Part II
Crooke’s picture of society in the late 1800s is very educative
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/JatHistory/message/2128
Subject: Condition of the Jats in 17th century Rajastan
for he shows how following 1857(and earlier) the British enshrined the Jagirs/zamindaris grated by the Muslim to the Rajputs. /Talukdars (all revenue collectors for them), and gave over in slavery entire populations to them.
Not only that, they also acted to use their force to protect the rajputs.
This sad state of affairs did not last very long, for the Jat resistance rose up again, and names like Mirdha, Arya,
The Jat awakening in Rajastan- 20th century CE
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/JatHistory/message/2055
Luxman Burdak ji has been bringing up much material on this.
William Crooke was a British Civil Servant at the end of the 19th century.
Out of his observations he wrote some books one was “
The North West Provinces of India- 1897, Reprinted 1975- Cosmo Publications, New Delhi
Which was a compendium of his observations on Indian society.
His observations of society in north India are worth noting.
As can be seen, in then Haryana (Haryana, Punjab, Western UP,) the Jat Khap system with its Panchayati Raj stayed intact, despite all the turmoil of the past thousand years, and it could not be destroyed by the British, the Muslim or the feudal Rajput.
The British interest was revenue generation. To further this they confirmed the rights of the petty landlord, the Rajput Thakur, the Talkudar, the Nawab the Raja, and he writes:
“AS THEY ACCEPTED OUR SUPREMACY AND SURRENDERED, WERE CONFIRMED IN THE LORDSHIP OF THEIR ESTATES BY VIRTUE OF SANADS OR TITLE DEEDS, CONFERRED BY THE BRITISH GOVERNMENT.
FROM THE POINT OF VIEW OF THE OPPONENTS OF THIS MEASURE, A BODY OF PEASANT PROPRIETORS WAS MADE OVER, BOUND IN CHAINS TO THE MERCY OF THEIR HEREDITARY OPPRESSORS”
The Provinces of Agra and Oudh, were created after 1857, when Western U.P, was taken away from Haryana, called the province of Agra, and merged with that Oudh (Lucknow).
The forms of the society were different.
In the Oudh province, he found what he called, the land of great landlords and a depressed peasantry. The land being controlled by just three hundred families. This was a feudal system and “at the head of rural society stood the ruling Rajput or Mohammedan families, and beneath them was a mass of tenant farmers with no proprietary rights”.
“The Raja had the right of collecting the Government share of the produce; he governed the foreign policy of the sept; made levies for war or repair of the central fort; he exercised the power of judge deciding disputes among his subjects.”
This process of feudalization took various shapes In some cases grants of waste lands were made to some enterprising soldier or courtier- who was from the first practically independent, and all cultivators settled by him were his villeins, DESTITUTE OF ANY RIGHTS EXCEPT WHAT HE CHOSE GRANT OR COULD BE INDUCED TO SELL.
The Jat republican society was different.
The wonder is that they could not be subdued, and retained their society under the nose of the Muslim power.
Ravi Chaudhary
Some quotes:
“Gaining authority by one or more of these varied modes was developed the Talukdar or overlord, who is such a prominent personage in Oudh politics”
“The Talukdars, as they accepted our supremacy and surrendered, were confirmed in the lordship of their estates by virtue of Sanads or title deeds, conferred by the British Government.
FROM THE POINT OF VIEW OF THE OPPONENTS OF THIS MEASURE, A BODY OF PEASANT PROPRIETORS WAS MADE OVER, BOUND IN CHAINS TO THE MERCY OF THEIR HEREDITARY OPPRESSORS.”
“ they comprise the old feudal chiefs, mostly Rajputs, some of whom have embraced Islam; mushroom Talukdars, generally officials of the Oudh Court ; lastly, loyal grantees, mostly Panjabis, who were granted estates by our Government in consideration of Mutiny services”
In contrast, this he has to say about the Jats of Western U.P
“THE JATS-
Let us turn from this picture to the most instructive example of a peasant proprietary. We have the subdivision of Kosi, on the western bank. Of the Jumna, in the Mathura district, where fifty-five per cent of the cultivated area is held by JATS; except a few resident shopkeepers and menial servants here every one is to some extent a proprietor.
The revenue is realized by the headmen, and in the whole tract there is not a single land-holder of any social position.
Here we find a distinctly low level of social life. The land is held by a mass of peasants, devoted to a career of rather sordid drudgery there are none of those amenities which we are prone to associate with civilization.
There is no man head and shoulders above his neighbors; no Talukdar, with his showy equipages, his ill-devised rambling house, adorned with European furniture and gaudy French pictures, no half-educated swashbuckler, who frequents cities and loves to attend Darbars; no horde of tawdry menials.
On the other hand, the wealth derived from the soil is more evenly distributed. There is a more general average of comfort, less grinding poverty; steady, laborious industry is devoted to agriculture in a land where the seasons are less propitious and the fields of less abundant fertility.
But the race is more manly and robust, the tone of daily life more free, honest and self-reliant. And when times grow hard, the heavens withhold the rain, the hail sweeps over the ripening fields, the Jat somehow manages to brave the storm of trouble, while the Oudh serf sinks into beggary.
It has been the habit to speak of these village communities as if they were the ideal form of land tenure. And indeed when we compare them with the serfage of Oudh they have much to recommend them.
The great advantage of this form of tenure is that the income is not spent to humour the extravagance of some magnate, who has no capital to spend on developing the resources of the country and no real desire to aid in the improvement of the condition of the people. Whatever is gained from the annual harvests is spent in securing the rude comfort of hundreds of industrious households.
The peasant here has a future of prosperity before him; the petty holding, barren and irresponsive to his labour though it may be, is yet his own. If he can save he devotes his capital to widening the bounds of his heritage. He will endure a life of ceaseless labour and the most grinding economy if he can add but one rood to his birthright. He will sink the savings of years in building a well which is the only form of stable improvement in which he has confidence.
He is learned in the tending of cattle; he loves the great white cow and his pair of sleek oxen as if they were his children and he will starve himself rather than that they should lack their daily provender. In almost every farm is the brood mare whose produce he sells year by year at a profit. Drought may wither the crops, famine and disease may ravage the household: war may destroy the accumulations of generations, and the fields may lie barren for a season. But when the storm of calamity blows over the yeoman returns to his homestead and starts afresh his meager farm supported by the help and sympathy of his brethren.
The best example of this recuperative power of the peasant classes is shown in Colonel Baird Smith's celebrated Report on the famine of 1860, where he proves that by that time all trace of the disaster of 1837-38 had quite disappeared in the western Doab.
At the same time it would be incorrect to attribute this rapid recovery altogether to the village system. The peasant of the Upper Duab recovered his position so rapidly mainly because his wants were so few and his appliances so limited.
The chief danger to him in time of drought is the loss of his plough cattle. The rain seldom fails for two seasons in succession, and if he can save his oxen or purchase a new team he can easily borrow a small supply of seed grain. Then he at once restores his ruined hut, sets his plough to work, and after a year or two he is nearly as well off as he ever was before.
But it may be said that such local quarrels are equitably settled by the council of greybeards who sit under the old pipal tree, yet it is our law which has sapped the authority of the village council.
Thus, by the gradual influence of our administration and changes in practice tentatively introduced, the bond which held the village community together has been seriously weakened,”
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I would suggest the thread be left alone, and not removed, so that we can remind ourselves of how we suffered and more importantly how our ancestors fought back and gained freedom , not only for themselves but for the entire Indian people.
Zamindari was abolished thanks to the efforts of the Jats- Sir Chotu Ram, and Ch. Charan Singh being two prominent leaders.
Others may please add the names of those others who sacrificed so much and made great contributions.
Ravi Chaudhary
art II