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Country Politics and Agrarian Systems: Land grab on Bengal frontiers, 1750–1800

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  06 April 2017

DAVID LUDDEN
DAVID LUDDEN*
Affiliation:
History Department, New York University, United States of America Email: del5@nyu.edu
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Abstract

The forceful expropriation of land, labour, water, and other productive resources is fundamental for processes of agricultural expansion and intensification. What is known today as ‘land grab’ was theorized by Marx as ‘primitive accumulation’ and by David Harvey as ‘accumulation by dispossession’. Today it is most prominent and controversial in Africa, where the governments of India and China are major perpetrators; and it also drives most contemporary urban expansion in India and China. This article deploys David Washbrook's idea of ‘country politics’ to explore the process of land grabbing in the early-modern expansion of agrarian Bengal, where local peasant society and worldwide imperial political economy came together to expand frontiers of farming in what is now the Sylhet District of Bangladesh.

Type
Research Article
Information
Modern Asian Studies , Volume 51 , Special Issue 2: New Directions in Social and Economic History: Essays in Honour of David Washbrook , March 2017 , pp. 319 - 349
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2017 

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References

1 Washbrook, David A., ‘Country Politics: Madras 1880–1930’, Modern Asian Studies, vol. 7, no. 3, 1973, pp. 475–531 CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

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14 Navdanya describes ‘the war on farmers’ by ‘the speculative economy of global finance’, http://www.navdanya.org/news/174-the-great-land-grab-indias-war-on-farmers, [accessed 8 January 2017].

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16 See the report by Tiana, Hanqin, Bangera, Kamaljit, Boa, Tao and Dadhwal, Vinay K., ‘History of Land Use in India During 1880–2010: Large-scale Land Transformations Reconstructed from Satellite Data and Historical Archives’, Global and Planetary Change, vol. 121, 2014, pp. 78–88 CrossRefGoogle Scholar, http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0921818114001283, [accessed 8 January 2017].

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23 For the Madras Presidency, see Stein, Burton, Thomas Munro: The Origins of the Colonial State and His Vision of Empire, Oxford University Press, Delhi, 1989 Google Scholar.

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25 See David Ludden, ‘India's Spatial History in the Brahmaputra-Meghna River Basin’, in Re-Writing the Northeast, Neeladri Bhattacharya (ed.), forthcoming.

26 Selections are published in Firminger, Walter K. (ed.), Sylhet District Records, Assam Secretariat Printing Office, Shillong, 1917 Google Scholar. All citations here refer to Sylhet District Records volumes in the Bangladesh National Archives. Citation format is: SDRVolNum.page:LetterDayMonthYear; thus Volume 291, pp. 2–3, Letter dated 1 October 1779 appears as SDR291.2–3:1Oct79. Some spellings and punctuation have been changed in quotations.

27 Ludden, David, ‘Imperial Transitions in Agrarian South Asia: Sylhet and Tirunelveli, 1770–1820’, in The Eighteenth Century in South Asia: New Terrains. A Centennial Tribute to Pratul Chandra Gupta, Chakravorty, Subash Ranjan (ed.), The Asiatic Society, Kolkata, 2012, pp. 105–129 Google Scholar; and Ludden, David, ‘The Process of Empire: Frontiers and Borderlands’, in Tributary Empires in Global History, Bang, Peter Fibiger and Bayly, C. A. (eds), Palgrave Macmillan, London, 2011, pp. 132–150 CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

28 See Ludden, Peasant History.

29 Borah, M. I. (trans.), Bararistan-I-Ghaybi (A History of the Mughal Wars in Assam, Cooch Behar, Bengal, Bihar and Orissa During the Reigns of Jahangir and Shah Jahan, by Mir Nathan), Government of Assam, Guhauti, 1936, pp. 110–111 Google Scholar.

30 Ahmed, A. B. M. Shamsuddin, ‘Muslim Administration in Sylhet 1303–1765’, in Sylhet: History and Heritage, Ahmed, Sharifuddin (ed.), Itihas Samiti, Dhaka, 1999, p. 342 Google Scholar.

31 SDR294.156:12Dec86.

32 SDR291.55:3Nov79.

33 Eaton, Richard M., The Rise of Islam and the Bengal Frontier, 1204–1760, University of California Press, Berkeley, 1994 Google Scholar. Iqbal, Iftekhar, The Bengal Delta: Ecology, State and Social Change, 1840–1943, Palgrave Macmillan, London, 2010 CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

34 The Assam Phase includes a six-year interlude in the Province of Eastern Bengal and Assam between 1905 and 1911. See Ludden, ‘Spatial History and National Territory’.

35 Calculated from Firminger, Walter K. (ed.), The Fifth Report From the Select Committee of the House of Commons on the Affairs of the East India Company (Dated 28th July, 1812), R. Cambray, Calcutta, 1917, Vol. 2, p. 403 Google Scholar; and Census of India, 1961, Report on the Population Estimates of India, Government of India, Delhi, 1962, p. 71 Google Scholar.

36 Guha, Amalendu, Planter Raj to Swaraj: Freedom Movement and Electoral Politics in Assam, 1826–1947, Indian Council of Historical Research, New Delhi, 1977 Google Scholar.

37 For more details, see Ludden, David, ‘The First Boundary of Bangladesh on Sylhet's Northern Frontiers’, Journal of the Asiatic Society of Bangladesh, vol. 48, no. 1, 26 June 2003, pp. 1–54 Google Scholar.

38 SDR300.106:30Dec90; SDR301.64:29July91 again stresses that all landowners in Sylhet pay only in cowries.

39 Maloney, Clarence, People of the Maldive Islands, Orient Longman, Bombay, 1980, pp. 112, 126, 137, 417Google Scholar.

40 Yang, Bin, ‘The Rise and Fall of Cowrie Shells: The Asian Story’, Journal of World History, vol. 22, no. 1, 2011, pp. 1–25 CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

41 Perlin, Frank, Monetary, Administrative, and Popular Infrastructures in Asia and Europe, 1500–1900, Ashgate, Brookfield, Vermont, 1993, pp. 152–163, 270Google Scholar; Hogendorn, Jan and Johnson, Marion, The Shell Money of the Slave Trade, Cambridge University Press, New York, 1986 CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Wicks, Robert S., Money, Markets and Trade in Early Southeast Asia, Cornell University Press, Ithaca, 1992, pp. 28–72 Google Scholar.

42 SDR293.126–131:24Sept84.

43 Yang, Bin, ‘Horses, Silver, and Cowries: Yunnan in Global Perspective’, Journal of World History, vol. 15, no. 3, 2004, pp. 281–322 CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

44 Fazl, Abul, Ain-i-Akbari, volume I, trans. Blochman, H., Low Price Publications, Delhi, 1927, pp. 34, 136–137 Google Scholar.

45 Copper and silver coins officially replaced cowries in the 1820s, but Montgomery Martin indicates that cowries still circulated in Sylhet in the later nineteenth century. See Martin, M., The History, Antiquities, Topography, and Statistics of Eastern India [comprising the Districts of Behar, Shahabad, Bhagulpoor, Goruckpoor, Dinajepoor, Puraniya, Ronggopoor, and Assam], volume III, Cosmo Publications, Delhi, 1976, p.128 Google Scholar. I have heard personal accounts of cowries circulating in twentieth-century Sylhet.

46 Lindsay, Robert, ‘Anecdotes of an Indian life’, in Lives of the Lindsays; or, A Memoir of the Houses of Crawford and Balcarres, volume III, Lord Lindsay [his brother], second edition, John Murray, London, 1858, p. 176 Google Scholar.

47 Bareh, Hamlet, ‘Khasia-Jaintia State Formation’, in Tribal Polities and State Systems in Pre-Colonial Eastern and Northeastern India, Sinha, Surajit (ed.), K.P. Bagchi, Calcutta, 1987, pp. 264–267 Google Scholar. SDR312.141:7April1800: Iron ore in ‘immense quantity . . . is extracted and brought down by [Khasias] for sale and compose a principal article of their traffic with the natives in Sylhet.’ SDR297.48:29May88; SDR297.54:12May88.

48 SDR300.56–57:2Sept90: ‘Wax, ivory, and iron principally come from Cutchar and Jointah from whence limestone are not procured. But these articles as well as Mugadooties are brought to sale in the lowlands by the Cosseah traders . . .’

49 Lindsay, ‘Anecdotes’, p. 164.

50 SDR291.8–9:2Dec77. SDR291.18:Jul78: ‘the Chaudries of Chumtullah . . . as well as all the Hill people have been accustomed to draw their stock of grain from Sunamganj and the Bazars adjacent’ (SDR299.62:31Dec89).

51 Lindsay, ‘Anecdotes’, p. 190. Abul Fazl describes hunting elephants in khedah (Fazl, Ain-i-Akbari, volume I, p. 295). Lindsay, ‘Anecdotes’, pp. 190–197, describes khedah hunting techniques. Elephants suffered high mortality in captivity: SDR291.24–25:15Oct78 reports that of 217 elephants caught, only 112 survived. SDR291.18:Jul78 reports that of 221 elephants caught from Kartick to Byshack 1187, 106 died.

52 SDR303.45–47:26Oct92. Other Europeans also did business in tusks.

53 Habib, Irfan, Atlas of Mughal India: Political and Economic Maps with Notes, Bibliography and Index, Oxford University Press, Delhi, 1982, Map, 11BGoogle Scholar.

54 van Schendel, Willem, Francis Buchanan in Southeast Bengal (1798), United Press, Dhaka, 1992, p. 137.Google Scholar J. B. Bhattacharjee, “The Kachari (Dimasa) State Formation”, H. K. Barpujari (ed.), The Comprehensive History of Assam, Volume 2, Assam Publication Board, Guwahati, 1992, pp. 391–397, pp. 186, 194.

55 Comilla District Records, I, The Institute of Liberation Bangabandhu and Bangladesh Studies, 2000, pp. 49–52.

56 Lindsay, ‘Anecdotes’, pp. 198–202. The ships were the Sylhett (400 tons), Highland Green (260 tons), Beauty (160 tons), Tyger (150 tons), Buffalow (140 tons), and Rhinoceros (140 tons), for which Lindsay petitioned to acquire ‘the established freight [allowance] for 15000 bags of rice to Madras’, which he undertook ‘to Purchase at Backergunge from the Honourable Company and load free of all Charges for 1 Rupee per Maund’; SDR292.57:29Mar83.

57 Bareh Pakem, ‘State Formation in Pre-colonial Jaintia’, in Sinha, Tribal Polities and State Systems, facing p. 244, also pp. 261–306.

58 SDR304.11–17:20Apr93.

59 SDR299.72–74:15Jan90.

60 SDR298.7:(nd)Dec88.

61 SDR295.122–30:(nd)Nov87. SDR299.34:5Nov89.

62 SDR294.53:31May84. SDR293:24Sept84. SDR293.156:1May85. SDR295.122–130:(nd)Nov87. Index values for Bengal Presidency jamma are 100 in 1767, 137 in 1776, and 164 in 1784: Datta, Rajat, Society, Economy, and the Market, Manohar, New Delhi, 2000, p. 334 Google Scholar. Revenue demand on Rajshahi Zamindari increased only 18 per cent from 1765 to 1784: Mahmood, A. B. M., The Revenue Administration of Northern Bengal, National Institute of Public Administration, Dacca, 1970, pp. 28 Google Scholar, 32, 34, 42.

63 SDR293.156:1May85. SDR306.21–25:19Aug94.

64 SDR306.21–25:19Aug94. The first available district budget, in 1794, shows a total annual expense of Rs.1,31,144, and total jamma of Rs.2,90,554, leaving a balance of Rs.1,59,410, which, at the current exchange rate, translates into 8,36,900 Kahans, more than the Sylhet jamma in 1776, which was now available for remittance to Calcutta.

65 See Kolff, Dirk H. A., ‘The End of an Ancien Regime: Colonial War in India, 1798–1818’, in Imperialism and War: Essays on Colonial Wars in Asia and Africa, de Moor, J.A. and Wesseling, H.L. (eds), E.J. Brill, Leiden, 1989, pp. 22–49 Google Scholar

66 Forrest, G.W. (ed.), ‘Memoirs Relative to the State of India’, in Selections from the State Papers of the Governors-General of India, volume II, Blackwell, Oxford, 1910, p. 22 Google Scholar.

67 Bruce, Robert, Historical View of Plans for the Government of British India and Regulation of Trade to the East Indies and Outlines of a Plan of Foreign Government, of Commercial Economy, and of Domestic Administration, for the Asiatic Interests of Great Britain, Sewell, Cornhill, and Debrett, London, 1793, p. 14 Google Scholar.

68 SDR292.31:12Mar83.

69 SDR292.61:29Apr83.

70 This was the figure in 1794. SDR306.38–43:10Oct94.

71 SDR299.72–74:15Jan90.

72 SDR302.29:13Mar92. SDR301.33.:25May91. SDR301.15:13Apr91.

73 SDR304.11–17:20Apr93. SDR307.7–12:10May&8July95.

74 SDR293.126–129:24Sept84.

75 SDR291.41:26Jun79.

76 Lindsay, ‘Anecdotes’, p. 177.

77 Ibid., pp. 177–178.

78 The mode of this trade quickly changed after 1783, when Lindsay and other European merchants no longer resided in Panduah but rather made ‘advances . . . to the Inhabitants of the lowlands bordering upon the Cosseah Country’, who procured limestone as ‘contractors for the delivery of the stones to the manufacturers’. SDR300.57–59:2Sept90.

79 In 1790, seven Europeans owned 120,000 ferrahs of chunam in Sylhet markets, and 50 Natives owned 50,000 ferrahs. (1 ferrahs = 1 Maund, 10 Seers.) SDR300.63:2Sept90.

80 SDR300.57–59:2Sept90: ‘The mode of getting the stone in the first instance is by purchasing a Stone Hill from Cosseah Rajahs . . . Chunam manufacturers are then permitted to break the Hill and draw the limestone from thence.’

81 Lindsay, ‘Anecdotes’, p. 186.

82 SDR292.50–51:(nd)1783.

83 He added, on a personal note, ‘I have been in a constant state of warfare with the Cosseahs or Inhabitants of the mountains from whence the [lime]stones are drawn’, and ‘I have myself sustained considerable loss’: SDR293.92–93:1Mar84; SDR293.95:(nd)Mar84.

84 SDR293.119:4Sept84.

85 SDR304.38:30June93.

86 SDR295.84–88:11Jul87.

87 SDR295.104–105:23Oct87.

88 SDR295.97:5Sept87.

89 SDR295.47:(nd)Apr87.

90 SDR295.136:16Nov87.

91 SDR297.15:8Feb88.

92 SDR297.17:11Feb88.

93 SDR297.47:10Apr88.

94 SDR297.131:19Sept88. SDR298.116–118:13June89.

95 SDR297.122:5Sept88.

96 SDR298.172:1Sept89. One indication of recovery is that in August 1789, the Collector realized 107,533 Kahans revenue, compared to 55,779 Kahans in August 1788.

97 SDR297.70:12June88: ‘. . . amongst the Waddadar Farmers, Zemindars, and Ryotts there is no property independent of the produce of the land . . . In this District whenever inundation or any other calamity occasions a loss of crops on the ground the Company's Revenue will of course suffer. There is no accumulated wealth to supply the temporary deficiency. . .’.

98 SDR294.53:31May84.

99 SDR294.69:6Sept84.

100 SDR294.97–98:25Jun85.

101 Lindsay protected Gowar Hari Singh, Willes did not. He wrote to the Board that, ‘when [Gowar Hari Singh] bought the lands at the Company's Sales, he was Peshcar in charge of the Collections of the District, he was Wadaddar for the several Talooks, and he was also Shroff. From this you will judge what oppressive modes were pursued to establish his Zemindaree and how little such a Zemindaree is entitled to the protection of the Government’: SDR297.113:1June89. Willes later concluded that documents which Lindsay had used as judge to confirm the original purchases were fraudulent: SDR299.12–14:(nd)Sept89. Gowar Hari and his cousin and partner, Prem Narayan, held land and mortgages in many Sylhet localities: SDR299.43–45:28Nov89. In 1792, his personal estate consisted of land in 22 parganas with 17,678 Kahans jamma, of which 11,888 were in Chowalis: SDR302.43–46:23Apr92. His Janglah purchases were moreover the biggest land purchases at government auction up to that time; his purchases in 1783 and 1784 amounted to 39 per cent of the total sold in the four years after 1781. See footnote 107 below.

102 SDR294.53:31May84.

103 SDR293.156:25Jun85.

104 SDR294.118–119:4Feb86. SDR297.72–73:12June88.

105 India Office Records, Bengal Revenue Consultations, P/52/31, 10 June 1791, quoted in Datta, Society, Economy, and Market, pp.146–147, where Datta finds seven estate sales from 1776 to 1793 and 43 per cent purchase prices over 200 per cent jamma. Datta concludes that this sale price pattern ‘suggests a buoyant land market in this period’ (1724–1793), by the standards of the day.

106 In response to Collector Willes’ hostility, Gowar Hari Singh organized a petition campaign against him, focusing particularly on his conduct regarding the Hustabood measurement-registry of landholdings, to which Gowar Hari objected as a violation of his landholding rights. Willes defended himself at length. The case continued in the court and in 1793, Gowar Hari Singh's vakil arrived in Sylhet, under government orders to present ownership papers. Diwani Adalat and the Board of Revenue nullified his purchase of Lunglah, which was returned to original proprietors. SDR304.8–17:20Apr93.

107 SDR301.15:13Apr91.

108 SDR301.15:13Apr91.

109 SDR301.59:26July92.

110 SDR301.29–30:21May91.

111 SDR304.11:20Apr93

112 SDR305.8–19:(nd)Sept93. Two more estates were sold in 1793 for 350 per cent their jamma. SDR306.60–63:8Nov94. Datta, Society Economy and Market, p. 146, also shows an increase, during the 1780s, in the jamma-proportionate sale price of the small number of estates in his sample.

113 SDR295.117:14Nov87.

114 SDR295.136:16Nov87.

115 SDR295.122–130:(nd)Nov87.

116 SDR297.17:1Feb88.

117 SDR297.48–50:29Mar88.

118 SDR297.70:12June88.

119 SDR306.21–25:19Aug94.

120 SDR297.48–50:29Mar88.

121 SDR297.54–61:12May88.

122 SDR297.93–95:5July88.

123 Ibid.

124 SDR298.45:12Jan89.

125 SDR297.154:15Dec88.

126 SDR297.164:18Dec88.

127 Ibid.

128 SDR298.45:12Jan89.

129 SDR198.59:12Jan89.

130 SDR298.48:12Jan89.

131 SDR298.49:12Jan89.

132 SDR298.50:12Jan89.

133 SDR298.49:12Jan89.

134 SDR298.60:3Feb89.

135 SDR298.98:17Apr89.

136 SDR298.116–118:13June89.

137 SDR298.102:10May89.

138 SDR298.127:18June89.

139 SDR298.119:12June89.

140 SDR298.119–121:14June89.

141 SDR298.126:14June89.

142 SDR298.131:21June89.

143 SDR298.144–146:6July89.

144 SDR298.151–152:22July89.

145 SDR298.165–172:31Aug89.

146 SDR299.36:13Nov89.

147 SDR299.24–30:19Oct89.

148 SDR299.24:19Oct89.

149 SDR299.33:31Oct89.

150 SDR85.37:20Jan90.

151 SDR299.79:21Jan90.

152 SDR299.80:21Jan90.

153 SDR299.84:2Feb90.

154 SDR299.87:7Feb90.

155 SDR299.101:21Feb90.

156 SDR299.107:3Apr90.

157 All Europeans had to register to work in Sylhet with the Collector. In 1793, the Collector ordered one European whom he suspected of encroaching on the Jaintia Raja's timber business to stop his resident dealings in Jaintia and to work only through Jaintia contractors, as a condition for the renewal of his registration. SDR304.69:18Sept93.

158 ‘Companyganj’ first appears in SDR306.145–147:18Jun97.

159 SDR300.56–57:2Sept90.

160 SDR302.31–32:26Mar92.

161 SDR303.7–8:24Aug92.

162 SDR304.38–39:1July93.

163 SDR305.8–19:(nd)Sept93.

164 SDR305.8–19:(nd)Sept93.

165 SDR308.27–28:15Sept97. When the Board inquired about lingering Khasia claims at Bongong, Willes again said that they never had a valid claim and did not possess one now that the land had been reclaimed from jungle for cultivation. SDR308.51:11Oct97.

166 SDR306.126–127:8Sept95.

167 SDR309.51–55:12May98.

168 SDR305.8–19:(nd)Sept93.

169 These figures are from a sample of 35 sales in 1793 and exclude atypical cases from the northern frontier in Bunsicoorah and other ‘devastated parganas’ toured by Willes in 1789.

170 See Willes in SDR297.126:5Sept88 and again, as quoted below, in SDR300.141–144:24Oct91.

171 SDR300.141–144:24Oct91.