Indian peasant uprisings: Myth and reality

A.R. Desai (ed.), Peasant Struggles in India, Delhi: Oxford University Press, 1979. Pp.xxv + 772; Rs. 140.

Sunil Sen, Peasant Movements in India: Mid‐Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries, Calcutta: K.P. Bagchi, 1982. Pp.275; Rs.75.

D.N. Dhanagare, Peasant Movements in India: 1920–1950, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1983. Pp.xii + 254; £12.

This review of some important recent works on peasant movements in India examines four major questions concerning (a) the social locus of rebellions, (b) the role of capitalism and imperialism, (c) the part played by existing state power, and (d) the role of parties or organisations. It is argued that while there is no unchanging social base the disproportionately high degree of tribal participation in armed rebellion may provide some clue to the relative lack of similar participation among the mainstream peasantry, that capitalist imperialism is a multi faceted phenomenon impinging on the peasantry in many ways, that existing state power plays a major part in rebellions, and that a party or organisation is a necessary precondition for any trans‐local or trans‐tribal movement. It concludes by suggesting that varieties of mobilisation within the framework of parliamentary politics should be studied in order to assess the really significant role of the peasantry in the political evolution of post‐independence India.