Colonialism and the Countryside (Exploring Official Archives)

2.1 Core concepts

• Colonial rule was first established in Bengal, where the earliest attempts were made to reorder rural society and establish a new regime of land rights and a new revenue system (NCERT §1, p. 228).
• The Permanent Settlement came into operation in 1793; the East India Company fixed the revenue each zamindar had to pay, and estates of defaulters were auctioned (NCERT §1.1, p. 228).
• Over 75 per cent of the zamindaris changed hands after the Permanent Settlement; in the Burdwan auction of 1797, over 95 per cent of the sale was fictitious as the raja's own agents bought back his estates (NCERT §1.1-1.2, p. 228).
• The Permanent Settlement was made with the rajas and taluqdars of Bengal, who were classified as zamindars; the zamindar was not a landowner but a revenue Collector of the state, paying a revenue demand fixed in perpetuity (NCERT §1.2, p. 229).
• Reasons zamindars defaulted: (a) initial demands were very high; (b) it was imposed in the 1790s when agricultural prices were depressed; (c) revenue was invariable and had to be paid punctually; (d) under the Sunset Law, if payment did not come in by sunset of the specified date the zamindari was liable to be auctioned; (e) the Permanent Settlement initially limited the zamindar's power to collect rent (NCERT §1.3, p. 229-230).
• The Company disbanded zamindars' troops, abolished customs duties, and brought their cutcheries (courts) under the supervision of a Collector (NCERT §1.3, p. 230).
• Jotedars — rich peasants documented in Francis Buchanan's survey of Dinajpur — had acquired vast areas (sometimes several thousand acres), controlled local trade and moneylending, and got land cultivated by sharecroppers called adhiyars or bargadars who handed over half the produce (NCERT §1.4, p. 231).
• Jotedars resisted zamindars, mobilised dependent ryots, delayed revenue payments, and often bought up auctioned zamindari estates; they were strongest in North Bengal and were called haoladars, gantidars or mandals elsewhere (NCERT §1.4, p. 231).
• Zamindars resisted displacement through fictitious sale (benami) — agents bought back auctioned estates and refused to pay the purchase money, forcing resale until the estate returned cheaply to the zamindar; between 1793 and 1801 four big zamindaris made benami purchases yielding Rs 30 lakh (NCERT §1.5, p. 232-233).
• Lathyals (stickmen) of former zamindars attacked outside purchasers; ryots themselves felt bound to their zamindar as proja (subjects). Zamindari power finally collapsed only during the Great Depression of the 1930s (NCERT §1.5, p. 233).
• The Fifth Report, submitted to the British Parliament in 1813, ran into 1002 pages (over 800 pages of appendices) and became the basis of parliamentary debates on Company rule; recent research shows it exaggerated the collapse of zamindari power (NCERT §1.6, p. 233-235).
• In the Rajmahal hills lived the Paharias, who practised shifting cultivation — they cleared forest patches, scratched the ground with hoes, grew pulses and millets, and collected mahua, silk cocoons, resin, and wood for charcoal (NCERT §2.1, p. 236-237).
• Paharias raided plains for survival; zamindars on the plains paid tribute to hill chiefs, and traders paid tolls to use the passes (NCERT §2.1, p. 238).
• In the 1770s the British embarked on a brutal policy of extermination of the Paharias; by the 1780s Augustus Cleveland, Collector of Bhagalpur, proposed a policy of pacification giving chiefs an annual allowance (NCERT §2.1, p. 239).
• The Santhals began coming into Bengal around the 1780s; by 1832 a large area was demarcated as Damin-i-Koh, declared the land of the Santhals, with the stipulation that one-tenth be cleared in the first ten years (NCERT §2.2, p. 240-241).
• Santhal villages grew from 40 in 1838 to 1,473 by 1851; population grew from 3,000 to over 82,000 (NCERT §2.2, p. 241).
• Heavy taxes, high interest from moneylenders (dikus), and zamindari encroachment on the Damin pushed the Santhals to the Santhal Revolt of 1855-56 led by Sidhu Manjhi; after the revolt, the Santhal Pargana was created, carving 5,500 square miles from Bhagalpur and Birbhum (NCERT §2.2, p. 241-242).
• Buchanan was a physician in the Bengal Medical Service (1794-1815), conducted surveys for the Company, was an employee of the EIC, and his vision was shaped by commercial concerns of the Company — he saw forests as wasteful and wanted them cleared for cultivation (NCERT §2.3, p. 244).
• The Permanent Settlement was rarely extended beyond Bengal because, after 1810, rising prices benefitted zamindars but not the state with its fixed revenue; new territories used temporary settlements (NCERT §3.2, p. 247).
• The ryotwari system introduced in the Bombay Deccan settled revenue directly with the ryot; soils were classed, revenue-paying capacity assessed, lands resurveyed every 30 years and rates raised — influenced by David Ricardo's theory of rent (NCERT §3.2, p. 247-248).
• The first revenue settlement in the Bombay Deccan was in the 1820s; demands were so high that peasants deserted villages. A famine struck in 1832-34 killing one-third of cattle and half the human population of the Deccan (NCERT §3.3, p. 248).
• The Cotton Supply Association (1857) and Manchester Cotton Company (1859) were founded in Britain to find alternative cotton sources to America; when the American Civil War broke out in 1861, raw cotton imports from America fell from 2,000,000 bales to 55,000 bales by 1862 (NCERT §3.4, p. 249-250).
• Between 1860 and 1864 cotton acreage in the Bombay Deccan doubled; by 1862, over 90 per cent of cotton imports into Britain came from India. Ryots got Rs 100 advance for every acre planted with cotton (NCERT §3.4, p. 250-251).
• After the Civil War ended in 1865, American cotton revived; export merchants and sahukars stopped extending credit and demanded repayment. The next ryotwari settlement raised revenue by 50 to 100 per cent (NCERT §3.5, p. 252).
• The customary norm that interest could not exceed principal broke down; the Deccan Riots Commission recorded a case where Rs 2,000 interest was charged on a Rs 100 loan (NCERT §3.6, p. 253).
• The Limitation Law of 1859 held loan bonds valid for only three years, but moneylenders forced ryots to sign a new bond every three years rolling unpaid balance into a new principal (NCERT §3.6, p. 253-254).
• The Deccan Revolt began on 12 May 1875 in Supa (Poona district); ryots attacked sahukars, burnt bahi khatas and debt bonds, and looted grain shops. The revolt spread over 6,500 sq km and 30+ villages; 951 people were arrested (NCERT §3.1, p. 246).
• The Deccan Riots Commission report was presented to the British Parliament in 1878. The Commission was specifically asked to judge whether government revenue demand caused the revolt; it concluded that moneylenders, not government, were to blame — illustrating the colonial reluctance to admit popular discontent against government action (NCERT §4, p. 255).

2.2 Definitions to memorise

2.3 Diagrams / processes to remember

• Fig. 9.5 — Power in rural Bengal (p. 236): A flow chart showing Company → Zamindar (controls villages) → Jotedar (rich ryot/trader/moneylender) → Ryot → Under-ryot, with arrows showing revenue upward and loans/produce/rent downward.
• Fig. 9.15 — The cotton boom (p. 249): Index graph showing the rise and fall in cotton prices between 1860 and 1869.
• Timeline (p. 256): 1765 Diwani of Bengal; 1773 Regulating Act; 1793 Permanent Settlement; 1800s Santhals arrive in Rajmahal; 1818 First Bombay Deccan revenue settlement; 1820s Agricultural prices fall; 1840s-50s slow Deccan agrarian expansion; 1855-56 Santhal rebellion; 1861 Cotton boom begins; 1875 Deccan ryots rebel.

2.5 Timeline / Key events

2.4 Common confusions / NTA trap points

• Permanent Settlement vs Ryotwari: Permanent Settlement (1793, Bengal) was with zamindars and revenue fixed forever; ryotwari (Bombay Deccan, 1820s) was with individual ryots and resurveyed every 30 years. NTA often swaps the regions.
• Jotedars are NOT zamindars — they were rich peasants/village headmen who often resisted zamindars and bought their auctioned estates. They were strongest in North Bengal.
• Paharias practised hoe (shifting) cultivation; Santhals practised plough (settled) cultivation. The "hoe vs plough" contrast is the title metaphor of Section 2.
• Damin-i-Koh (1832) ≠ Santhal Pargana (post-1855-56). Damin-i-Koh was created BEFORE the rebellion as a Santhal homeland; Santhal Pargana was created AFTER the rebellion as a conciliatory administrative unit.
• The Deccan Riots Commission (1878) blamed moneylenders, NOT government revenue policy — although evidence pointed to both. The Fifth Report (1813) similarly exaggerated zamindari collapse. Both illustrate biases of official archives.
• The 1857 reference is not the 1857 revolt itself — British officials in 1875 feared the Deccan Riots would echo 1857, leading to the Commission of enquiry.