Under this part of the project, the data for villages and towns have to be computerised, duly matching the villages (by making suitable adjustments in cases in which boundaries have been altered subsequent to 1961), and arranging the data in a common format (which would also permit preparation of maps showing locations) for data entry. It was decided that the data, thus coded and stored, would be made available to researchers and the public. The analysis and computerisation of census data was taken up only in two States - Kerala and Tamil Nadu. Data for Kerala have been collected, collated, and computerised. The analysis is in progress. Work in Tamil Nadu is nearing completion. The analysis of the data is yet to begin. After the work in these two States is completed and based on that experience, the work for the other two States, Andhra Pradesh and Karnataka will be taken up.
Status reports
Preparation of status reports was taken up in all the four States, based on the census monograph series for the different census years as well as studies done by individual researchers and institutions such as village surveys done by ICRISAT and ISEC, annotated bibliography prepared by IDS (SUSSEX), and resurvey of villages (by MIDS). This part of the work has been completed for all the four States. The reports were reviewed in a workshop and the researchers have revised their papers on the basis of suggestions for revision and modification. The Programme will publish these status papers.
Restudies of villages
Restudy of a sub-set of 1961 Census villages (under Part III of the project) is divided into two phases: (i) the first phase consists of a quick comparative analysis of the changes in socio-economic and cultural conditions of the selected villages as between 1961 and the present; and (ii) the second phase comprising a comprehensive study of the factors and the processes facilitating and retarding changes in the villages. Resurvey proposals were examined at a workshop held in August 1998. Based on the recommendations of the workshop, resurvey of a total of four villages from Kerala, two each from Andhra Pradesh and Tamil Nadu, and one from Karnataka was decided. The first phase of the study for all the villages conducted in 1998-'99 has been completed and the draft reports are available. It may be of interest to provide a brief account of the changes noted in these villages, as reported in the first phase reports.
D. Narasimha Reddy has taken up the restudy of Koth Armur village in Andhra Pradesh. The village is located in Nizamabad district and had been surveyed thrice earlier; in 1929-'30 and 1949-'50 by Kesava Iyengar and in 1961 by the Census of India. The restudy in 1998 was done by selecting 30 per cent of the village households. The highlights of the restudy are the following: (i) The land ownership pattern among caste groups has undergone significant changes over time. The dominant castes in the village have lost their land to a considerable extent. In the process, the backward and the Scheduled Castes have gained. The purchase of land has been made mostly by the backward castes and the average size of their holding has also increased. (ii) The cropping pattern has shifted from rice and coarse grains to cash crops. (iii) The source of irrigation has shifted from canal to wells and tube wells since the early seventies. The shift in irrigation has induced changes in the cropping system: farmers now practise crop rotation with maize with turmeric in the Kharif, and vegetables in the Rabi seasons. (iv) Profitability of the new crops is estimated to be very high. As a result, there is all round prosperity in the village. (v) Considerable changes have occurred in the labour market. There has been increasing casualisation; the practice of hiring labour has shifted from time rate to piece rate and to the contract system. Non-farm employment has increased, especially in trade and commerce. (vi) In recent years, there has taken place large-scale out-migration of labour; what is more interesting here is that, together with the upper castes, the backward and Scheduled Castes workers also migrated not only to the nearby urban centres, but to the Middle East as well. There are 30 migrants from the locality belonging to the backward and Scheduled Castes in the Gulf. Remittances are used for purchasing land. (vii) The middle class has grown in the village and the consumption pattern has undergone changes. About 15 per cent of the households possessed two wheelers such as scooter and motor bike; 51 per cent has television sets and 11 per cent of the households has telephones. (viii) It is estimated that between 25 to 35 per cent of the households is below the poverty line. (ix) Coming to the caste-economy nexus, it is noted that the traditional land lord caste (the gurudiruddies) have lost much of their dominance; the guratikapus, another dominant caste in the village is a major beneficiary of the new growth, due largely to their hard-working women.
Among backward castes, the gondala caste has gained upward mobility; the other castes could not improve their positions. The Scheduled Castes also gained partly because of the improvement in their access to land, partly due to the increase in demand for labour, and partly due to migration to Gulf countries.
G. Parthasarathy and Ani Nirmala have taken up the restudy of Ungatla village in West Godavari district of Andhra Pradesh. This village had been surveyed in 1916 by S. Narayanamurthy, in 1936 by P. J. Thomas, and in 1961 and 1971 by the Census of India. This is a dry village falling in the upper regions of West Godavari and was noted for its palmgur industry that provided a major source of livelihood for the local population. With the disappearance of the palmgur industry, villagers had to fall back largely on agriculture for their subsistence. In the year, 1966, the village was electrified. Consequently, tube-well irrigation became popular and provided a big push to production and the growth of the economy of the village. The major changes noted by the researchers include the following: (i) The cropping pattern shifted from dry rice cultivation to irrigated rice and sugar-cane cultivation. Roughly 50 per cent of the cultivated areas is under sugar-cane.
The larger holdings invested mostly in well irrigation and the small and the marginal holdings are left behind. They have to purchase water from the larger holdings. The medium and the large holdings cultivate most of the sugar-cane. Coconut and cashew replaced all the palm trees. (ii) The labour market in the village has undergone significant changes over time. With the development of agriculture, labourers engaged earlier in the gur industry have shifted to agriculture. The employment opportunities in the nearest urban centres absorbed a good number of workers from the village. The real wages of agricultural workers did not increase over time. (iii) Though there is decline in general poverty, the majority of the agricultural labourers remain below the poverty line. (iv) The agricultural surplus generated in the village has been moving to other areas.
Though the economy has grown over time, inequalities still exist due to uneven distribution of assets. (v) Regarding the caste-economy nexus, the study has the following observation: "We find change and development in a section of the population and continuity and backwardness in another section. The Kammas and a few other land-owning households from other communities adopted the changing technology like tube well irrigation, high yielding varieties and cash crops and improved their economic position. The lowest in the social ladder, the Scheduled Castes, who could not improve their access to land assets remained mostly as landless agricultural labourers leading a hand-to-mouth existence". The study also points out the extent of environmental degradation caused due to excessive extraction of ground water.
The changes noted in the two villages studied in Tamil Nadu have also shown trends similar to those noted in Andhra Pradesh. R. Rukmani has taken up the restudy of Arkavadi village in Villipuram district. This village was surveyed by Census of India 1961. In the early sixties, this was a small-sized village with 150 households. Vanniars were numerically dominant followed by Reddis and Scheduled Castes. Access to land was quite high for all the caste groups and landlessness was quite low. Coarse cereals and groundnut were the major crops. Today, though agriculture continues to be the sole economic activity in the village, the nature of agriculture has undergone major changes. Well irrigation has come up in a large way for Arkavadi and there is a tendency to produce commercial crops for the market. A sugar mill has been set up in a nearby village and sugar-cane is a major crop in the village. Coupled with commercialisation of agriculture there has taken place increase in the pace of fragmentation of land holdings.
A system of attached labour - Padiyal - still prevails. Together with control over land, the numerical dominance of the Vanniars has also increased; more than three-fourths of the population in the village are Vanniars. Scheduled Castes have become highly mobile and have been migrating out to a very significant extent. Out-migration is an important survival strategy adopted by the villagers. The landed households do mortgaging (15 per cent of the households) of their land and in most cases, it constitutes the first step towards its sale.
J. Jayaranjan has restudied Illuppakkorai village located in Thanjavoor district of Tamil Nadu. This village was studied earlier in 1959-'60, and later in 1985-'86, for doctoral dissertation by students of Madras University. The main changes noted by the researcher are the following: (i) Changes between 1959-'60 to 1985-'86: during this period, there was a crisis in rice cultivation due to the Cauvery water dispute. This crisis combined with the policy of monopoly procurement of rice by the State, and the militancy among the Scheduled Caste labourers, drove the upper caste landowners towards restructuring their cropping pattern from rice to sugar-cane and banana. Extensive cultivation of sugar-cane combined with banana cultivation could lead to considerable reduction in the intensity of demand for workers during the peak season - a counter strategy of the land owners towards labour militancy. (ii) The crop shift was followed by mechanisation. The small and marginal holdings, which were latecomers to adoption of technology and the new set of conditions, were to borrow for purchase of inputs and services. (iii) Since the mid-eighties there has been a shift back from sugar-cane and banana to rice presumably because the land in the village was found ecologically more suited to rice than to the other two crops. Over the time, concentration in land holdings has declined. On the one hand, the proportion of land operated by the larger size holdings has declined; at the other end, the marginal and landless purchased land. (v) The changes in the land market are also closely related to the changes in the labour market. About 40 per cent of the households now gets their income from the service sector. Some households have migrants working in the West Asian countries. Interestingly, 20 per cent of the households is involved in moneylending. (vi) Increased prosperity has brought in the consumer culture in the village. Two-thirds of the households have television sets; more than one-half of the households has LPG connections, a two wheeler and a mixy; about one-fourth of them has refrigerators and one-tenth of them has telephone connections.
Unlike the changes noted in Andhra and Tamil villages, the progress noted in Kerala villages is different in many respects. Sanal Mohan restudies Naduvannur village in Kozhikode district. The village, surveyed earlier by Census of India 1961, has a multi-ethnic population. In the sixties, rice and coconut were the dominant crops in the village.
Rice has now virtually disappeared and coconut remains the most important crop. However, the yield of the coconut crop did not increase over the time. The 1961 Census reported that the village had traditional industries such as handloom and pottery. Both these activities have virtually disappeared by now. Some of the other significant changes noted in the village are the following: (i) All the sections of the population make use of the educational opportunities. In 1961, 50 per cent of the people was illiterate. Now, virtually there is no illiterate in the village. The spread of higher education among the people is phenomenal. However, the economically advanced sections have succeeded in making better progress in education. (ii) Agricultural income now constitutes roughly about 10 per cent of the average households' income. Bulk of the labour force is engaged in non-agricultural activities. (iii) Ownership of land has undergone significant change. In the early sixties, Tiyyas (a backward caste) were mostly agricultural labourers and marginal farmers. While the upper caste (Nairs) lost bulk of their land, Tiyyas gained considerably in the process. There is no landless household in the village thanks to implementation of the land reforms. (iv) The quality of housing has improved for all the sections, so also the possession of consumer durables. (v) How has the process of change in the village affected the caste/economy nexus? The following observation in the report provides some insight.
"The Nairs of the village were traditionally landowners and they more or less retain their status in the community, though there has been occupational mobility positively and negatively. In the case of Tiyyas they have been reeling up the social ladder showing significant trends of upward mobility. Muslims were small-time traders and agriculturists. This advantageous position continues with certain gains brought in by overseas migration".
G. K. Rajendran restudied Anthikkad village in Thrissur district. This village had been surveyed in 1934 by T. K. Sankara Menon and subsequently by the Census of India 1961. Some of the interesting changes noted by Rajendran are summarised below: (i) Ezhavas (a backward caste) dominated the ethnic composition of the population in 1961 - about 70 per cent. Christians constituted only 2 per cent in 1961. Owing to out-migration of Tiyyas and in-migration of Christians since 1961, Christians constitute at present 22 per cent; (ii) In 1961, 63 per cent of the households did not own land, but today there is no landless household in the village. Most of the households owned land between 50-100 cents; (iii) Coconut is the most important crop. With the commissioning of the Peechi irrigation project, the whole land in the village has shifted from single crop to double crop rice. However, in recent years, due to increase in input cost and scarcity of labour people keep their paddy land fallow or convert it into house plots; (iv) There have occurred tremendous improvements in infrastructure, especially transport and communication; (v) People in the village have made use of the educational opportunities and the village has a high percentage of the labour force with high educational attainment; (vi) Toddy-tapping is the only traditional occupation that survives in the village; (vii) There has been considerable diversification of the economic activities of the population. In 1961, only four per cent of the workers were salaried with eight per cent of them women. The percentage of casual workers increased from 8 to 25 per cent. (viii) Twenty per cent of the households reports migrant workers in the Gulf and dependence on foreign remittance. A good number of workers find employment in the nearby urban centres too. (ix) Out of the 130 households surveyed, only four households were found to be below poverty line (<Rs 22000).
Chaya K. Degaonkar restudied the Hardanoor village in Gulbarga district of Karnataka. The village had been earlier surveyed by the Census of India 1961. The distribution of land in the village is very much influenced by its caste structure. Eighty per cent of the households possesses land. Health and educational facilities are yet to reach the village. Seventy per cent of the population in the village is illiterate. Only children of the upper and middle castes go to school. With availability of water from the Upper Krishna Irrigation Project, some changes have occurred in agriculture. There is some shift towards cotton and gram. The proportion of agricultural labourers in the labour force has increased. Non-agricultural activity has not grown in the village. Bulk of the credit needs is met from informal sources. In sum, winds of modernisation have not reached the village. External stimulants, i.e., irrigation, transport, and communication have not succeeded in bringing about desired changes in the socio-economic structure of this village.
Preliminary reports of the phase I studies were discussed in a workshop held in May 1999. Several problems relating to methodology and focus of the study were discussed at length in the workshop. The discussion ranged from the question of 'defining' a village (in the context of changing socio-economic characteristics and geographical boundaries) to that of observing changes from an 'insider's' view as different from an 'outsider's' view. It was also emphasised that since 'what has happened' has already been looked into, it is important to look intensively into 'why it has happened so'. The workshop was of the view that in the second phase, the political power dynamics, and changes in land holding patterns, labour market structures, investment patterns, consumption standards, and credit facilities should be looked into carefully. Similarly, the growth and diversification of social and economic institutions (e.g., banks, schools, panchayats, and health care centres on the one hand, and caste, religion, family norms of women's role in society etc., on the other) need to be studied in-depth. The second phase of the project is progressing satisfactorily.
Thematic village studies
As part of the village restudy project, an additional component was included to restudy villages which were earlier subjects of study by university faculties and other scholars who themselves had conducted the earlier studies. These enquiries, apart from the topic of the research of the earlier enquiry, will cover (i) changes in the caste composition of the village; (ii) changes in land ownership and control over the time; and (iii) changes in the contractual arrangements in production. At present, these thematic studies are undertaken for Andhra Pradesh and Tamil Nadu only. A brief overview of these studies is given below.
Andhra Pradesh
Under the project 'Thematic Re-survey of Villages', seven studies have been completed - one by an ex-M.Phil scholar of CDS and six by seven senior faculty members of the three universities of Andhra Pradesh viz. Osmania, Kakatiaya, and Hyderabad. Of these seven studies, four relate to Telengana region, two to Coastal Andhra, and one to several tribal settlements spread over Rayalaseema, Coastal Andhra, and Telengana regions. Out of the seven, three studies are on tribal village settlements and four, on villages with multi-caste and non-tribal composition in the plains, two from Telegana and two from the delta area of Andhra. Overall, the seven studies tried to portray the transformation processes taking place in rural Andhra.
The reference period of the studies varied. The longest period is for a village from the prosperous Krishna district of delta (coastal) area of Andhra, covering as many as 112 years, from 1885 to 1997. At the other end of the spectrum, there are a couple of studies that covered only a short period of seven to eight years, from 1991-'92 to 1998-'99.
The remaining four studies covered periods ranging from 40 to 60 years - two studies covering 40 years, one 50 years, and the other 60 years. By and large, all the studies paid special attention to analysis of rural transformation that occurred in the independence period, in particular the last three decades of the 20th century.
The tribal villages
Of the three studies on tribal people, two relate to settled agriculture and one to the more primitive stage of food gathering/hunting communities.
The settled tribal peasants have been subjected to political and market forces transforming their lifestyles and economic conditions. Penetration of non-tribal outsiders with investible capital from the developed regions, armed with new technology and cultivation methods, has led to a transition of the area from subsistence to commercial agriculture, with non-food cash crops such as cotton taking over an important role.
Besides de-peasantisation of tribesfolk, inter-locking of the agrarian markets and an overall deterioration of the economic condition of the native tribal population are the striking features of these villages.
In the more primitive food-gathering, seasonal fishing, and hunting villages, changes have occurred in the lifestyles of the people but only extremely slowly in terms of some improvement in housing, health and hygiene, education and economy. The tribal people's response to interventions by the government is found to be, in general, positive.
Non-tribal Telengana villages
In the non-tribal plain villages of Telengana, which had been earlier dominated by the rent-seeking and hegemonic landlords of the semi-feudal variety, significant transformation has occurred during the past two-to-three decades. The spread of the Naxal movement generating political awakening among the peasantry, technological upgradation, commercialisation of agriculture, growth of non-farm employment in rural informal sector, and in some villages Gulf remittances led to radical changes in the inter-caste politico-economic balances of the peasantry vis-…-vis the hegemonic landlord class. Peasant capitalism appears to have made successful inroads into the erstwhile semi-feudal Telengana villages.
Delta-Andhra Villages
As for the prosperous Delta-Andhra, assured irrigation has led to mono culture of rice which later acted as a catalytic agent in the transition to commercialised agriculture, paving the way for the emergence of agrarian capitalism. Like in Telengana, the inter-caste economic balance has changed in favour of the working peasantry in Delta-Andhra during the post-independence period. Commercialisation of agriculture, new technology, state intervention, and a general awakening among the deprived groups and castes have altered the parameters of political economy in Delta-Andhra.
Tamil Nadu
The village studies being conducted in Tamil Nadu pertain in general to changes in community compositions and inter-community power relations, land tenures, cropping patterns, irrigation systems, and growth and diversification of the village economy. In the Thimmanaicken village of Pondicherry, the power structure seems to have tilted in favour of Vanniars and Dalits (backward communities), Reddiars, the traditional landlords, losing out in the process. With changes in irrigation facilities, crop patterns, land ownership system and employment status of the working class are found to undergo rapid change.In the backward village of Dharmapuri district also, the upper caste landowners are found to be losing ground to Dalits and other backward communities and land transfers taking place across various caste groups.
The Puduppatty village of Madurai district is experiencing rapid changes in its society with the traditional kinship structure breaking down consequent on introduction of irrigation. The dominant class of middle peasants is getting richer, more educated and spatially and occupationally more mobile. The Kaveri delta villages of Thanjavoor and Nagapattinam districts are also undergoing socio-economic transformation, but not all in the same direction. For example, in one village, land is owned by resident rice-farmers, who own and cultivate small plots of land. These farmers have prospered over time and the economy is growing steadily. In contrast, another village in the delta, where again rice is the dominant crop, is economically on the decline, due possibly to the fact that the land is owned by non-resident absentee landlords and that bulk of the agricultural produce flows out of the village.
In Aravakurichipatti, another Thanjavoor village, the village dynamics is centred on the irrigation organisation. Irrigation used to be the bone of contention among the different communities, with the Dalits taking the battering most of the time. With the economic structure undergoing changes, the backward communities are found asserting their water rights more forcefully in recent years.It is interesting to find out the material and social changes taking place in the village that topple the long-established power balances. Kaveripakkam (in Vellore district) is experiencing changes in its socio-economic structure due to changes in land ownership patterns, land tenure systems, and labour market conditions.
The Kariampalayam village in Coimbatore district witnesses quite a different type of change. Here scarcity of labour and falling ground water resources on the one hand and rising non-farm employment opportunities, on the other, have altered the power equations among different communities, strengthening the socio-economic status and bargaining strength of Dalits, particularly Dalit women, in the process.
In the Verkaty and Enathimelpakkom villages of Thiruvalluvar district, the phenomenon observed is the disappearance of common property resources, gender discrimination in employment, caste-based social discrimination, and food insecurity. Keelakkottai village of Thirunelveli district is undergoing rapid social transformation, with Dalits asserting their rights; however, with insignificant economic change. The study being done in the village examines the determinants and dimensions of this uneven development.
The Palkurichi village of Nagapattnam (surveyed in 1917 by Slater) situated at the tail end of the Kaveri delta has witnessed since the mid-1970s, drastic reduction and serious uncertainty in the availability of water for cultivation, and the emergence and growth of a strong labour union movement. However, the labour union in this area is found to follow a strategy of encouraging and promoting production efforts, quite a-typical of labour unions elsewhere in the country. Vilely landholders, the traditional custodians of agricultural land in the Arasilangudi village of Thiruvarur district, have been steadily losing control over land during the past half-a-century thanks to the socio-economic turmoil accelerated by the Kaveri water tangle. The extent of this change and its links with the production relations and economic conditions is an area worth investigation.
Several teams of researchers are looking into the village dynamics of Tamil Nadu, which presents thus a highly variegated mosaic. Their surveys are expected to be completed and the reports of their studies made available to KRPLLD by the end of December 2000. A final workshop is scheduled in early 2001. The final output of these studies is proposed to be published in the form of an edited volume under KRPLLD publication series.