18 



INDEBTEDNESS OF THE LAND-HOLDING CLASSES. 



his land to cultivate at one-fourth the produce, assessment and seed 

 being supplied in the proportions of the landlord and tenant's interests 

 in the crop. When the tenant pays in kind, his payments may exceed 

 the amount of interest stipulated in the mortgage bond ; but he keeps no 

 account of such payments, and the creditor was found in all cases enquir- 

 ed into by the Commission to have no conception of his responsibility 

 for accounts 'on this head. As the responsibility cannot be enforced 

 by the ryot, it practically does not exist. Doubtless, most mortgagee 

 landlords have an account, but the ryot cannot get it without going to 

 court, which to him is out of the question. Another form of mort- 

 gage, which is usually entered into only when the parties have come to 

 a final settlement, is the transfer of the land to be enjoyed for a certain 

 number of years in satisfaction of debt (vivum vadium) ; it is usually 

 found, however, that before the period has expired the mortgagee has 

 established claims giving him a further lien on the land. A similar 



method of settlement by an instalment bond is 

 gladly accepted by a debtor, but here again the 

 failure to pay one instalment in a bad year usually gives the debt a 

 fresh departure. As above stated, the sowkar as mortgagee landlord 

 usually allows the ryot to cultivate the mortgaged land, and as 

 long as the ryot is left in this relation to his fields he accepts his 

 fate without much bitterness. It often happens, however, that owing 

 to default in payment by the tenant, or to better terms being offered 

 by another, or to the cattle and implements of the tenant being sold in 

 execution of a decree, it ceases to be the interest of the mortorag'ee 



* o o 



to leave the cultivation in the tenant's hands, and the land is then 

 taken from him. 



Instalment bonds. 



Labour bonds. 



Besides the security of the ryot's personal credit, stock, and 

 movables, house and lands, and the joint security 

 of a surety, the labour of the ryot is also drawn 

 into his dealings with the soivkar. This form of bond is not uncom- 

 mon in Ahmednagar, the terms being that the debtor is to serve the 

 sowkar, and that his wages are to be credited at the end of the year, 

 or that a certain sum is to be worked out by service to the soivkar for 

 a certain period. Sometimes the wife's labour is also included in the 

 bond. 



It is an almost universal practice to enter in bonds that "no pay- 

 ments are to be alleged by the debtor, unless they are certified 



