India is mainly an agricultural country. She has plenty of fertile, cultivable lands and a hard-working peasantry tied to the soil. And yet with growing population she is faced with a chronic shortage of food. For this, the blame lies squarely on her outmoded, often crude system of farming. Hers is largely a land of small-scale farming.
The small farmer cultivates fragmented strips of land in the primitive ways. India’s yield per acre compares most unfavourably with the yield of technically advanced peoples of the East and West.
Of course, the completion of the River Valley Schemes has increased the tempo of agricultural life. It would be necessary to reorganize the village economy in such a manner as to enable it to take full advantage of the ample resources.
It is in consideration of these that the Nehru Government was prompted to plan and sponsor a comprehensive scheme of co-operative farming. The scheme is yet at the theoretical stage. The small agricultural holdings will be merged in larger co-operative units. This will help them to switch over to modern mechanised cultivation. The small peasant cannot purchase a tractor. But a band of co-operative farmers would not have this difficulty. Mechanical appliances for ploughing, sowing, harvesting, threshing etc. could also be used. Further, it would help provide and maintain better facilities for storage and large-scale marketing.
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It has been urged that mechanised cultivation will prove harmful in many parts of the country where the sub-soil is soft. The fact is that, India has a teeming peasant population that makes mechanisation a doubtful benefit; for it may only add to unemployment. But in true co-operation the individual farmer retains the rights of ownership and pools his resources for better management.
In large-scale farming of land, owned by an individual, the peasant is reduced to a mere wage earner. Co-operative farming is superior to these systems as it utilises the peasant’s attachment to the soil while placing in his hand the vast resources of mechanised cultivation and well-organised marketing facilities. Loss of fertility of the soil, however, has to be guarded against by using suitable manures.
The misconceived opposition to co-operative farming comes from those who are rooted to traditions and cannot adjust their minds to changing conditions of modern life. Hence the scheme can be advanced only by educating the peasantry. Informed and organized propaganda may gradually win the peasants over.
The State must grant subsidies at the initial stage. This can be done through the Reserve Bank as in the case of co-operative banking. It also must provide the necessary technical personnel as well as the agricultural expert. It is only by adopting a two-fold line of cooperation,—first, among the farmers themselves and secondly, between the co-operative farmers and the Government,—that the movement may gradually succeed.