INDEBTEDNESS OF T^HE LAND-HOLDING CLASSES. 3t 



should impose ; and that the Government is prevented from protecting; 

 the actual cultivator, i.e., the expropriated owner, by a Tenancy Law. 

 Moreover, there is reason for believing that the refusal to recognize 

 actual facts in this connection has positively contributed to the people's 

 indebtedness. It is in evidence that the marwari or alien class of 

 money-lender, the most exacting of all, does not care to stand forth 

 as owner and cultivate the land. Had money-lenders of this class 

 been compelled to record their names, had the duties of proprietorship 

 been enforced against them, and had their sub-tenants been protected 

 against excessive rack-renting, these money-lenders would probably 

 have concluded that land was a less desirable investment than it has 

 been and is. 



339. Two ways of dealing with this first class of cases suggest 

 themselves, for we put aside as Utopian the re-purchase of the old 

 holdings by the State. One is to reinstate the old owners by coming 

 to a composition with the de facto owners, and by arranging for the 

 payment of the latter's claims by instalments. This method would, 

 we gather, be acceptable to Bombay opinion, and, if a practicable 

 means of enforcing it can be devised, it would no doubt be in every 

 way desirable. But we fear that, at best, it holds out but a slender 

 hope of success. There are no possible means by which the de facto 

 owners can be compelled to part with their property : while even a 

 liquidation based on consent could hardly be effected within any 

 measurable period of time. 



340. Failing such a scheme, one practicable method of dealing 

 with this class of cases seems to us to be to recognize the facts, to 

 record the money-lenders for what they are , namely, the owners of the 

 land which has passed away from the tenants, and to protect the latter 

 from rack-renting by a suitable Tenancy Act. There is universal 

 agreement that the expropriated owner has, as a rule, sunk to the con- 

 dition of a mere serf, tilling the land and making over the produce 

 to the owner. In good years he has nothing to hope for except a 

 bare subsistence ; in bad years, like last year, he falls back on public 

 charity. 



341. In regard to the cultivators of the second class who are as 

 yet the owners of their holdings, and in respect of whom the money- 

 lender is still merely a mortgagee, the situation is different. The 

 problem is how to preserve to the ryots their rights in their holdings, 

 which are fast slipping from their grasp. Here the remedial 



