Abstract
This chapter examines the way in which agricultural markets affected peasant producers in Ahmednagar district, from the period of the cotton boom engendered by the American civil war, through the global recession of the 1870s to the period of famine crisis and its aftermath. An attempt is made to contrast the necessary conditions for market-led growth with those prevailing in the district at the time. The aim is to ask whether, in a poor dryland area, market forces helped or hindered smallholders. One of the effects of the famine crisis from 1876 to 1878 was an exponential rise in district foodgrain prices, from an average jowar price of one rupee three annas (l/16th of a rupee) per maund (80 seers) in 1873–74 to four rupees, two annas and six pice (l/12th of an anna) in 1877–78.’ This common famine phenomenon was at once the cause of widespread entitlements failure and, according to contemporary economic logic, an incentive for private trade to bring in sufficient food to prevent starvation. Yet, despite the opening of relief works, 66 per cent excess mortality was recorded in Ahmednagar during the famine as well as extensive emigration.2 Market forces were not entirely successful, therefore, in alleviating famine. But did they make it less — or more — likely to occur? Can this famine be linked, directly or indirectly, to the opening up of rural markets, or did it occur in spite of improved profits for some individuals?
This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.
Access this chapter
Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout
Purchases are for personal use only
Preview
Unable to display preview. Download preview PDF.
Notes
Karl Marx, Capital, Vol. III (Harmondsworth, 1981), pp. 215–16.
Thus the British sought to improve the output of foodgrain agriculture to support the development of commercial cotton growing in much the same way as, a century later, independent India attempted to reform the whole agricutural sector to support industrialisation by providing an increased net marketed surplus. In both cases Byres argues reasonably — but with little apparent concern for unviable smallholders’ prospects in transitional labour markets — that ‘the agrarian structure prevented such growth’. Terry Byres, ‘Land Reform, Industrialization and the Marketed Surplus in India: An Essay on the Power of Rural Bias’, in David Lehmann (ed.), Agrarian Reform and Agrarian Reformism: Studies of Peru, Chile, China and India (London, 1974), pp. 233–7.
John Hurd, ‘Railways’, in Dharma Kumar (ed.), The Cambridge Economic History of India, Vol. 2 (Cambridge, 1983), p. 743.
See de Waal, Famine That Kills, p. 7; Neeladri Bhattacharya, ‘Agricultural Labour and Production: Central and South-East Punjab’, in K. N. Raj, N. Bhattacharya, S. Guha and S. Padhi (eds), Essays on the Commercialisation of Indian Agriculture (Delhi, 1985), pp. 122–3
and N. S. Jodha, ‘Famine and Famine Policies: Some Empirical Evidence’, EPW, 10 (41) (1975), 1613–14.
Bina Agarwal, ‘Social Security and the Family: Coping with Seasonality and Calamity in Rural India’, in E. Ahmad, J. Dreze, J. Hills and A. Sen (eds), Social Security in Developing Countries (Oxford, 1991), pp. 217–18.
Martin Ravallion, Markets and Famines (Oxford, 1987) pp. 58–62.
Srinivasa Ambirajan, Classical Political Economy and British Policy in India (Cambridge, 1978), p. 100.
Secondary sources
Agarwal, Bina, ‘Social Security and the Family: Coping with Seasonality and Calamity in Rural India’, in Ahmad, E., Dreze, J., Hills, J. and Sen, A. (eds), Social Security in Developing Countries (Clarendon, Oxford, 1991), pp. 171–244.
Alamgir, Mohiuddin, Famine in South Asia (Velgeschlager, Gunn & Hain, Cambridge, MA, 1980).
Alavi, Hamza, ‘Peasants and Revolution’, in Gough, Kathleen and Sharma, H. P. (eds), Imperialism and Revolution in South Asia (Monthly Review Press, New York, 1973), pp. 291–337.
Ambirajan, Srinivasa, ‘Political Economy and Indian Famines’, South Asia, 1 (2) (1971), 19–28.
Ambirajan, Srinivasa**, ‘Malthusian Population Theory and Indian Famine Policy in the Nineteenth Century’, Population Studies, 30 (1) (1976), 5–14.
Ambirajan, Srinivasa**, Classical Political Economy and British Policy in India (Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 1978).
Anderson, F. G. H., Facts and Fallacies about the Bombay Land Revenue System (Self-published, Poona, 1929).
Arnold, David, ‘Looting, Grain Riots and Government Policy in South India 1918’, Past and Present, 84 (1979), 111–45.
Arnold, David**, ‘Famine in Peasant Consciousness and Peasant Action: Madras 1876–8’, in Guha, Ranajit (ed.), Subaltern Studies III (Oxford University Press, Delhi, 1984), pp. 62–115.
Arnold, David**, Famine: Social Crisis and Historical Change (Basil Blackwell, Oxford, 1988).
Arnold, David**, ‘Cholera Mortality in British India, 1817–1947’, in Dyson, Tim (ed.), India’s Historical Demography: Studies in Famine, Disease and Society (Curzon Press, London, 1989), pp. 261–84.
Baden-Powell, B. H., The Land Systems of British India, Volume 1 (Oxford University Press, Oxford, 1892).
Ballhatchet, Kenneth, Social Policy and Social Change in Western India, 1817–1830 (Oxford University Press, London, 1957).
Banaji, Jairus, ‘Capitalist Domination and the Small Peasantry: Deccan Districts in the Late Nineteenth Century’, Economic and Political Weekly, XII (33 and 34) (1977), 1375–1404.
Bayly, C. A., Indian Society and the Making of the British Empire (Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 1988).
Bhatia, B. M., Famines in India: A Study in Some Aspects of the Economic History of India with Special Reference to Food Problem, 1860–1990 (3rd edn, Konark, Delhi, 1991).
Bhattacharya, Neeladri, ‘Agricultural Labour and Production: Central and South-East Punjab’, in K. N. Raj, Bhattacharya, Neeladri, Guha, Sumit and Padhi, Sakti (eds.), Essays on the Commercialisation of Indian Agriculture (Oxford University Press, Delhi, 1985), pp. 105–62.
Boserup, Ester, The Conditions of Agricultural Growth (George Allen and Unwin, London, 1965).
Brennan, Lance, ‘The Development of the Indian Famine Code’, in Currey, Bruce and Hugo, Graeme (eds), Famine as a Geographical Phenomenon (Reidel, Dordrecht, 1984), pp. 91–111.
Brennan, Lance**, ‘Government Famine Relief in Bengal, 1943’, Journal of Asian Studies, 47 (1988), 542–67.
Buchanan-Smith, Margaret and Davies, Susanna, Famine Early Warning and Response: The Missing Link (Intermediate Technology, London, 1995).
Byres, Terry, ‘Land Reform, Industrialization and the Marketed Surplus in India: An Essay on the Power of Rural Bias’, in Lehmann, David (ed.), Agrarian Reform and Agrarian Reformism: Studies of Peru, Chile, China and India (Faber, London, 1974), pp. 221–61.
Catanach, Ian, Rural Credit in Western India, 1875–1930: Rural Credit and the Co-operative Movement in the Bombay Presidency (University of California Press, Berkeley, CA, 1970).
Catanach, Ian**, ‘Agrarian Disturbances in Nineteenth Century India’, in Hardiman, David (ed.), Peasant Resistance in India, 1858–1914 (Oxford University Press, Delhi, 1992), pp. 184–203.
Charlesworth, Neil, ‘Rich Peasants and Poor Peasants in Late Nineteenth-Century Maharashtra’, in Dewey, Clive and Hopkins, A. G. (eds), The Imperial Impact: Studies in the Economic History of Africa and India (Athlone Press, London, 1978), pp. 97–113.
Charlesworth, Neil**, Peasants and Imperial Rule: Agriculture and Agrarian Society in the Bombay Presidency, 1850–1935 (Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 1985).
Charlesworth, Neil**, ‘The Myth of the Deccan Riots’, in Hardiman, David (ed.), Peasant Resistance in India, 1858–1914 (Oxford University Press, Delhi, 1992), pp. 204–26.
Clay, Edward and Schaffer, Bernard, Room for Manoeuvre: An Exploration of Public Policy in Agriculture and Rural Development (Heinemann, London, 1984).
Currey, Bruce, ‘Coping with Complexity in Food Crisis Management’, in Currey, Bruce and Hugo, Graeme (eds), Famine as a Geographical Phenomenon (Reidel, Dordrecht, 1984), pp. 183–202.
Davis, Mike, Late Victorian Holocausts: El Nino Famines and the Making of the Third World (Verso, London, 2001).
Devereux, Stephen, Howe, Paul and Biong Deng, Luka, ‘Introduction’, IDS Bulletin, 33 (4) (2002).
Devereux, Stephen, Theories of Famine (Harvester Wheatsheaf, Hemel Hempstead, 1993).
Devereux, Stephen**, ‘Transfers and Safety Nets’, in Devereux, Stephen and Maxwell, Simon, Food Security in Sub-Saharan Africa (ITDG Publishing, London, 2001), pp. 267–93.
de Waal, Alexander, Famine that Kills: Darfur, Sudan, 1984–85 (Clarendon, Oxford, 1989).
de Waal, Alexander**, Famine Crimes: Politics and the Disaster Relief Industry in Africa (James Currey, Oxford, 1997).
de Waal, Alexander and Omaar, Rakiya, ‘The Lessons of Famine’, Africa Report (November 1992).
Dewey, Clive, ‘Patwari and Chaukidar: Subordinate Officials and the Reliability of India’s Agricultural Statistics’, in Dewey, Clive and Hopkins, A. G. (eds), The Imperial Impact: Studies in the Economic History of Africa and India (Athlone Press, London, 1978), pp. 280–314.
Dewey, Clive**, Anglo-Indian Attitudes: The Mind of the Indian Civil Service (Hambledon, London, 1993).
Digby, William, The Famine Campaign in South India, 2 Volumes (Longman, Green, London, 1878).
Drèze, Jean, ‘Famine Prevention in India’, in Drèze, Jean and Sen, Amartya (eds), The Political Economy of Hunger, Vol. II, Famine Prevention (Clarendon, Oxford, 1990), pp. 13–122.
Drèze, Jean and Sen, Amartya, Hunger and Public Action (Clarendon, Oxford, 1989).
Dutt, Romesh, Open Letters to Lord Curzon on Famines and Land Assessments in India (Kegan Paul, Trench, Trubner, London, 1900).
Dutt, Romesh**, ‘The Indian Land Question’, in Romesh Dutt (ed.), Land Problems in India (G. A. Natesan, Madras, 1903).
Dutt, Romesh**, The Economic History of India, Vol. I (Kegan Paul, Trench, Trubner, London, 1902).
Dyson, Tim (ed.), India’s Historical Demography: Studies in Famine, Disease and Society (Curzon Press, London, 1989).
Dyson, Tim (ed.)**, ‘On the Demography of South Asian Famines, Part I’, Population Studies, 45 (1991), 5–25.
Edkins, Jenny, Whose Hunger? Concepts of Famine, Practices of Aid (University of Minnesota Press, Minneapolis, MN, 2000).
Floud, Jean and Rangasami, Amrita (eds), Famine and Society (Indian Law Institute, New Delhi, 1993).
Frykenberg, R. E., Guntur District, 1788–1848: A History of Local Influence and Central Authority in South India (Clarendon, Oxford, 1965).
Greenough, Paul, Prosperity and Misery in Modern Bengal: The Famine of 1943–44 (Oxford University Press, Oxford, 1982).
Guha, Ranajit, ‘On Some Aspects of the Historiography of Colonial India’, in Ranajit, Guha (ed.), Subaltern Studies I (Oxford University Press, Delhi, 1982), pp. 1–9.
Guha, Sumit, The Agrarian Economy of the Bombay Deccan, 1818–1941 (Oxford University Press, Oxford, 1985).
Copyright information
© 2005 David Hall-Matthews
About this chapter
Cite this chapter
Hall-Matthews, D. (2005). Market Opportunities, Risks and Failures. In: Peasants, Famine and the State in Colonial Western India. Palgrave Macmillan, London. https://doi.org/10.1057/9780230510517_3
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1057/9780230510517_3
Publisher Name: Palgrave Macmillan, London
Print ISBN: 978-1-349-52538-6
Online ISBN: 978-0-230-51051-7
eBook Packages: Palgrave History CollectionHistory (R0)