Rethinking Physical Labour Under Tamil Nadu Cultivating Tenant Protection Act 1955
R. Arunodhaya, B.Com. LL.B. (Hons), Tamil Nadu National Law University
CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION:
Agriculture is the backbone of Indian economy. But India’s agrarian society got exploited by the land revenue system. It is marked as long-standing peasant exploitation under Zamindari system, Mughal and British Revenue system. In a while, British came up with British Permanent Settlement which worsen the Peasants where the Zamindars were intermediaries to the British but then they became a permanent holder of that land and peasants were reduced to tenants cultivator. In 1857, peasants began to revolt, often referred as Sepoy Mutiny against British land revenue policies and to abolish Zamindari system and compelled the British Government to pass Tenancy Occupancy Right Act, 1859. After India got Independence, it launched a development initiative called First-Five Year Plan which aimed at boosting agricultural production, implementing land reforms and abolishing intermediaries and rehabilitate the economy. Land reforms involves redistribution of surplus land from the landlord to landless which aimed to boost agricultural productivity and ensuring social justice. For this purpose, the government followed a six-point approach such as elimination of intermediaries such as zamindars, control over tenancy in favor of improved terms, imposition of ceilings on landholdings to redistribute excess land to the landless, consolidation of fragmented holdings for economy, encouragement of cooperative farming, and institution of a mechanism to resolve tenancy disputes.
The tenancy reforms in India, under land policy were very focused on rent control, protection of tenure and tenant, and transferring the ownership of rented land to tenants to encourage productivity and social justice. Prior to independence, tenants suffered from exploitative rents, insecure tenure, and regular evictions, leading to state-level legislation by limiting rents generally up to one-fourth to one-sixth of gross produce and prohibiting arbitrary eviction of tenants, restoring land to tenant if the landlord unfairly used for his personal cultivation and in certain instances, the tenant can acquire land ownership from the landlord. Notable states like Kerala, Jammu & Kashmir, and West Bengal effectively established tenant rights and ownership, whereas the rest of the states had limited effects owing to inadequate land records, landlord avoidance, poor administration, and political opposition.
