Workers, peasant and tribal movements of Maharashtra
Deccan riots 1874
In May and June 1875, peasants of Maharashtra in some parts of Pune, Satara and Ahmednagar districts revolted against increasing agrarian distress. The Deccan Riots of 1875 targeted conditions of debt peonage (kamiuti) to moneylenders. The rioters’ specific purpose was to obtain and destroy the bonds, decrees, and other documents in the possession of the moneylenders.
As Indian agriculture was drawn into the world economy, credit, commerce, inequality and growth were interrelated. The cultivators’ distress resulted from falling agricultural prices, heavy taxation, and a sense of political powerlessness. The commercialization of agriculture under British land revenue policies burdened small peasants by placing a premium on access to credit to finance productive investments in the land. Employing capital advanced by European merchants, local moneylenders obtained unlimited title to the property and labor of their debtors; it gave them the “power to utterly ruin and enslave the debtor.” During the 19th century, they used this power to control peasant labour, and not their land, which was of little value without people to work it.
These changes in agriculture undermined the communal traditions which had been the basis of Indian village life. Access to common resources declined steadily because various forms of joint use were misunderstood by the British, access to the forests was restricted, and the British redefined the state’s relationship to pastoral communities. Vasudeo Balwant Phadke launched a violent campaign against British rule in 1879, aiming to establish an Indian republic by driving them out. However, his insurrection met with limited success. Someone betrayed Phadke to claim a bounty offered by the British; he was arrested and deported to Aden, where he died of a hunger strike in 1883.
Talasari Movement
This movement took place in the western India in Maharashtra in Thane district including the areas Jawahar , Dhanu, Mukhada,Talasari. The movement has Varli and Kathkeri tribe in its centre. The movement was cause of the exploitation of the tribes since centuries by pourtugal, Britishers, Marathas and now by the government.
During the colonalisation period the tiller Adivasis had to pay 50-60% of revenue to these colonised landlords. The Marathas simultaneously created a class of landlords called ‘Panderpesahas’. Once the Portuguese had been driven off, most of the lands were occupied by these Panderpeshas, who like their predecessors employed tenants at will and kept slaves. These Panderpeshas were usually of the higher castes (Brahmins and Prabhus) that received lands on low rates of assessment, and also held high offices, often acting as agents for the commandants of the hill forts. They also kept slaves largely to till their land. As for the tribals who were still occupying the larger parts of the up-land regions and growing ‘nachni’ (a coarse grain) some of them had already becom e the slaves of the Panderpeshas.
The Maratha system of revenue farming and increasing powers to the village head-men had led to exorbitant taxes and levies on the tribals. The tribals suffered much oppression at the hands of patils and talatis. While under the regime of the Britishers the things were liberalised to some extent but the pesantisiation didn’t reduce. The policy of the Britishers under Rayotwari System to give uniform land settlement under revenue collection for some period led to migration of people from other places. The most significant influx was however of the Marwari Vani, a trading community from Rajasthan, Lingayats from South Deccan and Bhatias from Kutch and Gujarat, as traders, moneylenders and shopkeepers. Alongside the Marwari, the Muslim and the Parsi communities were also to become dominant in terms of both landholding and trading. The Muslims had settled as traders in timber and grass and the Parsis had entered the liquor business. A large number of tribals who took advantage of the reduced rate of assessment to become independent ryots had to rely on the local money-lender both for seed capital and consumption loans; the right of alienation legalised the transfer of land to the moneylender, who in a short period of time acquired the status of a landlord. Thus, when grain was advanced for seed, interest equal to the quantity borrowed was generally charged, where-as for consumption loans (‘khavti’) to the tribal, interest in kind, equal to one half the quantity borrowed was payable at the next harvest. This led to the debt rodden tribals to sell their land to money lenders due to vicious cycle of debt. The larger land-holding ryots usually let out their lands to tribals, who cultivated it on the payment of a fixed rent. Many became tenants of Brahmin landholders under the ‘ardheli’ system. The absence of any institutional infrastructural facilities like credit, markets, protection against alienation and lack of education rendered the tribal an easy prey to the exploitation -by the money-lender and landlord.
Bombay Textile Strike
The general strike of the Bombay textile operatives, including about 150,000 workers, resulted from the gradual accumulation of grievances with regard to wage reductions and working conditions, to remedy which no efforts were being made by the leaders of the official Bombay Textile Union and the All-India Trade Union Congress. That it was no flash-in-the-pan or sudden response to irresponsible agitators is evident from the stubborn and united struggle of all the workers, which has already been in process for over two months.
The speeding up introduced in a selected number of mills last January led to a partial strike, but owing partly to the pronounced hostility of the Textile Union, led by Mr. N. M. Joshi, the General Secretary of the All-India Trade Union Congress, the workers were held back for a time. By the middle of April, the strike recommenced, and the number of strikers rapidly increased. On April 23 there occurred the incident in which the police opened fire on a procession, killing one and wounding others. The next day saw the proclamation of the general strike by the so-called “extremist” Strike Committee and the unanimous response of the workers.
It was not until the general strike was actually in being that the officials of the T.U.C. altered their attitude of aloofness and hostility. When the strike re-started in the middle of April, the strikers were supported only by the Weavers’ Union (Girni Mahamandal) and by the Workers’ and Peasants’ Party organisation, which had already been instrumental in founding a fighting trade union, the Mill Workers’ Union, during the previous month. N. M. Joshi and the other leaders of the Bombay Textile Labour Union (which itself only included less than 10,000 members) momentarily agreed to enter a Joint Strike Committee, but actually refused to attend a single meeting. On April 19, Joshi was still saying that he did not know the exact causes of the unrest, and that his union would have to be content to look on. As the strike still grew, his union discovered that the workers were suffering from direct and indirect wage reductions, and it appointed a committee “to get more information before deciding whether a general strike was desirable.”
Meanwhile, the general strike took place, and the Left-Wing leaders pressed once more for a Joint Strike Committee. Joshi’s Union met on April 25 and declared in favour of a joint committee of forty, provided they had 50 per cent. of the seats. The existing strike committee suggested ten representatives from the Textile Labour Union, ten from the Girni Mahamandal, five from the Mill Workers’ Union and fifteen representatives from among the unorganised strikers. In spite of negotiations during the next two days, no agreement was reached. The reports in the Press declared, “so far as the strikers are concerned, it is no exaggeration to say that the extremist group is temporarily dominating the situation.”
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