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Indian Freedom Struggle (1707–1947 A.D.)

Notes by the Congress at its Faizpur session, which included demands for fifty per cent reduction in
land revenue and rent, a moratorium on debts, the abolition of feudal levies, security of tenure for
tenants, a living wage for agricultural labourers, and the recognition of peasant unions.
At Faizpur, in Maharashtra, along with the Congress session, was held the second session of the
All India Kisan Congress presided over by N.G. Ranga. Five hundred kisans marched for over 200
miles from Manmad to Faizpur educating the people along the way about the objects of the Kisan
Congress. They were welcomed at Faizpur by Jawaharlal Nehru, Shankar Rao Deo, M.N. Roy,
Narendra Dev, S.A. Dange, M.R. Masani, Yusuf Meherally, Bankim Mukherji and many other
Kisan and Congress leaders. Ranga, in his Presidential Address, declared: ‘We are organizing
ourselves in order to prepare ourselves for the final inauguration of a Socialist state and society.’
The formation of Congress Ministries in a majority of the provinces in early 1937 marked the
beginning of a new phase in the growth of the peasant movement. The political atmosphere in the
country underwent a marked change: increased civil liberties, a new sense of freedom born of the
feeling that ‘our own people are in power’, a heightened sense of expectation that the ministries
would bring in pro-people measures — all combined to make the years 1937-39 the high-water
mark of the peasant movement. The different Ministries also introduced varying kinds of agrarian
legislation — for debt relief, restoration of lands lost during the Depression, for security of tenure
to tenants — and this provided an impetus for the mobilization of the peasantry either in support
of proposed legislation or for asking for changes in its content.
The chief form of mobilization was through the holding of kisan conferences or meetings at the
thana, taluqa, district and provincial levels at which peasants’ demands would be aired and
resolutions passed. These conferences would be addressed by local, provincial and all-India leaders.
They would also usually be preceded by a campaign of mobilization at the village level when kisan
workers would tour the villages, hold meetings, enroll Congress and kisan sabha members, collect
subscriptions in money and kind and exhort the peasants to attend the conferences in large numbers.
Cultural shows would be organized at these conferences to carry the message of the movement to
the peasants in an appealing manner. The effect on the surrounding areas was powerful indeed,
and peasants returned from these gatherings with a new sense of their own strength and a greater
understanding of their own conditions.
Rise of Karshaka Sanghams
In Malabar, in Kerala, for example, a powerful peasant movement developed as the result of the
efforts mainly of CSP activists, who had been working among the peasants since 1934, touring
villages and setting up Karshaka Sanghams (peasant associations). The main demands around which
the movement cohered, were for the abolition of feudal levies or akramapirivukal, renewal fees or
the practice of policceluthu, advance rent, and the stopping of eviction of tenants by landlords on
the ground of personal cultivation. Peasants also demanded a reduction in the tax, rent, and debt
burden, and the use of proper measures by landlords when measuring the grain rent, and an end
to the corrupt practices of the landlords’ managers.
The main forms of mobilization and agitation were the formation of village units of the Karshaka
Sanghams, conferences and meetings. But a form that became very popular and effective was the
marching of jathas or large groups of peasants to the houses of big jenmies or landlords, placing the
demands before them and securing immediate redressal. The main demand of these jathas was for
the abolition of feudal levies such as vasi, nuri, etc.
The Karshaka Sanghams also organized a powerful campaign around the demand for amending the
Malabar Tenancy Act of 1929. The 6th of November, 1938 was observed as the Malabar Tenancy
Act Amendment Day, and meetings all over the district passed a uniform resolution pressing the
demand. A committee headed by R. Ramachandra Nedumgadi was appointed by the All Malabar
Karshaka Sangham to enquire into the tenurial problem, and its recommendations were endorsed
by the Kerala Pradesh Congress Committee on 20 November 1938. In December, two jathas of five
hundred each started from Karivallur in north Malabar and Kanjikode in the south and, after
being received and hosted by local Congress Committees en route, converged at Chevayur near
Calicut where the All Malabar Karshaka Sangham was holding its conference. A public meeting was

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