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Ruling The Countryside

Question

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What were the circumstances which led to the eventual collapse of indigo production in Bengal?

Solution

The ryots in Bengal were fed up with the coercive methods which the planters employed and had refused to grow indigo.

(i)They had turned rebellion. They refused to pay rents to the planters, and attacked indigo factories armed with swords and spears, bows and arrows. Women too turned up to fight with pots, pans and kitchen implements.

(ii)Those who worked for the planters were socially boycotted, and the gomasthas – agents of planters – who came to collect rent were beaten up. Ryots swore they would no longer take advances to sow indigo nor be bullied by the planters’ lathiyals – the lathi-wielding strongmen maintained by the planters.

(iii)In many villages, headmen who had been forced to sign indigo contracts, mobilised the indigo peasants and fought pitched battles with the lathiyals. In other places even the zamindars went around villages urging the ryots to resist the planters. These zamindars were unhappy with the increasing power of the planters and angry at being forced by the planters to give them land on long leases.

(iv)Worried by the rebellion, the government brought in the military to protect the planters from assault, and set up the Indigo commission to enquire into the system of indigo production.

(v)The commission held the planters guilty and criticised them for the coercive method they used with indigo cultivators. It declared that indigo production was not profitable for ryots. The commission asked the ryots to fulfil their existing contracts but also told them that they could refuse to produce indigo in future.

After this revolt, indigo production collapsed in Bengal.

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