[ Extracts from the Famine Commission's Report, 1901.'] 

 (Part III, Section VI. Pages 106-111) 



INDEBTEDNESS IN THE BOMBAY PRESIDENCY. 



326. The indebtedness of the Bombay ryot has for many years 

 engaged the earnest attention of the Supreme and Provincial Govern- 

 ments. We agree with the analysis of the causes of such indebtedness 

 made by the Deccan Riots Commission ; but we desire to call special 

 attention to the agrarian system introduced by the Survey Settlement 

 as an accentuating cause of indebtedness, and more especially to the 

 unrestricted right of the cultivators to transfer their holdings which 

 the Survey Settlement recognised. A brief exposition of the leading 

 features of this agrarian system is necessary to explain our meaning. 



327. The salient features of the system are, (a) the creation of a 

 territorial unit of land revenue assessment, which is called 'the field' ; 

 (h) the assessment of land revenue on each 'field' independently, each 

 thus becoming a separate holding ; (c) the recognition of the recorded 

 occupant of 'the field' as possessing complete proprietary rights over 

 it, subject only to the payment of the revenue or tax assessed on it ; 

 and, (d) the punctual recovery of the tax from the recorded occupant 

 in bad years as in good. 



328. The system was devised for small cultivators ; there was no 

 intention to ^create large holdings. "There would seem," wrote Captain 

 Wingate, one of the authors of the system, "to be few grounds for 

 anticipating the establishment of wealthy agriculturists cultivating 

 large farms under any circumstances in India. Our measures have 

 to be framed for the class of small farmers who now prevail univer- 

 sally." Accordingly, the 'field' was designed to contain "the extent 

 of land capable of being cultivated by a pair of bullocks." This was 

 the theory ; but the facts of existing holdings and their boundaries 

 were accepted and fitted, as best might be, into the new scheme. 



329. The recorded occupier of each 'field' under the Survey Settle- 

 ment became the recognized owner, subject to the payment of a 

 moderate land tax. His rights as owner were, says Captain Wingate, 

 "absolutely free from all conditions except the simple one of 

 discharging the Government tax." But this condition was to be 

 rigidly enforced. In the discussions which preceded the adoption 



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