A release function for the book titled How do Small Farmers Fare? Evidence from Village Studies, edited by Madhura Swaminathan and Sandipan Baksi, was organised at the Tata Institute of Social Sciences (TISS), Mumbai, on November 29, 2017. The event began at 4 p.m. at the Library Conference Hall at TISS. The event was attended by about 80 students, scholars, and social scientists. Members from the All-India Kisan Sabha and the All-India Democratic Women’s Association were also among the audience.
The programme began with a brief introduction of the work of the Foundation for Agrarian Studies by Sandipan Baksi, Programme Coordinator of the Foundation. Sandipan talked about the detailed database on village India in diverse agro-ecological and socio-economic regions of the country, based on regular village surveys conducted by the Foundation under the Project on Agrarian Relations in India (PARI). The Foundation has surveyed 25 villages in 11 States of India under this project.
The book was released by Ashok Dhawale, President, All-India Kisan Sabha, who handed a copy of the book to the eminent economist, V. B. Athreya. This was followed by a talk by Ashok Dhawale, who traced the contours of the agrarian crisis facing the country today. The most prominent dimensions of the crisis, he noted, were the rising costs of agricultural inputs and stagnant prices of agricultural produce. Lack of support for institutional credit to the agricultural production system was another important aspect of the crisis. In addition, he emphasised the much-debated question of redistributive land reforms, which remains relevant to resolving the agrarian question in India.
V. B. Athreya’s talk focused on the small farm economy of India. He congratulated the editors on bringing out a book that is informed by a well established theoretical framework, as well as based on meticulously collected data through village surveys in different parts of the country. He discussed some of the important findings of the book to conclude that the main message of the book is in rejecting the romanticisation of small farms without abandoning the small farmer.
This was followed by a presentation by Madhura Swaminathan on the book. She began her talk by thanking the Rosa Luxemberg Stiftung for supporting the study by the Foundation on the small farm economy in India. The book is an outcome of this study. She described the book as an empirical enquiry on the claims made for the small farm economy, in terms of equity, economic efficiency, and ecological sustainability. This enquiry was mostly based on empirical material collected through carefully designed and conducted household and farm economy surveys by the Foundation. She highlighted the crisis of small farming in terms of the inability of small farmer households to generate adequate incomes to maintain a minimum standard of living. She underlined the growing tendency of proleterianisation of small farmers and the fact that small farms in India are far from being family farms. The evidence examined in the book, she clarified, does not substantiate the claims of the small farm economy being more efficient and profitable. Another striking feature of the evidence presented is of inequalities and differentiation within the study villages and across agro-ecological regions.
The last segment of the programme was a panel discussion moderated by R. Ramakumar, Professor, TISS, Mumbai. The panelists included S. L. Shetty, ex-Director of EPW Research Foundation, and Vijoo Krishnan, Joint Secretary, All-India Kisan Sabha. S. L. Shetty praised the book for the systematic and methodical work it reflects, and the range of issues it covers. He examined some of the issues raised in the book in the light of the data on farmers from the National Sample Survey Office (69th and 73rd rounds), to conclude that farming is no longer a viable occupation for the category of marginal farmers,[1] who constitute about two-thirds of the farming community in India. Vijoo Krishnan stressed the importance of in-depth and anlytical studies for the peasant movement in the country. Peasant organisations often suffer from an inadequate knowledge of various aspects of the problems of farmers which results in unreasonable demands. He gave the instance of the lack of understanding about the differentiation of the farmers in India, which further engenders the wrong notion of farmers as a homogenous entity. Studies, such as this book, he claimed, can help in countering wrong notions.
This was followed by an engaging discussion with the participants, moderated by R. Ramakumar. Professor Ramakumar took the opportunity to further discuss the importance of correctly analysing differentiation among farmers in India. He described how the policy regime in the country suffers from a systematic bias against small farmers.
[1] Marginal Farmers, as per the National Sample Survey Office defintion are farmers with operational holding size less than 1 hectare. Small Farmers operate on a land holding size between 1 to 2 hectares.
