Nehru’s Word: Government was always afraid of an agrarian upheaval’ 

As battle-lines between Kisans and the government continue to be drawn, we bring to you Jawaharlal Nehru’s account in his Autobiography of another battle ninety years ago fought by the kisans with the mighty British government during the Civil Disobedience Movement of 1930-31. Nehru’s speech as part of this struggle got him charged for sedition.

When I came out of gaol in October (1930), both political and economic conditions seemed to me to be crying out for a no-tax campaign in rural areas. The economic difficulties of the agriculturists were obvious enough. Politically, our civil disobedience activities, though still flourishing everywhere, were getting a bit stale…. Obviously something was needed to liven things up, a fresh infusion of blood was necessary. Where could this come from except from the peasantry? — and the reserve stocks there were enormous. It would again become a mass movement touching the vital interests of the masses, and, what was to me very important, would raise social issues.

At short notice we convened a meeting there (in Allahabad) of the executive of our Provincial Congress Committee, and, after long debate, we decided to sanction a no-tax campaign, making it permissive for any district to take it up. ….Having got this permission to go ahead, our district of Allahabad wanted to take the first step. We decided to convene a representative kisan or peasants’ conference of the district a week later, to give the new campaign a push. …

....I was anxious to attend the kisan conference before my re-arrest. We called this conference a private one of delegates only, and so it was, and did not allow outsiders to come in. It was very representative of Allahabad District, and, as far as I remember, about 1,600 delegates were present. The conference decided very enthusiastically to start the no-tax campaign in the district. There was some hesitation among our principal workers…. for the influence and the power of the big zamindars to terrorise, backed as this was by the Government, was very great, and they wondered if the peasantry would be able to withstand this. But there was no hesitation or doubt in the minds of the sixteen hundred and odd peasants of all degrees who were present, or at any rate it was not apparent. I was one of the speakers at the conference. .... My re-arrest had probably been hastened because of my activities in connection with the no-tax campaign. As a matter of fact few things could have been better for that campaign than my arrest on that particular day, immediately after the kisan conference, while the peasant delegates were still in Allahabad. Their enthusiasm grew because of it, and they carried the decisions of the conference to almost every village in the district. Within a couple of days the whole district knew that the no-tax campaign had been inaugurated, and everywhere there was a joyful response to it….

Delegates had come to it from practically every important village in the district and, when they dispersed, they carried the news of the fresh decisions affecting the peasantry, and of my arrest in connection with them, to every part of the district. They became, sixteen hundred of them, effective and enthusiastic propagandists for the no-tax campaign. The initial success of the movement thus became assured, and there was no doubt that the peasantry as a whole in that area would not pay their rent to begin with, and not at all unless they were frightened into doing so….

Our appeal had been addressed both to zamindars and tenants not to pay; in theory it was not a class appeal. In practice, most of the zamindars did pay their revenue, even some who sympathised with the national struggle…. The tenantry, however, stood firm and did not pay, and our campaign thus became practically a no-rent campaign. From the Allahabad district it spread to some other districts of the United Provinces. In many districts it was not formally adopted or declared, but in effect tenants withheld their rents or, in many cases, were wholly unable to pay them owing to the fall in prices. As it happened, neither Government nor the big zaminaars took any widespread action to terrorise the recalcitrant tenantry for several months. They were not sure of their ground, as they had the political struggle with civil disobedience on the one side, and the economic slump, resulting in agricultural distress, on the other. The two merged into each other, and the Government was always afraid of an agrarian upheaval.

The no-tax movement in the United Provinces…. shifted the centre of gravity of our struggle from the urban to the rural areas, and it thereby revitalised the movement and put it on a broader and more enduring basis.…

Excerpts from Jawaharlal Nehru, An Autobiography, 1962 edition, pp. 232-37 Selected and edited by Mridula Mukherjee, former Professor of History at JNU and former Director of Nehru Memorial Museum and Library