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that out of the total revenue of ryotwar holdings, 17*5 per 

 cent., or, say, roughly, one-fifth, is contributed by agricul- 

 tural labourers who must eke out a living by working for 

 others, the small extent of land held by them being in the 

 nature of agricultural allotments, the produce of which 

 merely goes to supplement their earnings by labour. Another 

 27'7 per cent., or, roughly, one-third, is contributed by 

 peasant proprietors who cannot afford to employ hired labour, 

 except during the time of harvest. Another 31*4 per cent., 

 or about one-third, is contributed by proprietors who must 

 farm their own lands, but who can employ hired labour for 

 carrying on some or all the manual work connected with the 

 farm. The remainder is paid by the class who can afford to, 

 but need not, let their lands, and subsist, not certainly in 

 plenty, but, as I have already stated, in accordance with the 

 standard of living usual among their class in this country. 

 If this class were suflBciently educated, and cultivated the 

 holdings without sub-letting them, they would be able to 

 adopt, not indeed very expensive improvements, but such as 

 those which small proprietors in European countries might 

 be expected to undertake. 



The number of ryots in zemindaris may be estimated at 

 about a million, but no particulars as regards the quantity of 

 land held are available. It may, however, be presumed that 

 the distribution among the several classes of zemindari ryots 

 is much the same as with Government ryots with the reser- 

 vation that as the incidence of the land assessment, whether 

 paid in money or in kind, is higher in zemindari tracts than 

 in Government taluks, the average extent of land to be 

 cultivated for subsistence must be larger and the number 

 of ryots smaller in the former case than in the latter. In 

 countries in which lands are held by a small number of 

 proprietors there is a very large section of the population 

 dependent solely on daily labour for subsistence, while in 

 countries where small properties predominate the capitalist 

 classes capable of initiating and carrying out agricultural 

 improvements do not exist; but the labouring classes have, 

 for the most part, the income derived from a small piece of 

 land to supplement their earnings from daily labour. In 

 this Presidency, it will be seen from the facts stated above 

 that while the bulk of the area is held in small properties 

 averaging 8 acres in extent, there are nearly 1,000 landed 

 proprietors, some of them with princely incomes. The reason 

 for the absence of agricultural enterprise must, therefore, be 

 sought not so much in the predominance of peasant properties 



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