How did land reforms in some parts of the country help to improve the socio-economic conditions of marginal and small farmers?

Land reform usually refers to redistribution of land from rich to poor. More broadly, it includes regulation of ownership, operation, leasing, sales and inheritance of land.

Land reforms have been considered as important tools of socio-economic change in India. They constituted an important component of the strategy of agrarian reform that was designed to transform and modernise Indian agriculture.

As land is state subject, the various reforms like abolition of zamindari, tenancy reforms and ceiling on size of landholdings and its distribution were implemented by the states which helped the marginal and small farmers in the following ways:

• Tenancy reforms, in total, led to more than one crore tenants getting ownership right in Assam, West Bengal, Kerala, Tamil Nadu and Gujarat.

• More than 10 lakh individuals became beneficiary (surplus land distributed to them) from the ceiling laws implemented in West Bengal.

• The landlords had no personal interest in the lands they owned and also did not take interest in investing on land improvement. But when the same land went into the hands of actual cultivators, they invested and multiplied the gains.

• Distribution of land to the actual cultivators provided an intangible incentive ‘to convert the land into gold’ which ultimately improved productivity of agriculture.

Although these reforms helped the actual cultivators, but, with time, fragmentation of landholdings has led to decline in productivity of agriculture. Government of India has recently circulated the ‘Model Agriculture Land Leasing Act 2016’ to the States which holds the key to improve the socio-economic conditions of poor farmers, as it will help in land leasing and consolidation.