Zamindari,Ryotwari, Mahalwari system In India

A

t the time of independence there were three types of land tenure prevailing in India. They were the Zamindari system, the Ryotwari system and the Mahalwari system. The basic difference between these systems was made of payment of land revenue. But in this three systems the usual practice was, land cultivated by the tenants.

Tenants themselves were three types

1) Occupancy tenants ---- enjoyed permanent and heritable rights on land, eligible to claim compensation from the land lord.

2) Sub tenants ----- appointed by the occupancy tenants. They did not have any security as tenure.

3) Tenant at will ---- appointed by the land lord and did not have security as a tenure could be evicted from the land at any time.

Now we discuss the three main intermediaries system of land one by one.

Zamindari system   ---- This system was started during the British period in India. The pioneer of this system was Lord Cornwallis. This system came in to its form when in 1973 British government entered in to permanent settlement with land lords with an interest to increase the revenue of the company. Under the system the landlords (Zamindars) were full proprietors of this large area of land and they were responsible to collect the rent from the farmers. Actually Zamindars played a role of intermediaries between the cultivators and the state. But this system suffered from a numbers of defects. Zamindars snatched a large portion of produce as a form of tax without participating personally in the productive process. During the time of independence this system prevails in West Bengal, Bihar, Orissa and Uttar Pradesh. Due to this kind of exploitation cultivator was left with no surplus to invest for better implement.

Mahalwari System -----William Bentinck introduce this system in 1833.At the time of independence the system was extended at the large area of north west frontier of India, Agra, Madhya Pradesh, Punjab. In this system land was divided in to mahals each mahal comprise one or more village. The responsibility to collect the land revenue and depositing it in the treasury was on the village head man.

Ryotwari system ------Under this system the responsibility for paying the tax to the government was on individual rayot or cultivator himself. In this system cultivators had full power on their land they could not be evicted from the land as long they were paid land revenue. This system was initially introduced in Tamil Nadu and latter extended on the other area. Though this system emerge some satisfactory result, but cultivators were failing on the trap of Mahajans and money lenders. In this area Mahajans and money lenders granted loan to the cultivators for cultivation and social purpose by mortgaging their valuable lands. If the cultivators were unable to return the amount then a substantial portion of land slipped out from their hand. The cultivators then enforced to cultivate as a tenant on their own land and the new Zamindars class emerged in Ryotwari system also.

After independence it was found that these intermediaries systems were the main cause of stagnation of our agriculture system. Poor farmers were exhausted and they are unable to do better implementation on agriculture sector. More over due to slip out a large portion of produce the capital to reinvest on land was limited.