Land Reforms: A Landlord's Perspective

The average income of a small trader or a restaurant owner in Karachi is much higher than that of many big landlords

Ahan.

The main difference is that the landlord tries to maintain a certain standard of living and therefore lives an ostentatious lifestyle and hence appears to be very wealthy

U mean to say.. all that excess wealth is a lie? Ahan.

Would the various learned writers on this subject agree to letting the workers have a share in all the respective industries and businesses where they work?

Yes. It`s called profit sharing.

all over the world it is the local who runs and primarily a local with sufficient means to pay for the enormous election expenses.

And those means come from making less than restaurant owners?
So how many restaurant owners run in elections from your district? Must be quite a few, since they`re obviously richer.

The reality of life is that the poor villager votes for his landlord not under coercion, but because he needs the support of the landlord to prevent him from all sorts of oppression. The first thing that a poor villager looks for is protection from the high handedness of the police, secondly he looks for someone who can provide him protection from dacoits and other villagers who may be of threat to him and thirdly to have a notable provide quick justice by acting in the form of an arbitrator in case of family or property disputes.

U mean he has a choice between the devil and the deep blue sea.

The primary reasons for low productivity are; lack of mechanization, irregular supply of water, expensive pesticides and fertilizer and reluctance on the part of the farm worker to use modern farming techniques and mechanization

Well, naturally there would be a shortage of machinery, irregular water supplies and fetilizers na... considering that landlords who make less than restaurant and boutique owners are running for elections which require mucho capital.

Reduction in the size of the land holdings will do nothing other than reduce the total productivity, as poor farmers will lack the necessary resources to provide the necessary inputs.

But wait! Are u saying.. the poor farmers are supposed to be buying all this needed machinery themselves? Ah! I C I C...

In countries like the United States and Canada the average land holding is between 2000 and 3000 acres

Accha, so u r saying that the size of Sindh is comparable to the size of Canada, therefore u should have 1:1 ratio of land holdings for landowners in Sindh versus landowners in whole of Canada. I C I C.

Let us stop trying to make agriculturists scapegoats for every ill in our society and try and identify the root causes of the ills in our society.

I fully agree. Let us try to do that. But first dissecting this article.

And why cannot I rate this article? I would like to give it seven stars. Original, insightful, interesting, noteworthy and compelling.

Related as I am to one of Sindh`s agriculturalists, I have to say that everything Mr. Kazi has written in this article is quite true, especially his points about the financial side of it all. Yes, feudals try to maintain a very ostentatious lifestyle but only few of the big guns actually have the cash to back it up. Many others live on credit, or debt. Farming is actually a job with very little security because the workers can make things difficult for the landlord. This article is a good change, not because it defends the lifestyle, but because it honestly describes the ground realities of farming and agriculture in Pakistan today.

Only honestly rich people in Pakistan are either inherently rich or made money in business; others have made money through corruption of one kind or another. A rich feudal, bureaucrat or military officer is obviously through illegal means because farm income or salaries could not be turned into millions in dollars or rupees....period.
My biggest disappointment with feudal class is their indifference to culture. They have contributed nothing over centuries to promote the culture and language of the land they depend and love so much. In this way, they are frozen in time or content with status quo.
The current generation of feudals have started sending their kids abroad insteas of Achison only and this might open their mind up to 21st century and native cultures. They are also diversifying their assets much more now than before because the area of land can not go up while numner of heads in a family do thus making individual share smaller and smaller.
With or without any reforms, the feudalism is dead in various parts of the country and slowly dying in southern Punjab and Sindh too.

You are trying to defend the lord`s castle when it is under no danger of attack. The fact is that our brave military generals (who become instant landlords when they so wish upon retirement), our enlightened landlords (like Bhutto the Hanged, who thought the entire nation was his fiefdom), and other enlightened political leaders (like the mullahs who are now trying to prove that they are actually very enlightened and so should be trusted with power, and lands will hopefully follow; like Nawaz Sharif who bought land at every exit of the motorway in order to become an urban landlord) have no desire to storm this castle. Far from taking away these ill-gotten lands from the landlords, successive governments have failed to even properly tax your unearned wealth.
And dont kid yourself into believing what you write. Landlordism is a cancer for Pakistan as it has been in other countries. Look across the border at land reforms (setting max. land at 6 hectares in Indian Panjab) and see how the tables have been turned: west Panjab, traditionally more prosperous than the east, is lagging behind. Look farther across: Argentina was as wealthy as the US in the 19th century, EXCEPT: the US had small family owned farms and Argentina had landlords. Now the descendants of those landlords are begging in the streets of Buenos Aires, or trying to sneak into the US or Europe. And US is the number one economy of the world.

PORPTY;I STHEFTS!!!!!!!!!!!!

Longliving Revolutions! Runningdoggies cpatliston!

I have a basic question which is nothing to do with economics of land reform.

How can people who have been living for many generations on some land (along with the animals, the trees and the soil which their landlord claims ownership to) be considered in the 21st century to be only cogs in the agricultural production machine, whose right to a just destiny of their choice on the land of their birth is to be decided purely on the basis of their economic worth as agricultural workers to their landlord at this point of time?

Do people and their identification and connection with the land of their forefathers come first, or the economics of farming comes first?

Shahzad,

There are times I have to agree even with a pakistani, and this is one instance. I do support the view that one of the great service provided by the feudals is instant justice as you correctly point out and are truly proud of. Below is a letter to the editor from dawn of today. It ends by asking the question what kind of people pakistanis have elected to rule them. Now add this from me, what kind of education that has been given to pakistanis that it produces a writer like shashzad kazi.


This refers to the report (Oct 19) according to which a landlord in Mailsi (southern Punjab) shaved the head and eyebrows of a mother of eight, after the decision taken by the local panchayat.

They then dragged the unfortunate woman half-naked across the streets after severely beating her up. This brutal action was carried after the complaint of her husband but she was not allowed to give her version.

This incident has happened when Muslims have been accused of being extremists and not treating the women well.

Let`s see what reaction comes from the MMA leaders. The MMA has promised to bring reforms in the country and wants to bring things in conformity with the injunctions of Islam. If they show silence on this inhuman incident, then the people of Pakistan should realize what kind of leaders they have elected to rule them.

AKIF

Karachi

Mr Kazi:

You say that:

1. “The average income of a small trader or a restaurant owner in Karachi is much higher than that of many big landlords. The main difference is that the landlord tries to maintain a certain standard of living and therefore lives an ostentatious lifestyle and hence appears to be very wealthy.”

Question: Where do you get the money from to live a lifestyle that “appears” to be very wealthy?

I bet that a small trader in Karachi would love to live a life-style only a tenth of yours. But maybe he’s not smart as you, for he probably wastes all his money on something totally useless such as food, clothing, and rent. And those tillers…well, you give them seventy percent of your revenue and what they do with it?…probably smoke charas and drink Johnny Walker Black and Chevas Regal (25-year old, mind you) and pass out after tilling “your” land rather than using the money wisely and living a life-style to match yours, or even better than yours since they get more money than you. Dumb idiots they are, I say…maybe you should do something to straighten them out…like beat them up or something…otherwise they won’t listen…

2. You make it sound as if you, meaning the landlords, are the benign, well-meaning shepherds to the innocent little sheep (read the tillers of the land). Without you the shepherds, the sheep will be run over and eaten by the wolves. Hence, you are their protector and savior. They love you for what you do for them, you imply. Fine and dandy. But unless we hear the other side of how they view you, the landlords, we will really not know what you are trying to defend is true or not.

I see some people at Chowk clapping, applauding and bowing to you, the landlords, for being so good to the tillers and doing a job of a saint, and speaking nothing but the truth…

I think it is very unfair for Chowk to publish this article without presenting a view from the tillers…but who should speak for them?… tough luck!…if they are not heard then they must not have any problems…probably living a good life smoking and drinking…and life goes on…

Bina: There are two sacred cows and two pigs in Pakistan. Once it comes to scapegoating or fall guys, both sacred cows hide behind two pigs. Pigs are essential to take care of garbage that is not suitable feed for the cows. Moreover, pigs can not be killed because pork is not part of cow`s diet otherwise cows would have eaten them by now. One of the pig is kept lean and the other one fat so that they both have reason to suspect each other to be cows favorite. Sometime feudals are fat pigs and corrupt politicians lean ones as is the case right now with fat pigs in PML (Q) and career politicians biting the dust; other times the positions are reversed as in the past.
The modus operandi of one of the cow is parasitic while other likes virus style. The system innocently works for virus one patient is infected and in the case of parasite, powerful claws help keep hanging on to the host until host is sucked dry.
This is Pakistani bible according to Muslim, Military, Feudal and Politicans.

By the way the trader/businessman hardly pays any taxes either (like most of our society). Their money is kept in overseas accounts while most zamindars live off borrowed money.

There are actually very few landlords that are ``wealthy``. Most of those who actually have a lot of money have earned it through means other than agriculture. There are businessmen who show their income as agricultaural, there are corrupt bureaucrats who do the same and then there may be some zamindars who are involved in not so legit activities.

I have a question here for sadna; If you live in a rented appartment for 210 or 20 years, should be be proclaimed the owner?

re: Jay # 7

We just lynched two human beings for reasons that no one but the most regressive can understand.

What education are WE providing OUR people?

pakfin #13
What if I was already in the apartment when the landlord was granted or claimed ownership.

Land has been the earliest and most basic source of sustenance for humans, much before the concept of land ownership came into being.

Could someone please tell us what the phrase ``Land Reforms`` mean to them - especially those people who consider feudalism/landownership the mother of all evils (other than religion). I understand the commie philosophy, which meant that the state owns the land, but since this religion is dead now, then what is land reform means now - No bile or acerbic vitriole plz (if you could help it). Thank you.

Sadna, if you were already in the apartment but did not own it then you were an illegal occupant in the first place. Are you claiming squatters rights to ownership or are you a proponent of communism/socialism?

Land Reforms in my view is a socialist practice of forcibly taking away assets from the ``haves`` and not necessarily giving these to ``have nots``.

pakfin,

Common sense (serious) questions:

1. Is the output of the land cultivated in Pakistan maximized, ie, is the cultivation efficient? If not, then why not? Would making the tillers of the land also owners increase the productivity of the land? Is there a model for it? What does China’s experience along the same line show?

2. Currently, how equitable is the distribution of the proceeds received from the land to those cultivating it?

To me, the above questions are central to so-called land reforms in Pakistan.

Godot seee my answers to your questions:

1. The output is currently not maximized. There are a numebr of reasons for this; insufficient use of technology/fertilizer, manual labour vs. use of equipment, improper/insufficient use of pesticides, hoarding of water by upstream provinces/farmers and lack of drive on part of the farm worker. Even when the tiller of the land has become the owner, the typical result has been the sale of the land and then spending the money gained while doing nothing.

2. Thre is no major issue of distribution of income to the persons cultivating the soil. The issue is the lack of timeliness in carrying out various actions on part of the farm labour. When the farm worker owns a pair of oxen and uses these to till the land, he gets 50% of the produce, while the rest of the inputs are the farmers`. The issue here is the lack of ambition on part of the farm worker. The worker typically wants to plant the crop that uses the least labour and does not necessarily give the best profits.

pakfin #19 you write ``The worker typically wants to plant the crop that uses the least labour and does not necessarily give the best profits. ``
I assume you are more industrious than this typical worker, and make the above statement after studying the evidence, and did not just make it up while idling around the computer. And I trust you will be industrious enough to share your evidence and that that evidence will be more than your (no doubt unbiased) personal opinion.

godot: In every village, more than half the population is neither landowner nor tiller. They own no land at all and yet survive due to a distribution mechanism. This is the artisan class, the mochi, tirkhan, mullah, nai, shop keepers, mirasis and musallis etc. All of these people are compensated rather honestly based on the production per acre of land. In any land reform effecting the owners and tillers, the fate of majority with nothing at stake hangs in balance. If you take away land from owner and give it to tillers, the power of tillers goes up so much that they can refuse, without any consequence, share of artisans. The law and order has to improve in devolution of land, so that landless majority keeps getting their share of the crop in exchange for services. In the current set up, owner keep an eye on tiller against cheating and tillers keep their eyes on owners for the same purpose because both parties have stake in the exact production. Once the crop production can not be cheated by either party, the landless majority is able to get their fair share for the services. The cheating will be the biggest problem once only one party owns and tills the land. A person owning and tilling 10 acres has every reason to show less production so that he has to give away less to landless artisan class. The mutual check and balance is the best guarantee against cheating.
Same goes for applying income tax to agriculture output. Given the less policing in countryside, everybody will have vested interest in showing less income than actual which will crush the landless dropping them from minimum sustenance level they have now.
A land reform without taking care of all these things is a recipe for disaster in exchange for possibly slightly better yields. The best way to improve yields is machinization of agriculture industry.

It is so tragic that ``educated`` people are actually defending landlordism - such a medieval concept. ( for some reason - the elite in pakistan are always defending all kinds of medieval practices - sharia / islamic banking / jihad against infidels etc....)

I have a sinking feeling that there is really no hope for people of Pakistan. With fundos(MMA) all set to bring back sharia with added bonus of islamic banking , the army continues guzzling up the resources , elites opposed to land reform ( some guys here have equated land reform to communism !!! ) , intellectuals on retreat as fundos march ahead. I guess common pakistanis are now getting squeezed from all sides. Well - that`s what happens when you willingly give up your right to choose your own gov`t by cheer-leading army desperadoes whenever they fancy taking over elected gov`ts.

pakfin #16
If it was a real apartment, then somebody built it, and hence presumably owned it before anyone could live in it and your term ` illegal occupation` works.

But if you are using the analogy of land as the apartment, the land was always there and humans lived on it and off it without needing ownership papers right from, let me see, Adam and Eve, much like animals live on land without any concept of ownership. Until that is, the concept of land ownership came along. You need to check up on how people became landlords and claimed ownership over large tracts of land which already had people living on them.

My question still holds, is the economy of farming more important or the the people who have always lived on that land?

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mohar11 #23 you write ``I have a sinking feeling that there is really no hope for people of Pakistan. ``
You mean buoyant feeling. Never fear, Pakistanis will muddle through anyway. Sorry to disappoint you.

Sameer (20), the sketch you draw violates the fundamental principles of economics, that is of invisible-hand and specialization. Further, in the current system of barter trade in villages, which you imply, one cannot ``cheat`` and receive something for nothing, that violates the human nature, for those at the not-receiving end will not survive, and nor would the ones receiving something for nothing, this cannot go on for too long. In this scenario, only a system of oppression would exist, something similar to serfdom, as it did in Russia before the Bolshevik Revolution. From what I understand, that is precisely the system that exists in the interiors of Sindh and Punjab.

Moreover, the problem of ``cheating`` you cite is very true but is also fundamentally human. My question is how other societies overcame this? What are the economic models, tried and tested, out there that successfully addressed this issue? What are the factors that contribute to increased productivity that would maximize the benefits to all those, not just a few, living off the land?

Increasing the productivity through mechanization brings up the issue of who would do the investment? This becomes an acute issue even in a win-win situation: by your investment, if you gain a Toyota Camry and the other person (who did not invest anything) gains a BMW, then you rather not have a Camry just because it would make the other guy gain a BMW.

Pakfin (19), what is stopping the landowners in investing in the land to increase productivity? Why aren’t the tillers motivated? I don’t think their laziness is the answer.

sadna and mohar11: Feudalism is bad. But to turn an unfair system into a just sytem for all has to follow a systematic approach so as not to turn an unfair system into a disaster in the name of undoing the unfairness. That was the gist of my previous post giving the example of landless majority.
This is often ignored if you follow too much of field marshall`s bashing of feudals as the ultimate culprits of all social, political, moral and economic evils. For a country like Pakistan where cheating is name of the game at every level, more devolution of power or land without a system in place to cope with the consequences of abrupt changes creates nothing but disorder. Thhis is what happened to devolution plan of Musharraf with too many nazims and councillors looking for their own interests without a system and institutions to control the unlawful practices.
The best option to me seems to go through a scientifically honest pilot plant study. Select a district or sub-district for implementing land reforms, another for sharia and stuff another for extra liberal/ secular practices, another one for full 50 percent women empowerment in the affairs and so on. Analyze the results every few months and perfect the system if possible or discard if not possible. Musharraf getting up one day and announcing major change in the unfair system is more likely a recipe for disaster than a step towards just society.

sameerJB #27 The problem with feudalism is two-fold: (a) it is a hurdle to improved land productivity; (b) it constitutes oppression on peasants that no civilized society should tolerate today (e.g. sindhi landlords keep entire families in bondage), and (c) it is also a hurdle to human development (e.g. tribal leaders in baluchistan, I am told by NGOs who have worked there, stop schools from being opened since they realize that education is the ticket to freedom for the peasant).
While (a) may conceivably merit experimentation, there is no reason at all why (b) and (c) should be permitted one more minute. If I had my way, the peasants would be free today, and the sindhi, baluchi, and south panjabi landlords brought to court to face criminal charges for kidnapping (which is what their ``private jails`` amount to), rapes, and payment of past wages for slave labor. I believe the charges would be enough, per the pakistan penal code, to hang many of these landlords and to divest the rest of them off the shirts off their backs.

Tahmed32 #28. First of all I disagree with your point (a) and dont know where you get your data from or what agricultural experience you have. As far as (b) and (c) are concerned there are limited cases of opression but should not be extrapolated and genaralized to cover all landlords.

It seems that you have a bone of contention with Sindhi`s, Balauchi`s and Punjabis and are simply stating your prejudices here. I wonder where this superiority complex stems from.

#25 by tahmed32 on October 25, 2002 8:33am PT
//...Never fear, Pakistanis will muddle through anyway. Sorry to disappoint you.//

I do fear. How long can they manage to ``muddle through`` ? What happens when they can`t go on like this any more? An islamic revolution - right ? When that happens - which bogeyman the ``revolutionaries`` will beat against - Americans, Jews, Hindoos - right? And how do you fancy nukes in hands of the ``revolutionaries`` ?
You sure disappoint me. You being part of the elite - the masses ``muddling through`` the morass does not bother you - does it?

Aamir

Your reply does not make sense. In case the land is taken from landlords, which is above certain ceiling level, then what we do with the land. Will goivernment own that land or it will be divided equally among peasants? and how will it be divided/ for example if there are six adult males in a peasant family then will each male get his equal share? what about women, will they get any. But in case the formula of division is per family, usually a dhok or jhok consists of at least 25-30 families who are directly involved in agriculture. An important question also arises as to on what basis the minimum ceiling will be selected - will it be equal to land producing revenue equal to the household of an average Paksitani family?

Sameer #27

Agreed. As you say, the aim shouldnot be to bring in a system worse/inefficient in more respects than before.

Actually I am more concerned with the principle than the method. When anyone proposes a law or brings in an overnight amendment for tackling a landed feudal system, what widely accepted fundamental principle would it be evaluated against, by the obeying or disobeyng public?

The mindset and optimum method of reform if the basic principle is that economics of farming is the first priority would be very different from the mindset and optimum method of reform if the basic principle is that people living on the land are the first priority.

Given the fundamental principle the method of best achieving that can be debated on merits as you were doing in your post and its clear where you yourself stand, but reading various other posters/newspaper articles over a period of time and Mr Hoodbhoy`s article about the attitude to Okara farms dispute, it is not clear which is the majority`s or politicians or military`s first priority, A. land rights of owners or B. justice and just options for the landless or C. economics of farming.

btw, I am curious why there are no India/Nepal like Maoist-type armed movements( touch wood) among the landless in Pakistan inspite of large landholdings. Is it because the land is productive enough that even the landless and bonded labor are not in real want or is it that people have feudal attitudes toward the landlord.

mohar11 #30 The reason I have confidence that Pakistanis will come through OK in the end is because I have faith in the average man in Pakistan - he may be poor, but he/she has a basic dignity and pride that no amount of misfortune will take away. While people from India on chowk often make much of religious fundamentalism in Pakistan, the fact is that religious fundamentalists have always been far less successful in elections in Pakistan than in India (where BJP was, even before it came to power, the second largest party after Congress if one does not count the different communist parties as a single party). In Pakistan, even in the latest elections, despite getting a huge helping hand from the military which suppressed the mainstream parties, the fundamentalists hold on power is shaky at best and they are rushing to prove their secular (!!) credentials in hopes of gaining power.
Granted that we have had the misfortune of power-hungry military and political leaders, whereas India has had some fine individuals as prime ministers (not the least of whom was Nehru). But, knowing Pakistanis, I have no doubt that Pakistanis will prove their mettle despite the unspeakable crimes committed against them by their own military leaders, by the landlords, and by other scum.

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I`m sorry, but I haven`t read all the replies before making this submission:

The right to own land is one of man`s most valued pre-political right, asserted, in recorded history, as early as the Magna Carta. It was certainly protected as early as the advent of Islam.

Pakistan`s landlords own their land by virtue of an ancient system of zimandari and jagirdari, which dates back to the Mughals. SO efficient was the system in providing for the landlords income that even the British were reluctant to change the tilling system. Even today, land law in Pakistan is referred to as ``Revenue Law.``

In the West, two centuries ago, the aristocricy was all landed. Becasue of important land reforms (carried out in no small part due to economic necessity), the social structure of the West has dramitically changed. Take England for example, after the intorduction of new land laws in 1925, an examination of the current ``aristocricy`` in the UK reveals very few of the old ``landed`` aristocrats. New money comes from trade, from the ownership of shares, from free trade and commerce. In short, the velocity of capital (including land).

Another example is Kerala. In the 1950s, the cocialist/communist government equalised land holdidng in the state. Although Kerala is still weak economically, it does have the highest literacy rate in India. This may seem weak cause-and-effect logic, but I think there may be a link between the satisfaction of being the owner of land, and the desire to improve oneself through something like education.

Pakistani`s need to understand that peasants tilling their fields would buy things like fertilizer and pesticides. It`s just that the landlords over them have foreever prevented them from doing so. They have prevented them by doing so by preventing them from holding any share in the land that they till. In my eyes, there are few injustices greater than this.

Rafay

sadna: The principle can in writing or widely practiced without in writing. Two examples would be British constitution and marriage. Many people have families or living together without having the principle of marriage in writing. The principle governing owner-tiller in villages is mostly unwritten or traditional. The property in writing is owned by owner but in practice tillers have been living on the property for generations. If this was not the case, a large number of peple would have had nomadic lifestyle and that is not the case in Punjab. The tennants are not evicted from the land in famines, poor crops or floods. The housing in village is free of cost because residential land in village is more ancestoral and not bought. This is one of the reason of feudals being able to exhibit better lifestyle than thier counterparts in the cities with equal income. It is no housing cost and overall lower cost of living when in village.
For example, I can go back and claim my grandfather`s home that is lying vacant despite nobody in my family owns even an acre of land there or living there anymore. It has no market value. I can built a nice house there without paying for the price of land. This is all because of unwritten tradition turned into unwritten principle.
The relationship between owner-tiller is also caste or tribal identity based except for corporate and miilitary officers owned land. A Jat or Rajput have tillers from the same identity and that binding is a powerful one when things are not good. It is similar to ummah concept at a small local level. That is why, the tillers are not coerced into voting their owners as widely believed. They vote for the similar reason, an Islmaist votes for MMA.
The case of Okara is different. It was an attempt to turn tillers into temporary workers (in urban type businesses) and as I mentioned, identity card did not apply in that case. Many corporate farms with tillers or employees are doing exceptionally good without any problem. Very close to troubled Okara farms is another well-managed farm known as Mitchell`s Fruit Farms. The workers there are taken well care of, from healthcare, housing and education for children. The productivity is good and the produce is often processed at the farms into Mitchell`s products such as jams, drinks etc.
The boded labor which tahmed pointed out is often limited to areas of poor farming lands. The land is often bad, requires additional work every year to cultivate and water in short supply. The bonded labors do not belong to the owner`s identity group, in Sindh, not even to owner`s religion. That issue must be dealt with on priority basis much before land reforms. It is a matter of basic human rights of a fringe minority group known as Bhel and Haris. However, not all landowners treat them in the same way. I do not know if majority are treated like animal or not. It is like Punchayat system. There are hundred or thousands of Punchayats making decision all the time and often not bad decisions but once they do things like Meerwala gang rape case, it must be dealt as gang rape case rather than passing a judgement in a hurry on the punchayat system which may or may not be a bad idea.
Same goes for private jails. They must be eliminated wherever they are found but to punish a landowner in Lyallpur for somebody having a private jail in Bahawalpur or Sanghar is not fair.

rafay_alam 35 There is indeed a link between land and education, but the causal relationship is opposite of what you indicate. That is, education eliminates dependence on land for livelihood. The implications of this link, if only people realized them, are I think far-reaching. Not the least of which is that countless disputes related to land (ranging from family feuds in the rural areas of Pakistan, to the india-pakistan dispute over kashmir to the israeli-palestinian mess) are no longer necessary: people would be much better off if they were as emotional about giving their children as much opportunity for education as they are wehn it comes to land. Even the landlord-peasant problem in Pakistan will I think be ultimately be solved this way (peasants move to cities, and a generation or two down the road their children get educated and finally freed from this dependence on land). It would be better if the landlords were kicked off the land today, but given that doesnt seem about to happen given the power structures in Pakistan.

#33 by tahmed32
//..the fundamentalists ... are rushing to prove their secular (!!) credentials in hopes of gaining power...//
Mullahs are ``rushing`` to be secular. ok - don`t let the mullahs know you said this - they will rip you apart. Who are you kidding Ahmed Mian!!! Calls to implement sharia, no co-ed schools, islamic banking are NOT secular thoughts. And what do you think - Ahmedis are going to get their basic rights back? Will shias be considered normal muslims? Even the mainstream parties will not do this. Even almighty Mushy cannot dare be anything near secular. Heck - he can`t even go out with his dogs in public. Mullahs have tasted blood - from now it is all the way up for them. They have the islamised Pakistani Army with them to see them thru.

//...I have no doubt that Pakistanis will prove their mettle despite the unspeakable crimes committed against them by their own military leaders, by the landlords, and by other scum....//
Well - I am not too optimistic about this. As I said before - so many times pakistanis have willingly given up their rights to choose their own rulers - they have cheerleaded military desperadoes everytime they take over pakistan - yet everytime they have been cheated and trampled and manipulated and denied their rights. This has happened 4 times in last 50 years. So when are the pakistanis going to prove their ``mettle``??

mohar11 #38 (second para of your post): Your (irrational) opinions about pakistanis are duly noted and filed at the bottom of the barrel (which may then be scraped by any comedian who has run out of jokes).

mohar11 #38 In pakistan we dont have mobs that rip apart people. I guess you cant say as much for the mobs in India (Gujrat), can you.

pakistani logic,

``The primary reasons for low productivity are; lack of mechanization, irregular supply of water, expensive pesticides and fertilizer and reluctance on the part of the farm worker to use modern farming techniques and mechanization.``

In any share cropping practice through out asia, the tiller has to pay for the inputs. The feudal takes fifty percent of the revenue. Hence for the farming to be profitable to the tiller, his profit margin has to be more than 50 percent. Now an educated pakistani, shahzad, turns this around and says that the tiller is allowed to keep 50 percent, and this is great for the tiller, this is better than the rpofit sharing.

In the baove exa,mple, one can see the working of the pak mind, similar to the support for the jihadists, and the creation of uncountables. No pakistani ever cares to talk of the pakistanis killed in afghanistan. Only this they have talked about is that indians have shipped some pakis from pakistan to india to provide proof of pak infiltration.

What the posts on chowk shows is the swelling of the insidious jihadic values all through the educated of pakistan. Finding virtues in feudalism, in jihad.

Having grown up and from a peasant family, I understand most of the problems faced by agricultural labor and small land owners but I have not seen the land onwership of many villages by one family or person and its effects on the workers. East Punjab does not have feudalism as it exists in the west punjab but that does not mean their problems are any different. In the west Punjab context, in principle it makes perfect sense and good thing to do to distribute the land to the tillers who have been farming it for years on the other hand I know it won`t improve their lives any way. Most tillers lease land in small lots. 10 or 20 acres. Their economic life won`t improve any if they owned that land rather than lease. may be a pride of ownership for one generation and then they will be back to owning 2 or 3 acres each brother..which is no better than driving a rickshaw in Chandigarh or Lahore...and certainly much poorer than any of your corner rehRi wala anywhere in the sub-continent. Distributing the land to the tillers also would mean to snatch it from the ownership of the land lords...that may be the only pleasing out come of this for many of us. It won`t give me any pain if that happens but I don`t have any illusions that it will solve economic problems of millions of farm workers.

The issue of distributing land from the rich feudals and giving it to tillers is thus mostly political in nature. My understanding of the issue from reading various Pakistani posters for years is that biggest proponents of this are urban, non-farming background and anti-regional affection(for lack of better term) people. They have nothing in common with the farm worker and don`t have any idea of his problems. They feel that feudals control the rural vote bank thru land ownership and urbanites have been unable to break this voting in blocks. They want to divide it and spread it more evenly amongst opponents and brighten their own politcal muscle.

The farming is a losing business. Hard work, large investment and poor net income. It has ben that way for long time except during the green revolution of 60s and 70s it has lifted standard of living of the people involved..the standard that can not be sustained on the farming for very long. It was kind of one time gain in production due to new fertilizers and machinary technology. Now that period of gains is over. Small land owners owning lands 10,20, 50 acres are going bankrupt, losing the lands to banks and aRhtiyas. Many are committing suicides. If Pakistan distributes its land evenly to all, their fate won`t be any different after one generation. It will certainly ruin few feudals but it won`t change the fate of the tillers for very long.
Simply speaking there are too many people with no means or skills other than tilling the land (and that too very un-skillfully). There got to be a better way of up-lifting their lives other than satisfying ourselves with the generous act of giving them 10 acres for once and posteponing their suicides for 20 years.
Just a rambling.

#39 by tahmed32 on October 26, 2002 4:30pm PT
//..In pakistan we dont have mobs that rip apart people...//

of course you don`t. The massacre of christians, stoning of ``blasphemy`` convicts/rape victims, killing of shia doctors, honour killing of adulterous women are all done by pious muslims, just going around ful-filling their religious duties for Allah. The whole country is awash with pious mullahs carrying Kalashnikovs and koran preaching peace and brotherhood to the whole world.

dulla bhatti #42 I think you make an excellent point when noting that it is ``too many people with no means or skills other than tilling the land (and that too very un-skillfully)`` and that ``there got to be a better way of up-lifting their lives other than satisfying ourselves with the generous act of giving them 10 acres for once and posteponing their suicides for 20 years.``. Land is quickly subdivided among children over a couple of generations and disappears. Unless new lands are brought under cultivation - as used to be the case, but the land frontier has by now basically been reached in both India and Pakistan and that is not possible.
However, as I mentioned in my earlier post, the feudals in many parts of pakistan (sindh and baluchistan and southern panjab, as I mentioned earlier, which caused a poster to wonder if I was anti-sindhi, baluchi, panjabi!!) are a roadblock to human development (they enslave entire families of peasants, wont allow schools in their area). To keep things in perspective, this would not affect more than a small percentage of society (given the rapid urbanization and given that feudalism is not present at the same scale in many parts of NWFP and panjab). But nevertheless, where we do have such feudalism we should dismantle it. Not for the land, but to free the peasants to give their children a chance for getting education and moving to non-agricultural jobs.

mohar11 #43 Please re-read what I wrote: I was talking about mob killings. You get a trophy for so cleverly avoiding the issue.
As for honor killings and those other murders you mention in Pakistan, if I had a penny for every time jay or someone like him mentioned murders in Pakistan I would be a rich man. I understand that murders just dont take place in India. That tens of thousands of brides are not burnt each year in India (far greater in absolute as well as relative terms than all the murders you and jay and so forth constantly talk about) by greedy husbands and loving mothers-in-law; that christian missionaries (and their young children) have never been burnt alive by hindu zealots; that robberies and rapes are unheard of in India.
But thanks for your deep concern about the future of Pakistan. It is really very self-sacrificing of you to ignore your own problems and worry about ours. You must be a disciple of jay thackeray, who (like mother teresa) has devoted his life to pointing out to us pakistanis the fact that we have crimes take place in Pakistan and therefore we are doomed.

Sameer #36
Your post is very interesting. What you describe is very much like the interlinked caste structure in rural/semi rural India. A family member was describing how in family weddings( in an ordinary service or businessman family), jewellery got made for even who? the barber`s wife, because the barber was traditionally an important functionary in carrying out a wedding, arranging things, carrying messages. And it was a daily routine for portions of food cooked for the family to be given to sweepers, bhistis and others who worked in the streets outside the home, who were also rewarded during festivals and family functions.

But the mindset governing social dynamics has to be changed if the bhisti is to stand for local mayor, if his son is to go to school with everyone else and if his nephew is to work in IT! But the risk is that the bhisti will lose his traditional support which sustained as well as restrained him and he will not be able to send his son to school either because the government didnot deliver on its promises and due to lack of capital, his nephew will have to migrate to a large town and live in squalid conditions looking for a unskilled job. Those are the pitfalls of all changes. This is one reason why Gandhiji wanted a self contained village economy which didnot altogether ruin the interlocking relationships.

``I can built a nice house there without paying for the price of land. ``
Sameer, thats right. But I am curious, is the set up such that you can you go back and make a livelihood say farming on that land, without the local landlord`s consent? Or for example, can you buy and sell property in that area, open a shop, form a cooperative society, set up a school, stand for election, can you realise any of these rights related to your connection with that land without his explicit consent? If not, then perhaps only ownership of land or acceptance of villagers` social activism by the landlord can bring those rights ?

As for land reform, there seem to have been all varieties of reform in Asia. Compulsory rent reduction, sale of public lands and ``under the Korean land reform, landlords whose plots were expropriated were compensated for their land loss with land bonds or financial assets which could be reinvested elsewhere. The government encouraged the use of these land bonds for industrial capital formation through the purchase of vest nonagricultural enterprises. The land bonds constituted an important vehicle of the capital formation that was needed for Korean industrialization, and many landlords, especially the largest ones, profitably used land bonds to become industrial captialists``

sadna: Actually there is a difference between supporting the rights of landowners and opposing land reforms Pakistani style considering all the factors I have been talking about. Author of this article defended the rights of owners but did not go deep enough in opposing the land reforms what dullabhatti and I are focussing on.
There are two main issues here. The lawbreaking by anybody, feudal, tiller or an urban citizen are indefensible by law. If anyone is getting away with bonded labor, private jails or other abuses is due to poor law and order/ corruption. The other issue is abusing the unwritten tradtional ethics governing at the grassroot level in village environment. Power corrupts and powerful in all fields abuse power. While good law and order provides a remedy or respite from abuse, the traditional way do have built in checks and balances, otherwise it would not have lasted as long as it did.
For example, with very limited very corrupt police force at village level, roughly 3-4 policemen per 5 villages -more than 10,000 people, major thefts are rare and the culprits are quickly apprehended. The crime rate is much lower at village level. A thief or landowner can kick open most village doors if so wishes, an entrance through mud wall can be made in minutes with an average drill to steal most valuable thing - Jewellery. Small corrupt police presence will never be able to stop this from happening yet it does not happen often because of common concerns, caste, relatioships, brotherhood etc etc. How can they start throwing out people from land in this kind of tight knit structure? They just can`t! The problems do appear but usually settled with the interference of elders or go betweens. The owner owns farm land and not village residential area. The owner can not evict any person from the home in a village. Moreover, only few villages, mostly in south Punjab and Sindh, have whole village farming land belongingt o one person. In most Punjabi villages, amny competing owners own pieces of lands. In my grandfather`s village, out of 1000 acres, the largest holding was 100, followed by 3 about 75 and so on.
My grandfather had 6 acres after inheritance divided great grandfather`s 40-50 acres. Now five children of my grandfather inherited 6 acres, about 1 1/2 acres each. Having seen this situation coming, they are went to school and colleges, sold their acre and a half of land and settled in urban jobs. If I want to fo into farming, I will have to buy land from somebody in similar situation, my grandfather was decades ago. Other owners in the village would have no right and no problem with somebody selling his land to me. Big plots of land are often not for sale because agriculture land does not bring enough money to move to big cities and live happily ever after. The feudals having big houses in Karachi and Lahore, bought decades ago when it was cheap to own property there. The new settlements in Karachi, Lahore and all of Islamabad have much less presence of feudals because the real estate in cities is too expensive. It takes to sell high quality 25 acres in Punjab to buy a house in upper middle class areas of Islamabad.
No feudal whose income is primarily from land makes into the top 50 of Pakistan. Only one family, Noon family of Sargosha, made it to the list 30 years ago due to their large land holding that became part of residential Sargodha city and they were in politics too for a long time and must have made some money there. Another group that regularly makes it to top 50 is cotton traders brothers, MiaN Amin-Mian Bashir, who work as middlemen or comission agent in cotton trading. Lyallpur being highly fertile and well watered district with many feudal families has the richest people in transportation and textile businesses. The largest land holder in Sindh is, I believe Ahmed Chandio but no comparison with Bhutto`s wealth because Bhutto and Zardari are not rich from the land but from other sources. Sharif family did not own much land and Chaudhry`s of Gujrat, the current big shots are not big landowners. Both of them made money during Zia`s era by borrowing, defaulting and investing oney in industries. The top 50 list is made up of mostly businessmen, children of corrupt generals and some bureaucrats.
I was not familiar about South Korea model. It is interesting and development friendly model. That is my point. There has to be something well planned, debugged and forward looking instead of controlled by raw passion in the name of justice, equality or politics.

jay #41

.......... even i cannot find any redeeming value in this post ....... jay, get a grip on yourself !

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AAmir #49 Your post is a unintellible melange of cut and pastes from mohar`s posts and from my posts. I have no clue whether you agree or disagree, and if so with whom and on what point. You have obviously chosen the wrong medium (namely, the english language) through which to express your genius, boy. You would be better off using a paint brush rather than the keyboard, and critics will then rave about your abstract art that no one (not even you, as the artist) can make head or tail of. You will then be acclaimed as a 21st century picasso.

One of the points I had made earlier about the maulvi brigade becoming more pragmatic rather than succeeding in making Pakistan more religious, after their huge success in the polls, seems to be coming true, faster than I could have imagined:

``MMA on fast track from hard-line to pragmatic: ISLAMABAD, Oct 28: Islamic party alliance have abandoned the hard-line demands of their election campaign, pledging instead flexibility on US troop presence, constitutional changes and Islamic laws. Maulana Fazlur Rehman, a key leader of the Muttahida Majlis-e-Amal (MMA) alliance, told reporters late Sunday that the Islamic bloc was ``flexible`` on constitutional amendments and Islamisation, and that the question of US troops` use of Pakistani airbases was up to Washington. The expulsion of US troops from Pakistani airbases, where they are based for operations in Afghanistan, was a key pledge by MMA`s firebrand clerics in the campaign before the October 10 general elections. But MMA leaders have not once repeated that demand since winning massive gains in the polls and landing the balance of power in the hung national assembly. ``We have made our position very clear, that we can root out terrorism on our own and we do not need anybody`s help,`` Maulana Fazlur Rehman said. (AFP) (Posted @ 15:50 PST) (Dawn, Pakistan)

These guys are politicians first, and maulvis second. I think they are slowly coming around to reality. This is why I think it is a healthy change to actually have these guys go through one round of power, specially if they defeated the dreaded feudal, in the process. Aik teer say do shikar.

I think if the upper class women (and men) can hold their breath for five years, this whole phenomenon of maulvi politics will fizzle out, once the maulvis get discredited also.

#40 by tahmed32
//...Your (irrational) opinions about pakistanis are duly noted and filed at the bottom of the barrel (which may then be scraped by any comedian who has run out of jokes). ...//
My opinion was no joke Ahmed Mian. Not to those pakistanis who are planning to board the first plane out of pakistan the day the chief mullah of MMA takes over (As reported in pakistani news readers` columns). U don`t have to worry about that of course - you already out from the land pure - safely settled in land of Kafir.

And speaking of jokes - the standing joke of our time actually came from you - when you declared Mullahs of MMA are ``rushing`` to prove their secular credentials.

SameerJB #48
``Small corrupt police presence will never be able to stop this from happening yet it does not happen often because of common concerns, caste, relatioships, brotherhood etc etc. How can they start throwing out people from land in this kind of tight knit structure?``


PM quotes from World Bank`s CAS in the Junaid Ahmed thread
``* The landless comprise 50% of the population and are afflicted most by rural poverty, which falls steadily as rural ownership increases.
* Almost 75% of Pakistan`s poor are landless and these comprise of 70% of the rural poor.

The CAS report further states that ``INEQUITY IN LAND OWNERSHIP explains why overall agricultural yields in Pakistan remain BELOW that of other countries of SIMILAR LAND ENDOWMENTS. There is evidence from developing countries, including Pakistan, that as farm sizes increase, productivity falls``

Just as you mention there is a societal consensus against looting, and another societal consensus against eviction which springs from the tight knit biradari-jaati structure in the rural areas, what is needed is to create a similar societal consensus in the tight knit biradari-jaati structure for poverty alleviation of the landless, another consensus to promote literacy and civic participation including women`s literacy, a third consensus for women`s health and reduction in infant mortality, just like in the cities, and you are all set to achieve UK`s developed nation status :).

Tahmed bhai, whyy ouare call AAmir pissaco? HaiN?

Ia mthink thisis not niceness, okay.

Romair #54 give a fool a rope and he will hang himself. that is what I think you are saying about giving maulvis power. i thought the mullahs (in the form of the taliban) had already hung themselves once by making afghanistan the breeding ground for terrorism. in doing so they also turned millions of afghanis into homeless people seeking refuge in neigboring countries from this ``islamic government``. So will we now have people from NWFP and Baluchistan suffer for five years while we wait for the mullahs to hang themselves?

Lajwanti #51 i give good advice to AAmir, and you say i call him pissaco. i think you try put me in bad books of AAmir. Then he write more abstract post on chowk and confuse me even more. you bad person.

//... You get a trophy for so cleverly avoiding the issue...//
Actually u will win the ``world cup``, if there is one given, for your expertise on avoiding thorny issues. When you are backed up the wall - you respond with stupid hyperboles and hide behind vague explanations like ``I have no doubt someday pakistanis will prove their mettle``. And of course anybody questioning such statements will immediately be bombarded with more hyperboles and invectives.

I am not pointing out just ``murders`` in pakistan - rather the constitutionally-guaranteed massacres that goes on. Honor-killings are legal - carved in stone in law books of the state. In fact - the first thing Mushy Boy did after he took over pakistan was to invite a couple of honor-killers( parents who killed their daughter for falling in love or something) for a photo-up and their felicitation. The couple were also felicitated by Nawaz Sharif while he was still ruling the country. Blasphemy is legalised too: heck - you would have been declared blasphemous by now just for saying mullahs rushing to be secular - and you know what the punishment is for such ``sin`` - don`t you Mian? death by stoning.
And then a whole group of people(Ahmedis) have been constitutionally-declared ``non-muslims`` and legally-sanctioned to be murdered being by mobs of blood-thirsty mullahs - for worshipping the prophet`s son or somebody. This is even worse than Nazi Germany man!

Postings #42 by dullabhatti and #48 by sameerJB are right and have described the situation on the ground very accurately.

The major points here are as folows:

1). Some urban political parties or interests resort to landlord bashing; not because they want to support the lot of the downtrodden, but because they want to take political control out of the hands of the rural masses.

2). The primary issue in countries like Pakistan, irrespective of Urban or Rural areas, is lack of justice and corruption.

3). Most landlords who flaunt there wealth are not wealthy from farming/agriculture, but have become rich through ill-gotten means.

4). The richest people in Pakistan are not landlords, but are corrupt civilian and military officers followed by tax-evading businessmen.

pakfin #58: I agree with you. There used to be one interactor by the name of Baloch1 couple of years back. He wrote excellent post with regards to separating facts from myths and fictions on this issue. I wish he was here to interact.
sadna: Naturally, property owners are better off than propertyless anywhere in the world. Most of the Pakistanis are poor due to lack of property owning and no other means of income available in addition to poor levels of education and sub-standard treatment of women within poverty ridden society. I agree totally with the last paragraph of your post of using the goodness of jaati or traditional culture towards reducing poverty from the society and bringing justice to all, particularly who have been treated unjustly more often. However the power of landlord to do all this is limited. It needs planned government backing and smart approaches such as you mentioned in the case of South Korea. Just think about the power of landlord from one and only one fact.
Landlord is running in elections. The fight is tight. He expects all tillers and co-caste/ tribally affiliated prople to vote for him. He is not exceptionally rich but rich enough to take voters to nearby polling booth and back on election day. Right! Then why voter turn out does not exceed 25 percent despite all the powers he is exaggeratingly endowed with? He is totally unable to bring women of tillers families to walk less than a mile and vote. He is unable to excite or force more than half of his male tillers or bonded laborers to go to polling station even with the promise of transportation and free meal. It amazes me to read all the fancy stories of his powers from raping, pillaging, enslaving, stopping schooling for children and so on when on most important day of life and death, the electioni day, despite his wishes inability to just ask his ``so-called slaves`` to come to polling station and vote. Think about it!
Now if I have a house somewhere in Pakistan and giving upper floor to a poor will decrease his poverty: will I do it or how many other property owners would share their ownership so that poverty level in the society is reduced? How many will share their bank balances or businesses to do just that? If not many, then why land owners are expected to play their role in decreasing poverty? By the way whatever little charitable contribution, feudals or landowners contribute goes to their own caste, tillers and within village whereas urban charities go for LeT, LJ, HM, mosques and other Jihads mostly. Unlike urban wild mullahs, the feudal has nothing to worry about or gain from illiterate village mullah but they still subsuduze his living, year after year after year. From this income, the mullah of my village was able to give dowry to his daughters and able to send his sons to school and college until they moved to cities and settled with jobs. Who does an illiterate village mullah owes all this kindness and for what?
Who will disagree with you that steps must be taken to reduce poverty and eliminate injustices from any society but steps must be built before building castle in the air. The land reform in Pakistan is such as illusionary castle, or ``amrit dhara`` with nobody interested in paving the way to the castle or synthesizing amrit dhara.

Look at the social roles played by landlords in rural areas. When the crops fail because of droughts or floods, the farm workers survive on charity of the landlords. If a villager is harrassed by the police, he turns to the landlord. When his children are sick it is the landlord again who comes to his rescue.

Do businessmen do this readily for their workers? If a mill is in trouble one year, will the mill owner keep on paying his workers so that they may not starve?

There are no social ties or bonds between the owners and the workers of a commercial enterprise, but on the other hand these bonds are very strong in rural areas, havng been forged by generations over centuries.

History has shown that the institution of the Wadera or Choudhry has been weakening with time. As such institutions weaken, oppression increases, because in a weak and corrupt society the administration reigns supreme and when there is no one to keep this in check, the high-handedness of the administration keeps on growing.

Sameer#59
Re inability of landlord to ensure turnout in elections, let me be devil`s advocate.

Firstly the landlord knows he doesnot need a good turn out to get elected, he just needs more votes than his opponent and the advantage of `prepoll rigging`. Depending on the extent of his influence, few of those who depend his goodwill for their safety, livelihood or social acceptance, will oppose him within his party much less stand against him. If there is no other landlord, perhaps he maynot even have a strong opposition candidate. He is probably friendly with government functionaries in the area including the police. With this sort of influence, even if he cannot ensure turnout(even the govt. and Army cannot) he can certainly stand in the way of whatever the govt does or doesnot want.

His tillers, who are intelligent people, most probably donot go to vote because one of them or someone who can fight for their concerns will never stand for election as long as the landlord is around. As employees they already know the extent of what the landlord will and will(not) do for them, so what is the need to stand in line simply to put a govt. `mohar` on him when he is already maibaap?

``why land owners are expected to play their role in decreasing poverty? ``
Probably the emphasis is because most of the poor in our nations are among the rural landless.

#61 by sadna You are right in saying ``Probably the emphasis is because most of the poor in our nations are among the rural landless``.

Most urbanites complain about how the nations wealth is concentrated in the hands of the landlords and how city dwellers are being discriminated against. This is totally incorrect. If you compare the richest rural landlord with the richest urban businessman/industrialist, there will be a world of difference between their incomes, with the industrialist of course being way ahead. Similarly on the other side of the spectrum, the poorest villager will be much poorer than the poorest city dweller. The big issue that causes disparity is that most of the governments resources are concentrated on a few cities, with the rural areas being neglected for the most part.

Another issue that most people dont realise is that the return on investment in agriculture is very low. A trader in Kharadar makes much more from a small shop/office than a landowner with say 200 acres of land.

If you think that life is great in the rural areas of Pakistan with all landlords being rich and powerful, why dont you migrate to a village and take up farming for a living?

pakfin #62
``If you think that life is great in the rural areas of Pakistan with all landlords being rich and powerful, why dont you migrate to a village and take up farming for a living? ``
My doing so will not prove anything to the point here because I`m an Indian and we have land ceilings.

Pakfin: I have few questions regarding the feudals of West Punjab. Biggest land lords that we have in East Punjab(India) own may be few hundred acres..200..may be few upto 500...anything beyond that is rare and even people owning 200 acres is very rare..most villages don`t ahve even 1 land owner who owns that much..my village has a big land area compared to many others in the neighbourhood and there is no land owner who owns more than 50 acres now. May be previous generation but not any more. Many landowners whose grand fathers owned 200 acres now have 2 or 3 acres and earn their living by leasing other people`s[absent owners like myself] land to feed their kids...some have actually started working for dihaaRi doing construction work etc.
So my question is:

- What percentage of farming land area in Pakistan is owned by few land owers who own thousands of acres?
- is it that few(1 or 2%) people own all the land and everyone else is a tiller? or some tillers also own some land of their own but not enough to survive so they lease others`? what I want to knwo is that is this a case of some people own more others less or some people own other don`t at all?

If we are not looking solely on the merits of large landholdings, I will concede, as a comparison with other power groups, feudals have nore reason to realise that their destiny is interlinked with that of their tenants and others of their soil.

I cannot imagine what would have happened for example if in the UK, every discussion on national policies mindlessly pitted the landholdings of feudals on one side against the influence of neo-feudals among taxevading, lawbreaking industrialists, the civilian-space invading Army and externally-funded religious fundamentalists all on the other side.

#65
``..feudals have MORE reason to realise that..``

dullabhatti #64 Here are some numbers that are indicative of the size of landholdings in Pakistan (and an anecdote, this being chowk), and the games played with land reforms:
In the 1959 land reforms, the ceiling for private ownership was fixed at 500 acres irrigated and 1,000 acres unirrigated BY INDIVIDUAL. Multiply this with the landlords` wife(s) plus children plus loyal servants and that gives you an idea of the number you are looking for. And EVEN this ``re-distribution`` was never implemented (less than a million acres, often useless land, was taken over by the government). In 1972, Bhutto reduced the ceiling to 150 and 300 acres BY INDIVIDUAL, and even these ``reforms`` were never implemented (an expatriate pakistani who had taken a sabbatical from his job in the US in hopes of pushing proper land reforms in pakistan ended up exchanging angry words with Bhutto over the latters lack of sincerity in calling for land reforms, and in quitting the assignment).

#64 by dullabhatti. First of all we should not look at the absolute size of the landholding. For example, land in the Multan, Sahiwal or Faisalabad area may be more productive than say land in the Potohar region or Bahawalnagar. Similarly on orchard on 200 acres in Mirpurkhas or Nawabshah would produce much more income than say 1000 acres in Thatta or Badin.

The land in Punjab and I presume it is the same in both West and East Punjab is much more productive than land in Sindh, which in turn is mch more productive than land in Balauchistan. The primary reasons being arid zones in the South and West resulting in poor quality of soil because of a lack of organic matter and control of the water supply in the North resulting in more dry patches down South.

I do not know the exact ratio of landholdings in Paksitan between small and large landowners, but I suspect that most of the land is held by larger rather than smaller landowners. Having said that, it is all relative; there would be very few landowners in Sindh owning land in the thousands of acres and fewer still in the Punjab. Most landholdings would be in the hundreds of acres, which in my opinion is not large but more like medium landholding size. The problem with owning 2 or 3 acres is that it would barely generate subsistance level earnings. There is a mix of tillers owning land vs. no land at all. Most tillers would not own any land.

As far as East Punjab isconcerned, I have heard that a lot o the reforms were carried out to break the political hold of the Sikhs, however, I do not know if this is correct.

Let us look at the a pricing model for a farm frowing sugercane.

Average cost of land/acre: 25000
Opportunity cost of this/yr. @10% 2500
Fertilizer Cost/acre: 3000
Seed Cost: 1000
Tractor: 1000
Water and Land Revenue: 300
TOTAL ANNUAL EXPENSE/ACRE: Rs.7800

Average Yield/Acre: 500 maunds

Average Revenue/Acre @Rs. 40/maund: Rs. 20000

Farm Workers share @25% (Net Income): Rs. 5000

Landlords Share @75%: Rs.15000

Landlords Net Income: Rs.7200

Usually a farm worker would work on say 4 acres and would net Rs. 20,000 per year. On the other hand tha landowner may own say 200 acres and hence would net Rs. 1,440,000.

Please note that this analysis is for one of the best cash crops namely sugercane and the numbers would be much less for say wheat or rice. We have also not taken into the account the fact that crops need to be rotated at least every three years. Therefore, in essence you can grow sugercane on about two thirds of your land holding at any one time as the other one third would have a rotational crop like clover growing on it, which is then plowed back into the ground and is therefore not a revenue earner. Another important point to note hear is that during lean years of drought or floods, the labourers are supported by the landlord.

If we compare the ratio of incomes here with those of an industrialist vs. a factory worker, we will see that the industrialist or trader earns manifold more than the factory or commercial worker compared to a farm worker vs. a landlord.

Thanks pakfin and Tahmad for your replies..that helps in correcting my understanding of the situation on your side. I don`t think putting a ceiling on the land holdings in East Punjab produced any political or economic repercussions. Biggest sikh land lords were in West Punjab most of whom got some land alloted in Punjab, Haryana etc but not to the extent of their preious holdings. Majority of the landowners already had smaller holdings...usually all the land used to be under the name of the family head..Only thing I know or heard about land reforms is that most families ended up transfering the land to all family members..e.g. earlier grand father had everything uder his name..say 120 acres... although his 4 sons and 12 grandsons had physically distributed the land and each owned his 10 acres, grand father held on to the ``registry`` printed on the ``ashtaam faarm``. Now they ended up paying some registration fees and regitered under ``real`` owners` names which they did not do before to avoid paying the taxes or fees. Other than that I have heard few big land lords (500 acres or so) in Ferozpur, Faridkot districts were effected slightly but frankly there was not enough excess land to take away from them. Land reforms or no reforms in East Punjab, the land holding was already shrunk to a level to be any serious problem.

dullabhatti #70 Landholdings are also steadily shrinking in Pakistan as a growing population uses up remaining virgin territories, and (along with other trends like urbanization, opening up of jobs outside agriculture, growth of the expatriate pakistani population, and so on) it seems that a decade from now the entire issue of land reforms may be a dead horse. The failure of successive governments to fix the horse when it was still alive, and the resulting cost to at least two generations of pakistanis in general and the misery to the peasants in particular, will then pass into history as another small monument to the mismanagement of pakistan by its leaders and entrenched interests.

The World Bank CAS report has this table.

Distribution of Land Ownership in Pakistan 1990

Farm Size (acres).......Percent of Owners.......Percent of Total Farm Area
5 or less............................54.0 ........................................12.0
5 – 25 ..............................39.0 ........................................39.0
25 – 50.............................. 5.0 ........................................15.0
50 – 150.............................2.0 ........................................17.0
150 and above ...................0.5 ........................................17.0
All sizes ............................100.0 ....................................100.0
Source: Government of Pakistan, Agricultural Census (1990).

I couldnot locate an equivalent table for India.. But the picture seems to be that below a certain size of landholding the Indian farmer doesnot have the capital to improve his techniques and become a more productive farmer and this can lead to consolidation or a small farmer leasing his land to be tilled by a larger farmer or insolvency and debt. Land redistribution has to be accompanied by strengthening things like farmers organisations, distribution and marketing etc.

The CAS report also says `Close to 75 percent of Pakistan’s poor are landless and constitute 70 percent of the rural poor, while less than 3 percent of households owning 10 acres or more are poor.`


Here was an interesting comment on World Bank prescriptions from foodfirst.org:
``.. Listening to the case studies, it soon became clear that the World Bank is imposing a virtually identical set of policies on widely different countries, without regard for their unique histories, cultures, or patterns of land use. The policies focus on privatizing and individual titling to create markets in land, and in some countries include credit funds by which the poor acquire debts to purchase land from ``willing sellers.``

When communal lands are parceled up and individual titles are given out, the result has often been a disaster, as in the case of Thailand. Communities that had held relatively stable tenure over their land for many generations lost them in just a few years after the new titles were used as collateral for bank loans, generating destitution and despair. In cases where the poor were given credit to buy land from willing sellers, as in Brazil, Guatemala, and South Africa, the results have been no better.

Unfortunately, what wealthy landlords are willing to sell are their poorest quality lands. Rampant corruption means that the prices the poor pay for almost useless plots are inflated by 200 to 300 percent over their true value, making this form of ``land reform`` so expensive that it cannot possibly make a significant dent in the scale of landlessness, and generating debt burdens so high for the ``beneficiaries`` that 100 percent of the families interviewed in the case studies said they would not even be able to make their first payments once the several-year-long grace periods are up. Not only that, but families are required to put up so much of their own counterpart capital that the poorest - and thus the most in need of land - are complete