Landreform essay
Land Reform in India
(Prepared as an entry for The Oxford Companion to Economics in India edited by
Kaushik Basu, Oxford University Press.)
Introduction
Land reform usually refers to redistribution of land from the rich to the poor. More broadly, it includes regulation of ownership, operation, leasing, sales, and inheritance of land (indeed, the redistribution of land itself requires legal changes). In an agrarian economy like India with great scarcity, and an unequal distribution, of land, coupled with a large mass of the rural population below the poverty line, there are compelling economic and political arguments for land reform. Not surprisingly, it received top priority on the policy agenda at the time of Independence. In the decades following independence India passed a significant body of land reform legislation. The 1949
Constitution left the adoption and implementation of land and tenancy reforms to state governments. This led to a lot of variation in the implementation of these reforms across states and over time, a fact that has been utilized in empirical studies trying to understand the causes and effects of land reform.
In this essay, we will briefly discuss the economic and political arguments in favour of land reform, and review the Indian evidence on the effects of land reform on agricultural productivity and poverty, and economic and political determinants of the speed and intensity of implementation of land reforms.
Economic Arguments in Favour of Land Reform
The most obvious argument in favour of land reform is equity. In a land-scarce country with a significant section of the rural population below the poverty line, the case for ensuring that everyone has access to some minimum amount of land seems compelling from this point of view. However, this is a general argument in favour of redistribution, not necessarily redistribution in kind (i.e., land). To make that case, one needs to understand the economic forces that govern the allocation of
(Prepared as an entry for The Oxford Companion to Economics in India edited by
Kaushik Basu, Oxford University Press.)
Introduction
Land reform usually refers to redistribution of land from the rich to the poor. More broadly, it includes regulation of ownership, operation, leasing, sales, and inheritance of land (indeed, the redistribution of land itself requires legal changes). In an agrarian economy like India with great scarcity, and an unequal distribution, of land, coupled with a large mass of the rural population below the poverty line, there are compelling economic and political arguments for land reform. Not surprisingly, it received top priority on the policy agenda at the time of Independence. In the decades following independence India passed a significant body of land reform legislation. The 1949
Constitution left the adoption and implementation of land and tenancy reforms to state governments. This led to a lot of variation in the implementation of these reforms across states and over time, a fact that has been utilized in empirical studies trying to understand the causes and effects of land reform.
In this essay, we will briefly discuss the economic and political arguments in favour of land reform, and review the Indian evidence on the effects of land reform on agricultural productivity and poverty, and economic and political determinants of the speed and intensity of implementation of land reforms.
Economic Arguments in Favour of Land Reform
The most obvious argument in favour of land reform is equity. In a land-scarce country with a significant section of the rural population below the poverty line, the case for ensuring that everyone has access to some minimum amount of land seems compelling from this point of view. However, this is a general argument in favour of redistribution, not necessarily redistribution in kind (i.e., land). To make that case, one needs to understand the economic forces that govern the allocation of
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