricultural
labor
Others Total Self-
employed
in
agriculture
Agricultural
labor
Others Total
Andhra
Pradesh
17.81 38.63 43.56 100.00 83.41 13.52 3.07 100.00
Assam 47.46 10.17 42.37 100.00 95.49 2.62 1.89 100.00
Bihar 39.27 10.12 50.61 100.00 75.62 2.62 14.59 100.00
Gujarat 42.42 47.88 9.70 100.00 96.00 9.79 2.00 100.00
Haryana 39.70 4.05 56.26 100.00 90.43 2.00 8.09 100.00
Himachal
Pradesh
70.14 0.00 29.86 100.00 99.32 1.48 0.68 100.00
Jammu&
Kashmir
49.47 0.00 50.53 100.00 85.03 0.00 14.70 100.00
Karnataka 9.62 41.48 48.90 100.00 91.24 4.83 3.93 100.00
Kerala 29.27 12.20 58.54 100.00 56.14 13.60 30.26 100.00
State Percentage of area leased out by Percentage of area leased in by
Self-
employed
in
agriculture
Agricultural
labor
Others Total Self-
employed
in
agriculture
Agricultural
labor
Others Total
Madhya
Pradesh
26.30 11.93 61.77 100.00 92.89 8.16 8.95 100.00
86
Maharashtra 14.87 48.33 36.80 100.00 82.23 12.93 4.85 100.00
Orissa 26.65 16.73 56.62 100.00 83.58 12.44 3.98 100.00
Punjab 65.43 0.09 34.48 100.00 96.36 1.16 2.48 100.00
Rajasthan 64.10 2.24 33.65 100.00 83.64 0.92 15.44 100.00
Tamil Nadu 43.27 12.27 44.46 100.00 78.09 11.82 10.10 100.00
Uttar
Pradesh
33.12 11.53 55.35 100.00 91.88 3.88 4.24 100.00
West
Bengal
60.16 0.41 39.43 100.00 80.23 13.51 6.27 100.00
All India 34.35 19.39 46.26 100.00 85.25 7.51 7.24 100.00
Source; Government of India (1989): Some Aspects of Household
Ownership Holding, 37th Round, January to December 1982, No.330,
Department of Statistics, Ministry of Planning
88
There have been reports of the land lease market working in reverse. To
realize economies of scale in the use of new technology, the medium and
large holdings are increasingly entering the lease market (Gill, 1989). In
the regions of faster agriculture growth the employment opportunities in
other sectors also have increased. In such a situation, it was more
profitable for small holders to lease out their holding and move on to
other employment opportunities elsewhere. Thus the allocation of land
through the land-lease market has altered the size distribution of
operational holdings.
Table 3.4
Percentage operational holdings reporting leased-in area for broad class
of operational holdings
Size Class % of operational
holdings reporting
leased in area
%
distribution
in both
seasons
Area leased in
Any part of the year
Major part of the year
Both
season
Any
season
0002-0.20 4.4 7 94 42 39
0.21-0.50 4.9 6 94 67 67
0.51-1.00 1.9 4 99 41 41
1.01-2.00 5.7 10 87 128 115
2.01-4.00 4.4 7 99 51 51
4.01-10.00 14.1 17 81 41 41
10.01 &
above
0.0 60 89 24 24
All sizes 4.3 7 91 394 379
Source: Sarvekshna, January- March 1997.
89
According to the data given in Table 3.4 in the broad size class of above
10 hectares leased in area was as high as 60.34 percent. When both
seasons are considered, the percentage proportion amounted to 89.10
percent. In smaller size classes the proportion of leased in area was
comparatively lesser.
Present scenario
At present, the government is not zealously following up the activities
related to land reforms. Only the recovery and re-distribution of surplus
land is being continued. The reviews of the efficacy of the land reforms
process in Kerala stressed the fact that the land reforms in Kerala did not
yield the expected results. But it led to the transfer of ownership to a
series of intermediaries who did not have any direct involvement in
agriculture. The expectation that an environment conducive for
productivity improvement in agriculture will be nurtured by the land
reforms was misplaced. Meanwhile there was commendable productivity
improvement in plantation crops where restrictive ceiling provisions were
not laid. However, the effect of land reforms on the productivity of
crops, especially plantation crops is not conclusively proved.
The land reforms helped the socially and economically weaker sections of
the population to become owners of their own homes. This was socially
90
significant but not economically. In the wake of the social change, the
state inherited an agrarian sector dominated by small and marginal
holdings, which are vulnerable as far as the scope of commercial farming
is considered
It altered the self sustaining and regenerating common property resource
management system that has been prevalent in the villages of Kerala
irreversibly. Before the implementation of the land reforms, the grazing
lands, ponds and other types of water bodies were common pool
resources of the village managed by private persons or religious
institutions. But when the land was distributed as surplus land, there was
nobody responsible to maintain these common assets. They were
abandoned or converted to other uses.
The small size of the holding is a deterrent in sustaining the agricultural
ambitions of majority of the farmers in the state. However, at present, the
system of informal leasing of land is practised. This new practice alters
the ecological interrelations in farming. The lessee with no long term
interest in the fertility of the soil taps the fertility intensively with over-
use of the agricultural chemicals.
91
The data as per the 59th Round of National Sample Survey showed that
out of the estimated 2.1 million farmer households in the state, 6.6 per
cent leased- in land during the first crop season ( Kharif ) and 5.35 per
cent in the second crop season( Rabi ). Though there is no conclusive data
on the extent of land leased in as a proportion of the operated area, the
data on the type of activity indicate that the land is put to intensive
cultivation.
The state-level data on tenancy are considerably underestimated because
of several problems. Since tenancy has been declared to be illegal under
the sections 72 L, 73 and 74 of the Kerala Land Reforms Act, most of the
tenancies are oral and both lessors and lessees may not report the terms of
agreement. Besides the location-specific characteristics of the lease
agreement may not be captured by a state-level survey.
The distribution of number of tenant holdings by the length of tenure and
average size of owned and leased-in area in a sample study is described in
Table3.5.The data indicate that immediately after the implementation of
the 1970 Act there was significant reduction in the number of tenant
holdings but after 1990, there is a reversal in the situation with around 62
per cent of sample under study entering into leased land cultivation.
Further, those who took up lease cultivation owned small plots of land
92
only. The average size of owned holdings was higher for those who
entered tenancy prior to 1970.
Table 3.5
Distribution of number of tenant holdings by Length of tenure with
average size of owned and leased- in area
Year of origin No. of Tenant
Holdings
Average Size of
Owned Area
(cents)
Average Size
Leased-in Area
(cents)
Up to 1970 18(14.4) 52.3 19.7
1971-1980 8(6.4) 15.6 17.1
1981-1990 22(17.6) 15.3 14.5
1991-2000 77(61.6) 17.0 11.0
Total 125 21.68 13.25
Source: Omana Cheriyan (2003)
Lease Land Farming
When paddy cultivation became a non-lucrative affair, farmers of the
state deserted paddy fields. Kudumbashree found this as an opportunity.
Neighbourhood Groups of the mission were given encouragement to start
paddy cultivation. Many groups have identified the immense potential of
lease land farming. Lease land farming is beneficial both to the landless
poor women of Kudumbashree Neighbourhood Groups and the land lords
who are not cultivating the land on their own. Kudumbashree gives prime
importance for the economic empowerment of the indigent masses,
especially the poor women of Kerala. Began in April1, 1999, this 10 year
project includes three components micro credit, entrepreneurship and
empowerment. In 2004, leased land farming was done in 3466.65
93
hectares of paddy fields. 33501 families, hailing from 3703 NHGs got
benefited.
Data on informal leasing as practised in Kerala is furnished below in
Table 3.6. More than 16,000 Hectares of land has been brought under
cultivation of paddy, under various districts till 2005.
Table 3.6
Lease and Farming as on 31.03.2005
Sl.No Districts No.of NHGs
No.of
families Area in Hectares
1 Thiruvananthapuram 1506 18709 508.53
2 Kollam 1940 13886 380.58
3 Pathanamthitta 727 16300 2055.35
4 Alappuzha 3373 45811 1951.1
5 Kottayam 1074 11720 540.9
6 Idukki 6565 68331 2794.95
7 Ernakulam 3139 29368 2541
8 Thrissur 794 12383 599.19
9 Palakkad 1315 12065 801.57
10 Malappuram 337 3120 552.12
11 Kozhikode 1146 12291 520.89
12 Wayanad 1073 15662 1445.97
13 Kannur 2860 24835 1012
14 Kasaragod 1743 13432 429.51
State 27592 297913 16133.66
Source: Planning Board, 2005.
Estimates of income from tenant cultivation of different crops were made
by various researchers ( Cheriyan,2003; John, 2004; Veron,1999).