This book is a comprehensive analysis of farmers' movements in
India with a focus on the movements in Tamil Nadu, Maharashtra, Punjab
and Karnatka. It examines the economic, social and political aspects of
the farmers' struggle for a better deal within regional and national
perspectives and evaluates the potential impact of these struggles on
economic development in general, and on rural development, in
particular. In a most competent way the author has presented the current
state of the debate on the subject. He deals exhaustively with the
subject of agricultural price policy and argues against the proposition
that favourable price-setting for farm products is adequate to alleviate
rural poverty. A better way to tackle this problem is to improve the per
capita output in the rural sector, since the root cause of the problem
is not unfavourable terms of trade but the increasing proportion of land
holdings, which are economically not viable. Agricultural price policy
is analyzed within the context of class relations, which enables to
establish a link between the economic and political demands of the
farmers. This analysis leads the author to conclude, that in contrast
with the peasants' movements in India, which helped to break up the
feudal agrarian set-up, the recent farmers' movements, with a few
exceptions, have little revolutionary content. Their leadership has been
appropriated by the rich landowners, who have transformed the movements
into a lobby for advancing their own interests, within the existing
power structure, to the neglect of the poorer peasantry.