24th Conference: Proceedings and Resolutions

Harikishan Singh Surjeet, summing up the discussion, referred to various points raised by the delegates and clarified certain doubts expressed by some of them. In his speech Surjeet said, we are facing two types of problems. One set of problems orginates from the different conditions prevailing in different States. The other set of problems arises out of a wrong understanding of the situation.

It is essential to so organise the peasant movement as to bring about a realignment of class forces, to accelerate the democratic movement and achieve the aim of agrarian revolution.

Surjeet referred to the peasant upsurge that took place after the Varanasi Conference. He said that some of the so-called “Marxist” economists had opposed the movement for remunerative prices for agricultural produce on the plea that consumers would be hit hard. They had labelled the movement as one of the landlords and kulaks. But we know that, while we have to fight for the peasant and agricultural labourers, we have at the same time to fight for the supply of articles of daily necessity at fair prices to the consumers. He referred to the decisions taken at the Varanasi Conference and said that those conclusions had been arrived at after a thorough discussion. He expressed his sense of pride over the kisan movement in West Bengal and said that it had become powerful enough to face any onslaught of authoritarianism.

Surjeet explained the situation in which the formation of a separate organisation of the agricultural workers became necessary. The slogan of land to the landless is to be taken to the board rural masses and proper attention has to be paid to the problems of the tribal people.

On the question of remunerative prices, Surjeet said, we cannot adopt a dual policy for any crop on an all-India basis. We are different from the Naidus, Joshis and Rudrappas, spokesmen of the rural rich lobbies in Tamil Nadu. Maharashtra and Karnataka.

Surjeet forewarned the delegates that no individualist leader should be allowed to dominate the movement. They will have to take initiative on every issue facing the peasantry. He also asked them to defeat the designs of the secessionist and communal forces which were trying to channelise the mass discontent in a wrong direction. He also told the conference that the masses would have to struggle against the attacks of the ruling Congress(I) on the democratic rights of the people. Moreover, we will have to carry forward the tradition of the anti-imperialist struggle.

After Surjeet’s summing up of the discussion, both the reports were adopted unanimously.

Chathunni Master submitted the accounts of the All India kisan Sabha which was accepted unanimously.

At 6.00 P.M. State Government employees held a rally in the foreyard of the Zila Parishad Bhavan. They raised the slogans, “Down with Imperialism”, “Down with Authoritarianism”, “Worker—Peasant Unity Zindabad”. Addressing the rally M. Basavapunniah said that the employees of the West Bengal Government should not treat themselves as just the employees of any State Government. They are employees of a Left Front Government and that is why their responsibilities are manifold. He told the employees that they should keep in mind the fact that the Left Front Government was an instrument in the hands of the people of our country with which they can strengthen the democratic movement for their advance. The employees of West Bengal have an important role to play in this movement.

With Red Flags in one hand and improvised food packets in the other, thousands of men and women, both young and old, in their tattered clothes and mostly bare-foot, started pouring into Midnapore town on the eve of the Open Session of the All India Kisan Sabha and the Founding Conference of the All India Agricultural Workers’ Union. They had come from all corners of the district with their respective banners, beating drums and playing their traditional musical instruments. There were quite some from other districts and also from States like Andhra Pradesh, Orissa, Assam, etc.

The unending streams coming from all directions were shouting the same slogans: the Central Government must concede the demands of the Left Front Government to meet the drought situation, radical land reforms must be implemented. The determination to struggle against the exploitative system, was write large on the faces of these poor peasants and agricultural workers. They were clearly not daunted by the severe drought conditions in the State. If anything, it had further strengthened their resolve to struggle.

On November 11, the day of the rally, despite a cloudy weather, lakhs and lakhs of people had collected at the Judges Court Maidan on the bank of the Kanasavati river. The proceedings of the rally began at about 4 p.m. with Benoy Krishna Choudhury presiding over it.

E.M.S. Namboodiripad, Jyoti Basu and Shantimoy Ghosh greeted the rally after which a minute’s silence was observed as a mark of homage to the departed Soviet-leader, Comrade Brezhnev.

The newly elected office-bearers were then introduced to the rally. Thanking the people of Midnapore for making the session and the rally a huge success, Sukumar Sengupta, District Secretary of the CPI(M), called on them to strengthen the organisation.

E.M.S. Namboodiripad, greeting the rally, recalled that Bengal-first united Bengal and then West Bengal—has so far organised’ four sessions of the All India Kisan Sabha, the one just concluded also being the Founding Conference of the Agricultural Workers’ Union. He said that many problems emanated from the same source. It is the same set of exploiting. classes which are the enemy of both. Greeting the people of West Bengal, he said, delegates who have come here from all over the country will draw inspiration from the struggles that have been conducted here.

The newly elected General Secretary of the AIKS, Santimoy Ghosh, said that the Kisan Sabha in West Bengal had grown amidst struggle and was carrying forward that struggle. He gave a call to intensify the struggle against landlords and money lenders at the all-India level and the fight against divisive and communal forces.

Harkishan Singh Surjeet, addressing the rally, safe that after deliberating on the national and international situation and the problems of the peasantry and agricultural labour on the revolutionary soil of Midnapore, the Kisan Sabha has resolved to take initiative and lead the united struggle against the bourgeois-landlord classes, mobilise the people against the war danger created by the machinations of the imperialists, and to resist along with all other democratic sections the increasing attacks on the democratic rights of the people.

Referring to the current national situation and the activities of divisive forces in Punjab and the North-East, Surjeet said that fundamentalist forces like the Jamait-e-Islami and the Viswa Hindu Parishad were frying to divert the discontent of the people against the bourgeois-landlord regime into disruptive channels. The session has resolved to wage an all-out war on these forces.

Contrasting the anti-worker, anti-peasant policies of the Indira Congress with the policies of the Left Front Government of West Bengal, Surjeet said that the Central Government had no right to refuse assent to the West Bengal Land Reforms(Amendment) Bill. Strongly criticising the Centre for its policies, Surjeet said that Punjab by itself could meet the rice requirement of West Bengal provided the Central Government did not put obstructions. He said that the message of the revolutionary people of West Bengal would be carried to all parts of the country after this session.

Godavari Parulekar greeted the rally, especially the large number of women who had come to it from far-flung areas of the district. She sharply attacked the bankrupt policies of the Indira Congress in her speech.

Greeting the rally on behalf of the people of Tripura, Nripen Chakravarty warned against the increasing war danger. and referred to the huge peace movement that was growing all over the world. He said that if the Kisan Sabha was not strengthened and expanded, then our multi-national country would be faced with serious and complex problems. Giving an account of the measures taken by the Left Front Government of Tripura for the welfare of the tribals, peasants and the people in general he said that the Indira Congress in Tripura was entering into alliance with forces such as the TUJS and Amra Bengali. To safeguard the integrity of the country, the democratic organisations have to intensify their struggle against divisive forces and strengthen their own organisations, he said.

Greeting the AIKS and the AIAWU and the massive gathering, Joyti Basu said that it was a matter of pride to be among these who propagated democratic consciousness among the rural people and conducted their struggles. He called for fulfilling the tasks left behind by the innumerable martys who had laid down their lives under Congress rule.

Referring to the present critical situation, he said that it was the CPI(M) and not the Congress(I), which was working for the integrity of the country. He said that the National Integration Council formed by the Prime Minister, had been reduced to a farce by lending support to communal and divisive forces. It was evident in Assam, Tripura West Bengal, Bihar, Punjab and Kerala. He warned that if this was not checked, the country would be in peril.

Talking of the prevalent corruption and unprincipled manoeuvrengs of the Congress(I) leadership, Basu warned against the conspiracies of the Congress(I) against the Left Front in West Bengal. The CPI(M) has endeared itself to the people of West Bengal by its services to them in the last six years. He called upon the Party cadre to work honestly and work hard to win ever larger numbers of people.

Joyti Basu said that the Left Front Government has successfully tackled the onslaught of the 1978 floods and now it was determined, with the cooperation of all, to overcome the present calamity due to drought.

Severely condemning the activities of the Congress(I) in the State of West Bengal, Joyti Basu pointed out how Congress(I) people were putting obstructions in the way of meeting the grave drought situation by organising bands and blockades on such issues as the death of the police officer in Tiljala recently. He pointed out that the Congress(I) never raised its voice when 74 police personnel were killed during its regime in the State.

He criticised the Centre for not permitting the State to buy and bring food grains from other State to help the drought-hit people.

Benoy Krishna Choudhury gave a brief report of the deliberations and decisions of the AIKS and AIAWU sessions.

The differences that came up in the discussion can be broadly put into two categories: one arising from a wrong understanding of the problem and working out the line according to subjective desires; and the second arising out of different situations in different States.

While the first type of understanding has to be corrected, the second has to be taken note of in the frame work of the general policy laid down by the AIKS.

We are working for the completion of the agrarian revolution. This can be accomplished only by overthrowing bourgeois-landlord rule, and to reach that stage, we have to continuously and consistently fight against bourgeois-landlord policies, build a powerful agrarian movement rallying all the peasantry, based on the poor peasants and agricultural labour, build the worker-peasants alliance and change the correlation of class forces in the country.

Ours is still an agrarian country with 70 per cent of the people dependent on agriculture. The peasantry here has an important role to play, along with the working class, in the democratic revelntion. Therefore, it is necessary for us to overcome our weakness among the masses. The call to overcome the weakness has been raised since 1958. But taking the country as a whole, after 24 years, where do we stand? Is it only due to the failure of the organisation that we have not been able to overcome the weaknesses? Or, are certain policies advanced by us also responsible for our not making headway to the extent necessary?

We discussed this point at our last Varanasi Session and while correcting some of our old policies, we gave a new orientation to the peasant movement. To remind the delegates of this I will refer to what was said in the Varanasi Conference report.

That report made an assesment of the changes that have taken place in the agrarian structure in the last three decades or so. Land to the tiller and total abolition of landlordism have been the basic slogans of the Kisan Sabha since its inception. What bearing do the changes in the agrarian sector have on these basic slogans? Seizure and distribution of the land of the landlords still remains the central slogan for the Kisan Sabha to be propagated among the peasantry and other democratic classes. But the correlation of class forces which existed at the time when the Kisan Sabha inscribed these basic aims in its programme is not the same that exists today. This has great relevance to the chalking out of immediate slogans and actions.

The land reforms, which the Congress Governemnt set about to introduce after Independence, were not directed to end landlordism and give land to the tiller, they had only very limited objectives to reform, not abolish, the old type landlordism. This led to the coming into existance of the new-type landlord, combining in himself elements of both feudalism and capitalism. Another objective was to create a stratum of rich peasants. These two sections were to constitute the political base of the ruling party in the rural areas. With the thousands of crores of rupees from the public exchequer pumped into agriculture, these sections were helped to adopt modern methods of farming.

Here one tendency should be guarded against. Earlier there was a tendency to altogether ignore the penetration of capitalism in to agriculture. Now a reverse tendency is raising its head which considers that feudal landlordism and other semifeudal relations have almost totally been abolished. This is wrong. The extent of penetration of capitalism into agriculture varies from State to State and even from region to region inside a State. A concrete study of the situation in each area is necessary.

Another phenomenon to be noted is the monetarisation of the economy. Today, it is not only those who have surpluses who are taking their produce to the market. Even the poor peasant, immediately after the harvest, for various reasons sells his produce in the market and later buys even his foodgrain requirement from the market. It is only if this phenomenon is properly understood that we can mount a struggle against the big traders and the monopolists.

Even while concentration of land-ownership continues, Congress land reforms have resulted in the eviction of millions of tenants who have either joined the ranks of landless agricultural labourers or become tenants-at-will without any rights or protection. Only a section of the earlier tenants could buy a portion of the land on which they were working.

So, what is the position after Congress land reforms? About four per cent of the big owners have in their possession about one-third of the cultivated land. Another ten per cent consists of rich peasants. Yet another 15 per cent consists of middle peasants. Twenty per cent of the rural households are poor peasants. The remaining 50 per cent are those who own no land at all, earning their livelihood mainly by hiring them selves out as wage-workers or are engaged in handicrafts, village services etc. It has, of course to be borne in mind that this categorisation will vary from State to State and region to region.

What has to be noted is that unlike in the pre-Independence days, 25 per cent of the peasants constituting rich and middle peasants, are not moved any longer by the slogan of seizure of landlords’ land and its distribution. At the other end, the 70 per cent of landless and poor peasants are not conscious and organised enough to go into action for the seizure of land lords’ land. Even when they move into action, it is on the demand of distribution of Government Waste land, cultivable forest land, etc. Regarding even surplus land above the ceiling which the landlords are keeping, illegally, the struggles as in Kerala or Andhra Pradesh could not go beyond the stage of locating such surplus land and exposing the Governments’ claim.

What has to be noted, again, is that Congress rule, while failing to end landlordism, and concentration and growing landlessness, had successfully disrupted the pre-Independence peasant unity. It is true that unity centred around the rich and middle peasants, while today we are striving to build peasant unity centering round the agricultural workers and poor peasants. The two years of Janata Government had shown that its policies in regrad to land reforms are no differnet from those of the Congress.

What conclusion did the Varanasi report reach from all this? The conclusion is that the slogan of complete abolition of landlordism and distribution of land to the landless and land poor continues to be the central slogan of the agrarian revolution which we have to continue to propagate. But it is a slogan on which we cannot go into action today in most parts of the country.

From this, the Varanasi report drew the next conclusion. Criticism continuing to porpagate the central slogan, while conclusion. One leader struggle for surplus land, benami land. Waste land, challenged Kisan Sabha will have to take up for immediate action such issues as the question of wages of agricultural workers, house-sites, rent-reduction, 75 per cent of the produce to the share croppers, evictions, writing off or scaling down of rural indebtedness, remunerative prices for agricultural produce, cheap credit, reduction of tax burdens and heavy levies like water charge, electricity rates, etc., landlord goonda attacks with the connivance or direct help of the police, social oppression on Harijans, corruption in the administration, etc.

These are issues which affect all sections of the peasantry-poor, middle, rich and they can all be drawn into the movement on them. All these currents have to be brought together to build the maximum unity of the peasantry centering round the agricultural workers and poor peasants to isolate the small stratum of big landlords.

All this will of course depend on how successfully we organise the agricultural workers and poor peasants and bring them into action not only on their own specific demands but also on the general demands of the peasantry as a whole and how far we are able to draw other sections of the peasantry into movements on issues affecting them and on the general demands of the peasantry. There is no doubt that the middle and rich peasants can be drawn into movements on such issues. It is our task to see that while other sections of the peasantry support the agricultural workers in their struggle, the latter in turn extend support to movements on the demands of the easantry, thus paving the way for building peasant unity.

The period since the Varanasi Session has witnessed an unprecedented peasant upsurge culminating in March 26, 1981, Kisan March in the capital. This upsurge was mainly related to the questions of remunerative prices for peasant produce, growing indebtedness, heavy tax burdens, higher wages for agricultural workers, etc. Spontaneous movements developed in many States. We intervened and were able to give them proper direction. The united action of the peasantry form own State Governments to come down, some concessions. We have to draw the proper lessions of this upsurge was forward the understanding in order to develop a powerful peasant movement.

Even after the Varanasi Session, when these movements are developing, certain comrades again expressed differences saying that it was not correct to support these movements since they served the interests of the landlords and kulaks and were against the interests of the consumers.

There was also some resistance to the formation of a separate agricultural workers’ organisation. We discussed these questions at the meeting of the All India Kisan Council in Trichur and cleared the doubts on the question of the formation of the AIAWU. The AIKC at Trichur passed a resolution which said, “The All India Kisan Council, after considering the incessant demand to set up a separate All India Agriculture Workers Organisation has come to the conclusion that such a step is necessary to spread the agrarian movement to ever new areas and States in our country…… The different State units of the Kisan Sabha are free to decide whether it is necessary or not to form separate State agricultural labour organisations, after considering the concrete conditions obtaining in the respective States.”

Some issues were again raised in the last meeting of the Central Kisan Committee questioning certain aspects of the accepted policy of the AIKS. The CKC discussed them and clinched them. Yet, some of these issues have again been raised here.

The AIKS is proud of its West Bengal unit, it has tremendous achievements to its credit during the last 15 years. It has taken deep roots in the peasantry and also deepened its base among the agricultural workers and poor peasants. This inspires the peasant movement in the rest of the country. It has acquired tremendous prestige. But if this prestige is utilised by some comrades to challenge the accepted line, it can have very damaging effects.

One leading delegate from West Bengal, for instance, has challenged the whole line of the AIKS in the name of Bengal experience. There may be other delegates from West Bengal who, perhaps, are in agreement with him. Hence, it is necessary to answer the points he has raised.

He has said that from the beginning they in West Bengal have raised the question of fair price and have developed the movement on the slogan of “down with levy”. They have also developed a powerful canal movement. But afterwards very few of the rich and middle peasants remained with us.

Then he emphasised that only when they were able to take up the questions of land and wages, were they able to build a strong base among the agricultural workers and poor peasants. He then posed the question whether the policy which the AIKS was pursuing was not within the frame-work of the bourgeois path, and said that the West Bengal line conformed to the working class path. He also raised the question of peasant unity-whether it is unity with the rich and middle peasants or poor peasants? He narrated the experience of the West Bengal land struggles-how they had occupied benami and surplus land and made a big advance. He then came to the conclusion that instead of waiting for legal assent to the comprehensive land lagislation. Occupation of land would have to be resorted to. He raised this question in the form of seeking advice from the AIKS Session. Similarly in regard to drought-relief work, he proposed dehoarding of foodgrains, this also in the name of seeking guidance.

He ridiculed the 1967 United Front in West Bengal as a hotch-potch and asserted that the present Left Front was the real front.

But when he comes to the question of paddy prices, he says that even Rs. 140 (as demanded by the AIKS) will not be acceptable to the peasantry in his State and even Rs. 180 would be rejected.

He also said that even without a separate organisation of agricultural workers, they in West Bengal had been able to organise the agricultural workers in the Kisan Sabha.

What this comrade does is to counterpose the middle and rich peasants to the poor peasants, and he completely misses the new orientation given to the kisan movement-orientation that without raising the demands the new orientation given to the kisan movement-orientation that without raising the demands of the peasantry as a whole including the rich and middle peasants and without merging the different currents into one we can neither advance towards the agrarian revolution nor will we be able to raise the movement to the level of land occupation. What the comrade says reflects neither the West Bengal experience nor the experience of the peasant movement in the rest of the country.

The comprehensive land legislation of West Bengal is very important. We have not sufficiently undertaken the task of popularising it throughout the country so as to mobilise support to the demand of Presidential assent to it. This is necessary both from the angle of demanding the Left Front Government and developing the peasant movement in the rest of the country by exposing the claims of the Congress(I) Governments and putting them in the dock on this question.

The Planning Commission itself has admitted that land ceiling legislations have been a failure due to the loopholes in them, but when the Left Front Government plugs these loopholes through an amending Bill, the Central Government refuses to give it assent. This shows its collaboration with the landlords. This West Bengal legislation can be used as a weapon to isolate the bourgeois-landlord parties, to develop powerful movements and win many allies.

Similarly, in the matter of drought-relief work, when there is a Left Front Government here, you have to coordinate your activities with the steps that the Government takes. The Left Front Governemnt did exemplary work earlier in dealing with the situation created by the 1978 floods and is now doing the same in regard to drought-relief. The consciousness of the people has to be raised against the hoarders and against the Central Government which is not providing sufficient relief to West Bengal to meet the drought situation.

Regarding the issue raised about the separate agricultural workers’ organisation, I have already quoted from the Trichur CKC resolution which was adopted on the basis of experience and the necessity of bringing agricultural workers into the movement. But there is no compulsion in that resolution on any State. Our aim is to bring the agricultural workers into the movement and wean them away from the influence of bourgeois-lndlord parties.

As for the 1967 United Front in West Bengal, it is wrong to characterise it as a hotch potch. It played an important role in the then prevailing correlation of forces in the State. It is the experience of the 1967 and 1969 United Fronts, backed by a powerful mass movement, which has given us the present strength, and the Left Front of today cannot be isolated from the struggle which has been going on since 1967 because in many parts of the country, even now, such a process may have to be gone through.

Another delegate from West Bengal expressed disagreement with the accepted policy of the AIKS, saying that there was no upsurge in West Bengal on the question of remunerative prices. He forgets the fact that with a Left Front Government ruling the State, Rs. 125 per quintal was given for paddy by giving some bonus to the peasants. Secondly, why does he forget that strong discontentment was expressed on the question of jute price. The question of remunerative price for jute has been raised and we were able to forge the unity of the working class and peasantry. Jute being the main commercial crop of West Bengal, the peasants here will naturally fight for remunerative prices and this fight is a part of the countrywide upsurge.

In emphasising the growth of the movement in West Bengal he counterposes the Left Front to the mass movement and says that the movement has grown not because of the Left Front Government, but, on the other hand, the Left Front Government has come into existence because of the struggle and movement. This is a very wrong poser and would lead to very wrong conclusions. The two should not be counterposed, they are complimentary and supplementary. The Left Front Government, as an organ of struggle, with its policies and measures, has helped the growth of the movement in the State. Not only that. These policies and measures have inspired the working class, peasantry and other sections of the working people in the rest of the country also. Similarly, the development of the movement has given great strength to the Left Front Government whose base has gone on expanding year after year. Therefore, such mistaken notions have to be given up and a proper understanding needs to be imbibed.

One delegates from Kerala also has raised some points. Questions regarding most of the commercial crops of Kerala have been dealt with in the report. Cocoa was left out, that will be included.

On the question of agricultural workers’ wages, he said that the rates now prevalent in kerala were Rs. 20 to Rs. 25, but the report highlights the achieving of Rs. 9.80 as wages. He should understand that these wages in kerala are an exception. In the country as a whole agricultural labour wages are much lower. There is a powerful movements in Kerala. We have to develop such powerful movements in other States. That cannot be done on the basis of exceptional rates prevalent in one State.

But the main point which he has raised is in regard to land reforms. He has stated that kerala Land Reform legislation has “completely abolished the absolute right in land”, meaning thereby that landlordism has been abolished in Kerala. Though it has been stated that this is not the Kerala delegation’s view, since this understanding has been expressed for long-it was also expressed at the Sikar Conference of the AIKS in 1974-it is necessary to deal with this point.

First of all, they are confusing the question of basic land reforms with those carried out under the bourgeois framework. No doubt, there are significant achievements in States with Left Front and Left Democratic Front Governments backed by powerful movements. This is indicated by the Government report that out of the 1.9 million acres of surplus land distributed more than 1.1 million acres are in West Bengal and Kerala alone. But all this is within the bourgeois frame-work and should not be confused with the abolition of landlordism. That requires a different correlation of forces and a higher stage of the agrarian movement.

The Kerala delegate has also raised the question of higher price for paddy. There have been two trends on this question. Many, including some who are known as Marxist economists, have been arguing for a lower price for paddy and other foodgrains in the name of the interests of the consumers. There are others who have been demanding even higher prices completely ignoring the interests of the consumes. The Kisan Sabha has to fight against both these trends.

The first trend fails to understand that a solution to the deepening economic crisis cannot be found by passing on the burdens of the crisis to the shoulders of one section. Both the consumers and the producers have to carry on the struggle in defence of their interests against the Government’s efforts to throw the burdens on the peasants. That is why the Kisan Sabha has raised the question of remunerative prices—prices which would meet the cost of production plus some margin of profit. The Kisan Sabha also demands that the issue price to the consumer should be subsidised. But the Government, under world Bank pressure, is actually doing away with the subsidies.

But the Kisan Sabha cannot echo the demands raised by the landlords. That would not help in developing the peasant movement. But it is known that in certain areas in Kerala like Kuttanad the cost of production is much higher. In such cases the State Kisan Sabhas are entitled to demand some bonus over and above the fixed price.

Some other delegates have raised some other issues and given certain suggestions, They can be looked into by the CKC. Some comrades have raised the question of education of cadre, publication of a journal and strengthening of the AIKS Centre. The CKC will go into all this. Another comrade has raised some points about projects and cooperatives, panchayats, etc. We have to take up these demands, because the peasants feel very much concerned about them and we have to actively participate in panchayats and cooperatives to see that these institutions are not utilised by landlords to strengthen their economic and political interests.

In the end I want to state what the report highlights. What it highlights is that we have to carry forward the understanding reached in Varanasi about building and developing the peasant movement. The ruling party has come out with another 20- Point Programme to hoodwink the people. It is nothing but a rehash of the earlier 20-Point Programme whose bankruptcy has already been seen. The review of the new programme shows that not even 20 per cent of the targets have been ful- filled. We have to counter it by developing mass movements on various issues like remunerative price for peasant producers, stopping of evictions, distribution of waste land, reduction of debt burdehs and high taxes, stopping of atrocities on Harijans, etc.

We have to develop united actions. Even the two All India Kisan Sabhas are not strong enough to mobilise the peasantry throughout the country. The peasantry is in a ferment today. Only through united actions will be able to channelise their discontent in the right direction.

In this we have to utilise the achievements of the Left Front and Left-Democratic Front Governments. They have to be utilised to develop the peasant movement in different parts of the country. While this will be of tremendous help to the peasant movement in the rest of the country, it also enables us to defend the Left Front Governments from the attacks of the bovrgeois-landlord classes and their Governments.

Another important question is the defence of democratic rights. The Congress(I) Government is bent on supressing the peasantry through various means and the Kisan Sabhas have in unite with all others and fight against these attacks.

Yet another important question is that of the activities of divisive forces. The discontent of the people is being utilised by these forces to disrupt the democratic movement of which the peasant movement is an important part. They are raising separatist, communal, casteist and other slogans to work for the disintegration of the country.

The Kisan Sabha has to resolutely combat these forces and protect the integrity and unity of the country.

Extremely important to the kisan movement is the necessity of combating the war danger by developing a powerful peace movement and supporting the national liberation struggles that are going on.

Lastly, we have to strengthen the kisan organisation. Without strengthening and developing the organisation, neither can the tasks be fulfilled nor the lags in the movement overcome. For this, necessary cadre will have to be allocated. The organisation should not be allowed to become the pocket-borough of some individuals. Great attention has to be paid to the proper functioning of committees. All the struggles that are conducted should be properly reviewed and lessons drawn from them. In all this I have no hesitation in saying that the AIKS Centre also requires a lot of improvement.

About the report of the AIAWU, I have nothing much to say. It is a newly formed organisation. Some corrections have been suggested, they will be incorporated. Gujarat comrades have raised the question of Adivasis. The criticism that sufficient attention is not paid to their problems is correct.

The 24th Conference of the All-India Kisan Sabha salutes the brave martyrs who fell victims to police bullets or murderous assaults of goondas and class enemies in the glorious struggles that have been going on in various parts of the country since the last session.

The Session pays its respectful homage to the brave martyrs of Tripura and Assam who were brutally murdered by agents of separatist forces. They laid down their lives bravely defending the unity of various sections of the people which these reactionaries tried to disrput. The Session salutes the brave martyrs of Kerala and Andhra Pradesh who were murdered by RSS and Naxalite goondas in league with Congress(I) hoodlums.

These martyrs and others who have died fighting class enemies and facing brutal repression have added a new glorious chapter to the saga of struggles that have been fought in defence of unity of the fighting people against the attacks on the living of the people and their civil liberties. By their supreme sacrifice they have lifted the red flag higher.

The Session pledges to keep the memory of these martyrs ever green in the hearts of millions of our countrymen, by continuing and strengthening the movements in which they participated and doing our utmost to carry forward aims for which they fought.

The 24th, Session of the All-India Kisan Sabha pays its respectful homage to Com. A. Balasubramaniam outstanding working class and Communist leader of Tamil Nadu; Com. (Major) Jaipal Singh who participated in Telengana peasant revolt; Com. Suhrid Mullick Choudhury, C.K.C. Member; Com. Ramanand Singh, General Secretary, Bihar State Kisan Sabha and CKC Member; Com. Hardit Singh Bhattal, Vice President, Punjab State Kisan Sabha; Com. Fauja Singh Bhullar; Com. A.V. Kunhambu an outstanding leader of Kerala peasantry; Com. Satya Narayan Singh former CKC member and President of U.P. Kisan Sabha; Com. Choudhury Ghasi Ram a former CKC member and Com. Iyotirmoy Basu, Com. Dinen Bhattacharya, Com. Mukunda Mandal outstanding Parliamentarians who voiced the demands of working people; Com. Sohan Singh Josh a veteran Communist and all other leaders and devoted workers of the All India Kisan Sabha who passed away since the last 23rd. Conference. They held the red banner high, fighting the reactionary forces and serving the cause of the downtrodden to their last breath.

The 24th. Session of the All India Kisan Sabha expresses its heartfelt sorrow at the death of Sri Sheikh Abdullah, Chief Minister of Jammu & Kashmir, one of the most respected national leaders, and the most respected leader of the people of that State.

Sheikh Abdullah will also be remembered as one of the most fighting prominent leaders of the State People’s movement who roused and led the Kashmiri people in the fight against the regimes of the princes, puppets of British imperialism. This struggle of the Peoples of the former native States coalesced with the national struggle against British Imperialism for freedom and national Independence.

He was one of those outstanding leaders of the national movement who were considered to be the bulwark of secularism fighting against forces of communalism. In his famous “Quit Kashmir’’ programme, Sheikh Abdullah tried to give the movement in his State a progressive orientation, in which radical land reforms found a prominent place.

In his death the country has lost a prominent national leader and, the State of Jammu Kashmir its most popular and outstanding leader. Paying homage to this departed statesman and national leader the All-India Kisan Sabha expresses its heart-felt sympathies to the people of Kashmir and sends its condolences to the members of his family.

The 24th. Session of the All-India Kisan Sabha views with grave alarm the fast deteriorating international situation and feverish preparations being made by imperialism, first and faremost U.S. Imperialism, to plunge the world into a nuclear holocaust. Such a war spells danger to the very existence of mankind.

The Conference holds that the threat to humanity arises out of the aggressive policies of U.S. imperialism, directed against Soviet Union in particular and the Socialist world. All its weapons of destruction are concentrated against the Soviet Union. The plan to deploy Pershing and Cruise missiles in Europe is intended to directly hit the Soviet Union from the soil of West Germany. The aim is to destroy all the gains of the working people of the world and above all restore the old balance of forces where imperialism dominated the world. In the name of achieving military superiority over the Soviet Union, the U.S. Imperialists are going into mass production of the cannibalistic neutron bomb.

The talk of limited nuclear war is only meant to deceive the people and full their vigilance. No nuclear war can be limited, it will engulf the whole world and result in destruction and devastation on a scale never seen in any earlier war.

The USA tries to conceal its evil designs for global domination with the talk of a mythical threat to its security from the Soviet Union. It is the U.S. Imperialists who have encouraged the Israeli Zionists to commit continuous aggression in West Asia, urge their allies to extend NATO operations to the , Indian Ocean and the Persian Gulf, organise a rapid deployment force to intervene in Asia, and have converted Diego Garcia into a nuclear naval-air base. Driven out of Iran, they are seeking to convert Pakistan into their occupational base. The arming of the Pakistani military dictatorship poses a direct threat to India’s security.

This Conference expresses its satisfication that the Indian people have begin to be aware of the dire threat to peace as was seen in huge peace marches in West Bengal and the Capital of the country and anti-war demonstrations in almost all the States. This Conference is happy to note that the peasantry in large numbers participated in these demonstrations. The popular forces in India through these actions have taken die first step to join hands with the mighty peace movement in Europe and in the USA itself. The Conference calls on the peasantry of India which has glorious traditions of anti-imperialism, to take it as its urgent task to unite with the working class and all progressive sections to combat the war danger, expose and unmask the aggressive plans of the imperialists before the world and save it from nuclear devastation.

The 24th. Session of the All India Kisan Sabha denounces the Israeli aggression on Labanon and the genocidal massacre of Palestinian men, women and children in the Chatila and Sabra Camp in Beirut. The objectives of the Israeli Zionists were to liquidate the Palestinian liberation struggle by beheading the Palestinian liberation organisation of its leadership to drive out the Syrian Inter-Arab force from Lebanon, to establish Israeli control over South Lebanon and pressurise Lebanon into signing a separate treaty with Israel on the Camp David model. Though the Zionists have failed to achieve the objects for which they launched the war in the first week of June, the Israeli aggression continues, with Israeli troops still on the soil of Lebanon. The PLO remains unvanquished and carries on the struggle for an independent Palestinian State. This Conference extends its greetings to the heroic Palestinian people, to the PLO and its leader, Yasser Arafat.

Violating all resolutions of the United Nations, ignoring world opinion, the Israeli Zionists are refusing to vacate the Arab land occupied by aggression. Instead they have annexed the Golan Heights belonging to Syria and East Jerusalem and declared the latter as the capital of Israel. They are setting up lewish settlements, one after another, in the occupied West Hank of Jordan and the Gaza strip with a view to annexing these areas also, They bombed and destroyed without any provocation the Iraqi nuclear plant.

The Israeli Zionists would never have dared to continue these aggressive activities but for the blessing, encouragement and backing of the US imperialists. The USA, with its own aim of establishing supremacy over the oil-rich West Asia, is building up Israel as the superpower of the region, arming it to the teeth with the latest most sophisticated weapons worth billions of dollars to strengthen the Zionist Power of aggression. It protects the Zionist aggressors, by repeatedly using its veto in the U.N. Security Council.

This Conference vehemently condemns the Israeli Zionists and the US imperialists and reiterates that a just and permanent solution to the West Asia problem can be found only-by the Israeli aggressors vacating all the territory occupied in the 1967 War and afterwards and the establishment of a Palestinian State.

The Conference extends its solidarity to the Palestinian and the rest of the Arab people and assures them all support in their struggle against the US backed Israeli aggressors.

The 24th Conference of the All India Kisan Sabha extends its fraternal greetings to the peasantry and people of Afghanistan who are successfully defending the, Saur Revolution and its gains.

The U.S. imperialists, though rebuffed by the timely assistance given by the Soviet Union to the Government of the People’s Democratic Republic of Afghanistan, are continuing their interventionist activities to subvert the Karmal regime and plant a Government pliable to them in that country. They are arming and training reactionary Afghan tribal chieftains and big landlords who have fled to Pakistan. Incidents are being created inside Afghanistan to create a feeling of insecurity among the people.

The Conference notes with great appreciation that the people, the People’s Democratic Party and the Government of Afghanistan have so far rebuffed these machinations of the imperialists. The Karmal Government has stabilised itself and has thrown out the counter-revolutionaries from most of the areas from which they were operating. The economy is being rebuilt on the path of democratic advance. Significant achievements have already been made.

The People’s Democratic Republic of Afghanistan, as well as the Soviet Union, have repeatedly declared that the Soviet troops at present in Afghanistan would be withdrawn from there as soon as the conditions for such withdrawal are created by the ending of outside interference in the internal affairs of Afghanistan and the ceasing of all attempts at subversion from outside. The Afghanistan Government has always expressed its readiness to enter into talks with Pakistan and Iran, bilaterally or trilaterally, to create such conditions. While the Pakistani military regime has been holding talks with the U.N Secretary General’s representative, it is still not willing to enter into talks directly with the Government of Afghanistan. Instead it continues to facilitate the subversive activites of the USA and in the name of a mythical threat from the Soviet Union, through Afghanistan receives sophisticated weapons from the USA.

The Conference reiterates the All-India Kisan Sabha’s full support to the peasantry and people of Afghanistan and the People’s Democratic Party in their struggle against the Afghan counter-revolutionaries and their U.S. imperialist patrons. The Conference wishes the Afghan People all success in building their economy and society in a new democratic direction.

The 24th Session of the All India Kisan Sabha extends its fraternal greetings to the people of Kampuchea who, under the leadership of the People’s Revolutionary Party, are successfully overcoming the ravages of the despotic Pol Pot regime. The AIKS is happy to see that significant successes have already been achieved in rebuilding the shattered economy and improving the standard of living of the people.

This Conference denounces the conspiracies of the U.S. imperialists and their allies in South-East Asia to reverse the course of history in Kampuchea. Though thrown out ignominiously out of the three countries of Indo-China in 1975, the U.S. imperialists have never ceased their efforts to stage a come-back to Indo-China. They have been using the territory of Thailand to train and arm the Pol Pot remnants and other Kampuchean counter-revolutionaries to destabilise the Kampuchean borders. It is under their auspices that the new Coalition of Sihanouk, Son Saun and Khieu Samphan of the Pol Pot clique have been knocked together and this counter revolutionary clique has been accorded Kampuchea’s seat in the United Nations which rightfully belongs to the Heng Samrin Government of Kampuchea. In order to intensify these interventionist activities preparations are afoot with the active support of the U.S. for another so-called international conference on Kampuchea.

This Conference denounces these imperialist machinations against the People’s Republic of Kampuchea and reiterates the AIKS’s support to the stand of the three countries of Indo- China that any discussion on Kampuchea in the United Nations or so-called international conferences would be counter-pro­ductive. The Conference welcomes the decision of the Government of Viet Nam to withdraw part of its troops from Kampuchea, and hopes that the member countries of the Association of South-East Asian Nations will respond to the proposals of the three Indo-Chinese countries to create the proper conditions for the withdrawal, of the remaining troops of Viet Nam from Kampuchea. Viet Nam. Laos and Kampuchea have stated again and again that they are ready to enter into talks with the ASEAN countries bilaterally or multi- laterally to settle any outstanding problems in South-East Asia. This is the only way to ensure the security and stability of South-East Asia and to prevent the U.S. imperialists from intervening in the internal affairs of the States of the region.

This Conference wishes all success to the people and the People’s Revolutionary Party of Kampuchea in their struggle against imperialist intervention and for the building of Socialism in Kampuchea in fraternal, close co-operation with the peoples and Governments of Laos and Viet Nam.

The 24th Session of the All India Kisan Sabha extends its full support to the various initiatives taken by the Workers’ Party of Korea and the Government of the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea for the peaceful reunification of Korea without any outside interference.

This partitioning of Korea after the U.S. aggression in 1950, which was meant to be temporary is being perpetrated by the U.S. imperialists and their military-fascist henchmen in the Southern part of Korea. It has been converted into a military base, incessant provocations against the Socialist North are being carried out. In the South, all democraic rights of the people have been ruthlessly smothered and a fascist terror regime has been establishment to prevent the people from raising their voice for the reunification of the country.

The workers’ Party and the Government of the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea have again and again taken the initiative for peacefully reunifying the country, the most significant of which was the ten-point proposal put forward at the last Congress of the Workers’ Party by Kim II Sung. The main pre-condition for the peaceful reunification of Korea is the withdrawal of all U.S. troops and bases from South Korea and the restoration of democracy there. The Conference wishes all success to the efforts of the DPRK for the rest of world public opinion in demanding the withdrawal of the US from South Korea and the restoration of democracy there.

The 24th Session of the All India Kisan Sabha condemns unequivocally the South African racist regime’s efforts, backed by the U.S. and other imperialists, to deny freedom to that territory. In its efforts to keep Namibia illegally under its occupation, the racist regime of South Africa is committing aggression against free African States like Angola, Mezambique and Zimbabwe. The imperialist powers, especially the USA. which have vital strategic and economic interests in South Africa, are giving all help to the racist Botha regime to violate the U.N. decisions. While freely committing aggression against the front-line African States, the South African regime has the impudence to demand that the Cuban troops, which are in Angola at the request of the country’s Government, should be withdrawn from there. This is part of the racist regime’s conspiracy to set up client States in the neighbouring countries with support to counter-revolutionary forces against the progressive governments of these countries today.

The Conference extends its full support to the people of Namibia and their recognised representative, the South-West African People’s Organisation, their struggle for liberation from the racist regime of South Africa. The Conference is confident that with the franternal support of other African People’s-especially the people of South Africa who are themselves fighting against the barbaric aparthied regime, the people of Namibia, led by the SWAPO will soon win their liberation.

The 24th Session of the All India Kisan Sabha extends its fraternal greetings to the people of Western Sahara, their leader, the Polisario and the Saharawi Arab Democratic Republic which they have established in the course of a determined armed liberation struggle.

The gains of the Western Saharan People’s liberation struggle are sought to be denied by the reactionary regime of Morocco which is bent upon breaking the unity of the organisation of African unity, the majority of whose members have recognised the SADR.

This Conference extends all its support to the Polisario and SADR and demands that the Government of India take the initiative in the non-aligned movement to recognise the SADR and accord it its rightful seat in the forthcoming non-aligned summit.

The 24th Session of the All India Kisan Sabha and All India Agricultural Workers Union denounces the military dictatorship of Ziaul Haq in Pakistan for the brutally repressive regime that has been imposed on the people of that country.

The military dectatorship has abrogated the 1973 Constitution and is refusing to hold elections in the country. All political activities have been banned, the democratic rights and civil liberties of the people and the trade union rights of the workers and employees have been to ally suppressed. Thousands of people have been thrown behind the bars, many have been tortured. The Judiciary has been subverted and lawyers who demand the restoration of democracy are penalised. A respected and aged leader like Khan Abdul Ghaffar Khan has been detained and permission has being denied to the ailling Nursat Bhutto to go abroad for treatment. Every day fresh arrests and oetentions of various leaders are reported from Pakistan. In the name of enforcing Islamic laws, barbarous atrocities are committed on people who commit petty crimes.

While there is no threat to the security of Pakistan, the military regime, in the name of a mythical threat from Afghanistan, is getting itself armed with the latest and most sophisticated weapons including the F-16 fighter planes, and making Pakistan a client State of the U.S. imperialists in the place of Iran which they have lost.

Braving the brutal repression, the workers, employees, students, women, intellectuals, lawyers and other professionals are carrying on a heroic struggle for the restoration of parliamentary democracy and the holding of elections to end the oppressive military dictatorship.

The AIKS and AIAWU Session extends ’complete solidarity and support to the fighting people of Pakistan on behalf of the Indian peasantry and wish them speedy success in their struggle to regain their democratic rights.

The 24th Session of the All India Kisan Sabha and All India Agricultural Workers, Union condemns the suppression of the rights of the people and attacks on the left and democratic movements in Bangladesh by the military regime. The aspirations of the people who fought a heroic struggle for liberation from the Pakistani military regime are being thwarted today.

The Conference extends its solidarity to the people of Bangladesh and pledges all support to their demand for the holding of elections and restoration of parliamentary democracy.

The 24th. Session of the All-India Kisan Sabha conveys its warm greetings to the working class of India locked up in relentless struggles against the onslaughts of capital on their working and living conditions.

As a result of the ever rising prices of essential commodities the working class is facing continuous erosion in their standard of living despite increase in money wages. With the offensive of increase in the workload, rationalisation, modernisation, mechanisation and computerisation thousands are thrown out of their jobs and employment potential in industries is being continuously reduced. As a result, the ranks of the unemployed in the urban areas is swelling. With slow rate of industrial growth, adequate jobs are not being created. All this has led to the increase in the figure on live registers in the employment exchanges which has reached a record figure of 1.75 crores. The actual number is much higher since all unemployed persons do not register their names in the employment exchanges.

The Government of India has adopted a wage freeze policy which has only aggravated the situation. The growing recession in the economy is further leading to the employers trying to pass on the burden of the crisis on to the shoulders of the working class. The situation is particularly bad in public sector undertakings where the Government of India has issued arbitrary instructions to link further wage rise with productivity and not to raise rate of DA over Rs. 1.30 per point of rise in price index. In several public sector undertakings the negotiations have been stalled because of these directives.

The trade union rights of the workers are being supressed with the help of draconian laws such as National Security Act and the Essential Services Maintenance Act. Two more anti-working class Bills have been rushed through in Parliament namely the Industrial Disputes (Amendment) Act. The Trade Union Amendment Bill and the Hospital and other Institutions Bill have been introduced in Parliament. These provide for further restrictions on right to strike, on normal trade union functioning, deny the right to organise to the employees of hospitals, educational institutes etc The policy of patronising its handmaid in INTUC adopted by the Government of India had forced the other Central Trade Unions to boycott the recently held National Tripartite Labour Conference which thus became a mockery.

The All India Kisan Sabha is happy to note that the working class of India achieved spectacular unity under the banner of the National Campaign Committee of Trade Unions to fight against these anti-working class policies of the Govt. of India. The Joint movement has supported the demands of the peasantry for remunerative prices and higher minimum wages for the agricultural workers. It has also decided to oppose the economic policies of the Government of India which hit the interests of the common man.

The glorious one day all India strike by about 1 crore 20 lakh workers on 19th. January this year was a landmark in the history of the T.U. movement in India. Participation of agricultural workers in this strike was another notable aspect. Many agricultural workers laid down their lives facing police bullets in Tanjavur District on that day.

The strike of two and half lakh textile workers of Bombay for nearly 10 months is a shinning example of determination shown by our working class in their struggle for legitimate demands. The one day all India strike of coal mine workers on 8th, November is another notable struggle of our working class in the recent past.

The All India Kisan Sabha expressess its firm solidarity with the fighting working class and wishes them all success in their struggle. It strongly condemns the victimisation by the employers.

This Conference calls upon all its units to redouble their efforts towards further strengthening of worker peasant alliance which alone is a guarantee for victory in the sustained struggle against the pro-monopoly and pro-land lord policies of the Government of India.

The 24th. Session of the All India Kisan Sabha and Agricultural Workers. Union expresses its strong indignation at the growing atrocities on harijans, scheduled tribes and agricultural workers in most parts of the country especially in the Congress (I) ruled States. Mass killing of harijans and scheduled tribes, raising down their homes, looting of their property and rapes of their women by the upper caste landlords and their hooligans and the police has become a common occurrence in these States. In many of these cases the leadership is given by Indira Congressmen and RSS in connivance with the police. The atrocities on harijans increased from 13866 to 14308 in 1981. In Uttar Pradesh in the village of Deoli 24 harijans have been shot dead by dacoits. In Sadhupur in U.P. 10 harijans have been shot dead again by dacoits. In Madhya Pradesh four harijans were killed by caste Hindus, as the harijans tried to pour Ganga water on the idol. The same is the position in 1982 when 70% cases of atrocities took place in the four Cong. (I) ruled State of U.P., Bihar, Madhya Pradesh and Rajasthan.

Despite the tall talk of equality and equal rights for harijans, the Government had not cared to implement even the civil rights act properly. Harijans are forcibly evicted from their land and if they try to resist it their blood is spilt. Harijans and agricultural workers demanding increase in wages or possession of land allotted to them are ruthlessly supressed.

These inhuman atrocities continue and the landlords are able to perpetuate them with impunity with the help of the administration which is closely linked by family and other ties to the rural vested interests. This Conference demands that the Central and State Governments should take stringent measures against the persons responsible for these heineous crimes and also to put a stop to this immediately. But at the same time the Conference wishes to remind the people that by organised resistance of the oppressed sections, joining with the democratic forces alone can put an end to these barbaric activities. The Kisan Sabha and Agricultural Workers’ units should give special attention to organise this resistance, build unity and march forward to’stop this oppression.

The democratic rights of the organised workers and peasants and also of other democratic sections of the people are under constant attack by the bourgeois-landlord Government at the Centre as well as in most of the States. Their struggles for improving the conditions of their work and living are sought to be curbed for which the government of India have enacted the National Security Act (NSA) and the Essential Services Maintenance Act (ESMA).

Not only the democratic rights of popular mass organisations and anti-authoritarian political parties, but also the civil (liberties of individuals, the privacy of their correspondence and personal movement including Members of Parliament and legislators is often at sake.

In Bihar the Government has passed the Criminal Law Amendment Act in order to take away the elementary democratic rights of newspapers and individual journalists to perform their public duty to expose or criticise the misdeeds and atrocities of the Government of that State. The powerful widespread and legitimate protest actions that the Act has provoked all over India and which is backed by democratic public opinion is also dealt with by the Bihar Government in a most atrocious manner, exposing its character as a police State.

In view of these oppressive and authoritarian measures of the reactionary Government and the urgent need for restoration of all democratic rights of the people the Kisan masses led by Kisan sabha units along with other democratic sections of the people, should be roused to participate in a nation-wide struggle.

The need for the restructuring of Centre-State relations has become imperative. The experience of the last 35 years since independence has convinced the people that the existing arrangement between the Centre and States in political and economic spehers has not helped the nation as a whole to make significant strides. The present arrangement has been in favour of over-centrlisation of powers and resources, thus denying the States the scope and opportunity to chalk out their own programmes of development according to their specific needs and requirments. Even the limited federal principles are not properly respected by the Central Government. Its fiats to the State Governments become almost obligatory. Agencies like the Planning Commission act in tune with the desires and dictates of the Central Government. The State Governments also find it difficult to evoke the right kind of response from the Central Government at the forums like the National Development Council. It is a pity that the State Governments do not have any significant say on issues and problems vitally affecting them and in matters relating to their economic growth. The present Centre-State relations are not conducive to strengthen the unity and integrity of the nation-on the other hand they help centrifugal forces. National integration can be best achieved in an atmosphere where each State is offered the opportunity to bring about its own growth and development. If some States smart under the sense of discrimination both political and economic, then the process of integration suffers a jolt.

While we condemn in strong terms the separatist tendencies that attempt to raise their ugly heads in large parts of the country, we want that each State gets its proper and legitimate share in every sphere. The dangerous political situation in the country makes the restructering of Centre-State relations an urgent issue.

After deep deliberations, this Conference of All India Kisan Sabha is of the opinion that the States must be invested with more legislative, executive and financial powers to properly implement their own programmes. The States require guarantees that Prerident’s assent will not be required for bills passed by the State legislatures in their legislative competence. The scrapping of Article 356 of the Constitution that enables the Centre to dismiss these elected State Governments and impose President’s rule, is an imperative necessity because it is a negation of democracy and federalism.

It would not be out of peace to mention here that decentralisation of powers can pay large dividends. The State of West Bengal affords the bright example of democratic decentralisation. The three-tier panchayat institutions that have been effectively functioning since 1978 have made decisive impact on the structure in the countryside. Various welfare progrmmes implemented through these agencies have generated rural assests and enabled the local people to stand on their own to a certain degree. Dispersal of power and resources at the local levels has made the Panchayat institutions responsive to the needs of the common people and effective.

Once again, the Conference reiterates that devolution of powers and resources to the State levels is urgently called for, this will strengthen the country decisively and significantly, that giving more powers to the States will lead to more disunity is a bogey.

The 24th Session of the All India Kisan Sabha strongly protests against the declaration of the disturbed area in the North-Eartern part of Tripura bordering Mizoram.

The Session is surprised to learn that in spite of there being no law and order problems in the area and in spite of the Left front Government’s firm refusal to recommend declaration of disturbed area in the region, Central Government unilaterekly took the hasty decision to make such a declaration. It may also be pointed out that there have been no untoward incidents in the area. On the other hand perfectly peaceful conditions have prevailed. Under the circumstances the declaration of disturbed area has aroused doubts and suspicions in the minds of the people in Tripura, who consider this measure of the Central Government as a flagrant attack on the autonomy of a State.

This Session also notes the protest lodged by the Left Front Government of Tripura against the declaration of distrubed area by the Central Government in as much as the people living in the area would be deprived of democratic rights and facilities.

This Conference strongly urges the Central Government to immediately pay heed to the pleadings of the Left Front States Government of Tripura and withdraw the undemocratic measure of resorting to declaration of disturbed area in parts of Tripura.

The 24th. Session of the All India Kisan Sabha strongly condemns the policy of the ruling classes of imposing heavy burdens of taxes on the common people particularly in the form of taxes on commodities and services.

Between 1976-77 and 1981-82 indirect taxes have gone up from Rs. 9747 crores to Rs. 18403 crores-a nearly 100% rise in just five years. The proportion of indirect taxes has gone up in the same period from 79.4% to 83%.

In these three years additional burden in the form of enchanced postal rates went up respectively by Rs. 48.30 crores, Rs. 13.00 crores, while that in the form of enchanced railway right and passenger fares went up respectively by Rs. 160.80 crores, Rs. 204 crores and Rs. 432.86 crores.

The total additional tax burden imposed in 1982-83 budget was of the order of about Rs. 1300 crores out of which indirect taxes accounted for Rs. 590 crores, enchanced postal rates Rs. 35 crores in the budget proposals and Rs. 100 crores were due to on the eve of budget time hike, in Railway freight which accounted for Rs. 320 crores due to enhancement in December 1981 and Rs. 262 crores due to budget proposals in the budget year.

A review of the implementation of the Sixth Plan carried out by the Planning Commission for the meeting of the Commission held on 19th August 1982, pointed out that if the physical targets of the Sixth Plan have to be achieved an additional outlay of Rs. 10000 crores over and above the stipulated Rs. 97,500 crores would be necessary failing which “some scaling down of the plan is inevitable”. The review suggested as part of the “resource mobilisation efforts” to save the plan targets enhancements in price of petroleum products, reduction in food subsidies, further “adjustments” in Railway fares and “use of mechanism of Central excise and duties on generation of electricity”. These it may be seen are in line with’ the “conditionalities” imposed under the terms of the Rs. 5000 crores loan from the IMF.

This Conference demands that :—

1. Taxes on commodities must be drastically reduced and the policy of resorting to indiscriminate enhancements in indirect taxes in the name of “resource mobilisation” must be ended.
2. There should be no further hike in electricity rates or imposition of surcharges etc. on Electricity rates, bus-fares etc. and electricity rates should be brought down to 10 paise per unit or Rs. 10 per horse power without any surcharge, levy, minimum charges etc.
3. Corruption and inefficiency in public undertaking must be ended in cooperation with workers’ representatives to make them more profitable sources of revenue.
4. All arears of income tax, sales tax, electricity rates due from big business houses, persons with incomes above Rs. 20000 per year, industrialists etc, be immediately realised.
5. The bearer bond scheme be cancelled and all persons with unaccountable big incomes or property be made to pay taxes and penalties due on them along with punishing them heavily for their crimes.

An alarming situation has been created in most parts of India, particularly in chronically deficit areas as well as in areas which have been washed by devastating floods or are victims of unprecedented drought, as a result of high and increasing prices of essential commodities used by the common man and the peasantry.

In regard to the prices of foodgrains like rice, there is a peculiar anomaly in that they do not fetch the growers remunerative prices in surplus areas while in deficit and flood and drought affected areas, the price has gone up too high for the poorer sections of the people to buy.

This is mainly because the market is largely controlled by monopoly traders who, with their profiteering motive, often cause fluctuations in the prices or corner their wares in order to push the market to go dry.

In order to control this situation and save the people from the wholesalers, machinations, it is absolutely necessary that the Government of India should take over the entire wholesale trade and curb the monopolists’ greed, and introduce a country wide network of public distribution system, selling all essential commodities and foodgrains at fixed, uniform and, wherever necessary, duly subsidised rates.

For this purpose the following steps have to be taken by the Government immediately.

1. Monopoly purchase of paddy, wheat and other food articles directly from the producers at remunerative prices.
2. Establishment of a broad public distribution system all over the country. For this purpose, set up government owned and managed shops wherever necessary while utilising the services of small and medium traders where they are prepared to operate under government control.
3. Regular supply through these shops of all essential goods such as rice, wheat, edible oils, sugar, kerosine, salt, and cloth at subsidised and uniformly fixed prices all over India.

This Conference of the All India Kisan Sabha has called upon all its units to raise a systematic compaign for the ralisation of these demands.

The Varanasi Conference of the All-India Kisan Sabha has called upon peasants to launch united struggles to get remunerative prices for agricultural produce.

In the period following Varanasi Conference numerous united struggles of the peasantry took place in many parts of the country. These massive struggles were unprecedented in intensity and sweep.

This vast compaign on remunerative prices for agricultural produce culminated in the historic Delhi March, a symbol of planned joint action of many democratic peasant organisations.

These struggles wrested some concessions from the unwilling hands of the ruling classes, but the Central Government continued to pursue the same policy of throwing the burdens of the crisis on to the shoulders of the peasantry.

Due to rise in the cost of all manufactured goods the cost of living of the peasantry has gone up steeply. The cost of all inputs for agriculture has increased many fold. Subsidies of Central Government in this respect have been withdrawn.

In this situation, the prices the peasant gets for his produce are not even adequate to meet the actual cost of cultivation.

The absence of any suitable Government Machinery to procure his produce at a fair price further depresses the price of his produce and distress sales are alarmingly on the increase.

Without stable and remunerative prices for peasant produce, agriculture in our country is getting ruined and pauperisation of the peasantry is increasing daily.

In the very interest of the national economy itself, this situation must not be allowed to prolong any longer.

This Conference calls upon all units of the Sabha to fight, on their own and in concert with all peasant and democratic organisations, this battle of the Indian peasantry for survival, with great determination.

This Conference is deeply conscious of the efficacy of joint actions in the past on this basic issue and appeals to all democratic and peasant organisations to forge unity in action on bigger and bigger scales to force the Government of India to yield to the demand of the peasantry.

The Conference considers that the price of Rs. 122 offered by the Government of India for a quintal of paddy is inadequate and demands that Government of India must fix up the price, of paddy of common variety at Rs. 140 per quintal.

This Conference demands that Rs. 250/- per tonne of sugar cane must be fixed as minimum price of sugar cane.

This Conference demands that a price of Rs. 300/- per quintal for Jute and Rs. 550/- to Rs. 1000/-be fixed as the price for the various grades of cotton, and Rs. 1200/- for 1-4 form Grade of Virgina Tobacco per quintal.

This Conference is alarmed at the policy and action of the Government of India in getting imports of Copra, Coconut Oil, Rubber, Cocoa and pepper from foreign countries, in order to depress the prices of the local crops in the interest of industrial monopolies.

This Conference condemns this action of the Central Government which has caused very great damage to the peasants of Kerala and Karnataka who grow rubber, cocoa and coconut.

By this wanton policy of the Central Government, Kerala’s peasant producers are losing hundreds of crores of rupees every year.

This Conference once again calls upon all kisan sabhas and its own units to move seriously in to this key compaign in a massive manner and to protect the interests of the peasant producers and the national economy as well.

The 24th. Session of the All India Kisan Sabha expresses its deep concern over the growing debt burden on the peasants and agricultural workers, further accentuating their miseries. Despite the tall talk of Government to provide adequate relief to the agricultural workers and peasants by making institutional credit available to them at cheap rate, all the schemes adopted by the Government have not touched even the fringe of the problem. In fact whatever credit has been made available, the overwhelming majority of the weaker sections have not been able to avail of them due to landlord bias of the officials, cumbersome procedure and conditions of security for the loans. As a result agricultural workers in large number are a forced to work as bonded labourers. Along with the growing unemployment the increased indebtedness is resulting in increasing the army of pauperised peasantry. And in the background of deepening crisis of agrarian sector the peasantry is not able to pay back the loans incurred. Moreover institutional credit still has not become the major source of rural credit and meagre earnings of agricultural workers and poor peasants are being squeezed by the money lenders. Although no recent report is available about the amount of rural indebtedness but all the estimates go to show that it has crossed the staggeting figure of six thousand crores.

In 1978 the Sixth Five Year Plan estimated the credit need by 1983 to be of Rs. 3890 crores for short loans and Rs. 6290 ‘crores for long and medium loans and provided Rs. 2500 crores and Rs. 3690 crores respectively. The present Government’s revised Sixth Five Year plan provided Rs. 4000 crores or short term credit and only Rs. 1418 crores for medium and, long term credit.

It is not accidental that groaning under heavy indebtedness mid unable to pay the mounting arrears of institutional credit the peasants in various State were forced to launch movements against debt burdens. In the State of Karnataka, Gujarat, Maharashtra, Tamil Nadu and Andhra Pradesh these movements assumed mass character and forced the State Governments to give relief in the form of writing off part of such dues. But even this was being frowned upon by the Central Government and the Reserve Bank which threatened the State Governments to stop supply of finance for granting fresh loans if the over due position is sixty per cent or more of the advance.

This session calls on all AIKS units to fake up this urgent problem facing agricultural workers and peasants and in unity with other organisations develop a movement demanding liquidation of debts of agricultural labourers and peasants “owning less than two and half acres of land and provision of institutional credit at six per cent simple rate of interest.

It also demands special allocation of credit for agricultural workers and landless peasants without security.

The 24th. Session of All India Kisan Sabha views with grave concern that the concentration of land ownership in the hands of the big landlords continues, basically, to remain as it was before.

6% of the land-holders possess around 40% of the land, 15% of rural vested interest still held 60% of the assets in the rural areas.

This Conference asserts that without abolition of landlordism and distribution of land to the tiller gratis, no basic change can be brought about either in the conditions of living of the vast rural millions of agricultural labourers and poor peasants or in the direction of a stable growth of Indian agriculture.

Real big industrial development and expansion of the Indian market, so necessary for the proper growth of Indian economy are not possible without the abolition of all forms of landlordism and effecting the radical agrarian reforms.

Hence this Conference calls upon its units to extend and intensify the propaganda and agitation for basic land reforms to all parts of the country and to mobilise the vast masses of the peasantry in order to prepare them for fulfilling this fundamental task.

Even with regard to the implementation of the limited land ceiling legislations, most of the State Governments led by the Central Congress(I) Government have made a farce of it. It is only under the Left led Governments that certain effective measures could be implemented.

In 1969 Mahalanobis Committee had estimated the surplus land under ceiling laws to be 6.3 crore acres on the basis of a 20 acre ceiling. But things have come to such a pass that in the Sixth Plan the target for distribution is fixed at a mere 40 lakh of acres.

Out of these 40 lakh acres only 26.9 lakh acres have been taken possession of by State Governments while only 18.79 lakh acres have been actually distributed. Out of 13 lakh acres still to be acquired nearly 12 lakh acres are involved in court cases.

So it is clear that even the land ceiling legislation have been sabotaged by the landlords and the ruling classes and their Central and State Governments, taking the country as a whole.

Only the Left Front Government of West Bengal, Tripura and the Left and Democratic Government of Kerala took various vigorous measures to implement land reform legislations.

“Operation Barga” was a very significant achievement of West Bengal Government as far as the defence of the tenants is concerned.

The Land Reform Act has been amended in West Bengal, to stop the misuse of the provision of “self cultivation”.

Self cultivation was redefined to include that the main source of livelihood must be cultivation of land, that one must reside within 8 kilometres of the land for greater part of the year, and after resumption of land for self cultivation, the cultivation must be done by the person himself or by the labour of his own family.

The West Bengal Legislative Assembly had passed an amendment Bill on 9th April, 1981 to plug the loopholes in the existing ceiling law.

The Central Government after keeping this Amendment Act pending for more than an year for presidential assent has returned it back with a number of objections.

The Conference severely condemns this reactions on decision of the Central Government and demands that this act must be given assent to and allowed to be implemented without let or hindrance by the Left Front Government of West Bengal.

This Conference calls upon its units to unleash powerful campaign to get amending legislations passed by various State Governments, along the lines of the West Bengal Land Reform Act, of course, with suitable modifications for each State, in the interest of the toiling peasants and agricultural labourers.

The Left and Democratic Front Government of Kerala, invalidated Section 6-C Land Ceiling Act which provided for exemption of lands given as gift from the preview of land ceiling Act.

Rent arrears of peasants holdings up to one hectare were cancelled. The remaining amount of compensation which hutment dwellers had yet to pay for ownership of hutment land was cancelled.

This Conference calls upon its units to popularise the achievements of the Left Front Governments in the feild of land reforms, in sharp contrast to the failure and fiasco of Congress Governments in this sphere.

This Conference demands that all exemptions and loopholes found in the land ceiling laws of Congress and other governments be amended and that effective steps be takes to implement them. Records of tenants and Tenancy Rights must be ensured.

This Conference appeals to all kisan and democratic organisations to join together to enable the peasants to actually secure the benefits of land ceiling laws.

This Conference resolves to conduct this campaign as an integral part of the basic task of radical agrarian reforms.

This Conference calls upon the Government of India to give immediate assent to the pending legislations of West Bengal and Kerala.

This Conference calls upon all its units to build the unity of all sections of the peasantry in order to press for the total abolition of landlordism and for ensuring land to the landless and land poor.

This Conference calls upon various All India Organisations to forge united actions for demanding radical agrarian reforms.

In view of the Monsoon failure this year nearly 3,50,000 Coffee cultivators and over ten lakhs of Coffee Plantations Workers of Kerala, Tamil Nadu and Karnataka are facing a grim situation. 90% of these cultivators and their dependents are in a grave economic situation. The calamity has created a pitiable situation for the small and marginal coffee growers who are either self cultivating owners or planters employing between five to ten employees.

This Conference views this situation with serious concern and calls upon the government to take the following measures to save the small and marginal coffee growers and workers.

1. Extend the time limit for repayment of loans obtained from various financial institutions;
2. To grant subsidies to the debtor cultivators to enable them to pay the interest;
3. To sanction recurring expenditure for next year’s cultivation operations as grant;
4. To cancel Coffee Boards’ action reducing from 82 to 74 point per 50 kgm of Robusta;
5. To abolish excise duty on Coffee;
6. To re-constitute the Coffee Board democratically and to give adequate representation to the grower;
7. To cancel the 19.50% interest on first instalment, value to Coffee from growers;
8. To abolish the bond system for selling coffee to cultivators;
9. To disburse each years’ amount due to the Coffee growers in the same year;
10. To take steps to avoid delay in granting subsidies for development loans;
11. To reactivise the work of the Robusta Research Centre at Wynad;
12. To start an instant Coffee Industry in Wynad, and to ensure minimum reserve price yearly.

The All India Kisan Sabha is of the opinion that adequate afforestation is necessary for ecological balance, proper rain-fall, soil conservation and flood control and so attention is to be given for planting trees on a mass scale and afforestation. The social objective can only be fulfilled through proper motivation of the people. This can’t be achieved through legislation as contemplated in the new forest bill, now brought in for enactment in Lok Sabha. Some of the sections of the Bill will be utilised by the administration who have been given wide powers for harassing and oppressing the people, specially the tribal people, whose livelihood is intimately linked up with forest. It is not at all a fact that wanton destruction of forest is due to gathering of log wood for fuel or for making agricultural implements and construction of huts by the tribal and other people living in and around forest. The main culprits are the contractors who, in league with the corrupt Administration patronised by Congress(I) Governments are destroying the forests by indiscriminate felling of trees much in excess of the terms of contract. So instead of pointing an accusing finger towards the tribal and other people living in and around bursts appropriate action should be taken to check and stop wanton destruction of forests by the contractors.

It is known to all that the tribal people depend on forests for their livelihood and from time immomorial, they used to enjoy certain easement rights over the forest, such as gathering of fuel wood, leaves, flowers, fruits, seeds of certain trees from the forest, honey and gum etc, free of cost. But after the Government took over the forests, these easement rights have been taken away and they are being harassed and oppressed for gathering these materials and the relations between the forest department and the tribal people gradually became very much bitter. The tribal people who have traditional love and regard for the forests, could have been the best protectors of the forest but due to the wrong policy of the Government they have been made hostile.

The Left Front Government of West Bengal recognising that protection of forests can only be ensured with the willing participation of the population, whose life is dependent on forestry, has restored the following easement rights : —

1. To gather wood for fuel;
2. To gather leaves, flowers, fruits and seeds of trees like sal, mahua, peasal, kendu etc;
3. To have one pole per tribal house-hold per annum for being used as plough and three poles for house construction once every five years;
4. To assign any tree in the forest as ‘Jaher Than’ for the purpose of offering prayers and worship by tribals.

For the above purposes the forest directorate in consultation with the Panchayats would issue free permits to not more than two persons per tribal house-hold situated in or around the forest. No fee would be levied for issuing permits.

This Conference of the All India Kisan Sabha is of the opinion that the above steps of the Left Front Government of West Bengal are in the right direction and other States should take similar steps to win willing cooperation of the tribal people for the protection of forests.

This Conference further calls upon the peasantry and other democratic masses to build up a strong and broad-based movement throughout the country with the above objective of adequate afforestation with the willing participation of the people and for taking measures on the lines of Left Front Government of West Bengal to restore the casement rights of the tribals and other people living in and around forests to ensure their co-operation in this endeavour.

The 24th. Session of the All-India Kisan Sabha and Agricultural Workers Union notes that, after 35 years of independence the agricultural workers continue to work in conditions of semi-slavery. They are paid meagre wages, denied house sites for shelter and subjected to bonded slavery at the hands of money lenders and landlords. The much tom-tomed 20 point programme of the emergency days has not been able to bring any improvement in the living conditions of agricultural workers, and scheduled castes and tribes. They are subjected to the most crude and inhuman forms of social oppression and indignities including killing, raping of their women folk, setting fire to their huts and various other kinds of attacks. The much talked of land reforms over decades by the Congress Governments have failed to provide any security of tenure to the share croppers and tenants and have helped in only swelling the ranks of agricultural workers with evicted tenants year after year. This has resulted in the sharp growth of unemployment, which tends to grow further with the increasing use of machinery in the farming operations. The number of working days of agricultural workers are declining year after year. Even though a little increase is seen in the money wages, their real wages are on the decline due to high rise in prices especially of essential articles. The conditions of farm servants are no better though they have year round employment. Out of 23 lakhs of bonded labourers (as per the survey of the National Labour Institute, 1978) only 1.2 lakh have been identified and out of it only 31842 have been rehabilitated up to the end of year 1981. Large number of workers continue as attached labourers and forced to work from 10 to 16 hours per day. More and more agricultural workers fall into indebtedness.

West Bengal, Kerala and Tripura are the States where sincere steps have been taken for protecting the interests of agricultural workers through land reforms, increase in wages agricultural workers’ pension scheme, giving loan to agricultural workers and poor peasants on easy instalment payment system and various other kinds of ameliorative measures.

The capitalist path of development which the ruling classes are pursuing without abolishing landlordism is leading to the pauperisation of the peasantry throwing millions into the ranks of agricultural labourers. More and more sections of the masses in general are becoming disillusioned and they are coming forward to fight for their demands. This Conference of the All India Kisan Sabha and Agricultural Workers congratulates the agricultural workers who are carrying on the struggle in various parts of the country for wages, house-sites, distribution of waste lands, against unemployment and social oppression. Seeing this the Indira Gandhi Government has again come forward with a new 20 point Programme but its performaace upto August 1982 clearly shows that fits fate is not going to be any different from the 20 point programme of emergency days.

This Conference demands that:—

1. A Central Legislation be enacted to ensure minimum wages, security of service and better service conditions. Minimum wages should be fixed at Rs. 12 for agricultural workers per day.
2. All surplus lands and waste lands be distributed to agricultural workers with in a specific period.
3. House sites to be given to all within one year who have not got any house sites and a scheme should be drawn to construct houses for all.
4. Alienated land of the tribals should be restored. Alienated lands taken over by the landlords by evicting the tribal tenants in anticipation of tenancy legislations announced by Congress Governments since 1977 should also be restored.
5. All kinds of oppression on harijansand scheduled tribes to be stopped immediately.
6. All debts of agricultural workers to be cancelled.
7. A scheme may be drawn to give more employment to agricultural workers.
8. More funds should be set apart for NREP. Wages for NREP should be supplied in food and cash which has been withdrawn.
9. All agricultural Workers above the age of sixty must be given a monthly pension of Rs. 50/-

The session calls upon all units of the Agricultural Workers’ Union and Kisan Sabhas to organise movements for implementing of their demands and give organised shape to the struggle of agricultural workers and strengthen them by mobilising support of other sections of the peasantry.

The 24th. Session of the All India Kisan Sabha notes that in spite of repeated demands by the tribal and other democratic people of Tripura through various democratic movements during the last 35 years the Union Government led by bourgeois-landlord party have not conceded the rightful demands for extension of Sixth Schedule in the State of Tripura.

After a prolonged struggle the democratic people of Tripura in the year 1977 could defeat the Congress Party and install the Left Front Government in the State, which is trying to fulfil the four point charter of demands of the tribal people. One of the four point is that the Tripura Tribal Areas Autonomous District Council should be conceded.

Under the limited powers vested in the State by the constitution the Left Front Government set a bold example in the entire country by fulfilling the pledge under the 7th Schedule. Unless the Centre Government came forward to assist the State Government with adequate funds for implementing the above measures, the agelong backwardness of the tribal people can never be overcome, neither can manifold problems be solved.

This Conference of the All India Kisan Sabha therefore demands that the Central Government should immediately allot additional and sufficient funds for the Tribal Areas Autonomous District Council in Tripura pending extension of 6th Schedule under the Constitution of India.

This Session of the All India Kisan Sabha expresses its appreciation of the Left Front Governments of West Bengal and Tripura for the measures they have been taking in the interests of the peasantry, share-croppers and the agricultural workers of their respective States.

The Left Front Government in West Bengal has fixed Rs. 9.58 as minimum Wage and provided the machinery for the implementation of Minimum Wage Act.

The Left Front Government took up seriously the food-for-work scheme, now named as National Rural Employment Programme and provided work to lakhs of agricultural workers and poor peasants in lean season. This measure helped a lot to free them from various types of bondage due to indebtedness. Over a lakh landless agricultural workers received pattas for house-sites in West Bengal uptil now.

The main problems of the share-croppers are (i) eviction, (ii) protection of their rights, (iii) institutional finance to free them from the age-old bondage of usury. The Left Front Government of West Bengal has taken measures to tackle all these problems to the extent possible within the constraints of the constitution.

To stop illegal eviction suitable amendments have been made in the Land Reforms Act. As eviction is done mainly by invoking the clause on resumption for self-cultivation or in the definition of “self-cultivation” three conditions have been introduced. (1) If one intends to resume land for self-cultivation, he will have to prove that his main source of livelihood is from that land, (2) he will have to live within eight kilometres for the greater part of the year where the land is situated and (3) after resuming he will have to cultivate the land himself or by the labour of his family members. These conditions have gone a long way to stop evictions effectively.

To see that the share-croppers can enjoy the rights conferred by the various legislations, their names are being legally recorded in the record of rights. For this a time bound programme in the name of ‘Operation Barga’ has been taken up by the Left Front Government. The main features of this ‘Operation Barga’ are to identify the areas where bargdars are concentrated, then to hold evening meetings to encourage and convice them about the necessity and usefulness of recording their names and then to legally record their names by sending a group of officers within three or four days with the help of the local Panchayats. This method proved to be most effective. Uptill now eleven and half lakh bargdars could be recorded.

Previously, bargdars were subjected to severe exploitation due to consumption and input loans taken from the jotdars. To free them from this bondage, the Left Front Government has introduced institutional finance for the bargdars, the interest on the loan is only four per cent whereas previously they had to pay at the rate of 100 to 150 per cent. If the bargadars pay up their loan within 31st March next year, the interest will, be reimbursed by the Left Front Government and the bargdars’ loan will be interest free.

For the small and middle peasants, the Left Front Government has introduced various schemes to give relief in the matter of rent and debt burden. The Left Front Government soon after its installation completely exempted holdings upto four acres in irrigated areas and upto six acres in non-irrigated areas from payment of land rent and rents of others were reduced to half of what they were paying. Subsequently, an Act was passed abolishing the rent system and introducing a land holding levy on landed property worth over Rs. 50,000. The concept of rent is not at all consisent with the concept of peasant proprietorship. The imposition of levy being on a progressive basis-less on lower slabs and more on higher slabs it is more equitable in principle. This scheme is based on Raj Committee Report, though it has been adopted in a modified form. The Left Front Government can rightfully claim to be a pioneer in this matter in the whole of India.

Besides the measures mentioned above, the Left Front Government has been able to vest additional two lakh acres of vested land amongst the landless agricultural babomes and is currently distributing three and half lakh acres of vested land amongst the landless agricultural workers and land—poor peasants. Uptil new 7.34 lakh acres have been distributed currently and another 3.5 lakh acres are being distributed.

A comprehensive amendment of the Land Reforms Act has been passed on 9th April, 1981 and is still awaiting the President’s assent. The main objective of this amendment is to plug all loopholes in the Act in the matter of detecting and taking possession of the surplus land over the ceiling. This is the first serious and sincere effort to plug loopholes in the ceiling laws in the country. Every one is aware that very little amount of land could be vested uptill now because of these loopholes. So the importance of thic amendment is enormous. This can be a model to other States. So this session calls upon the peasants and other democratic masses to build up a based broad-powerful movement for getting President’s assent to this Act.

The Left Front Government of Tripura has so far been able to take over 1623.32 acres of surplus land. Out of this 1237.12 acres of land have been distributed to 1661 families. Besides this the State Government allotted agricultural land belonging to Government to 28,932 persons. Another 6267 persons were given house sites. The Government is encouraging establishment of Tea Garden by co-operatives of Tea Garden Workers. Already over 400 acres of land have been handed over to such co-operatives and 5,000 acres of land has been selected and set apart for the purpose.

This Government is also encouraging development of rubber plantation, horticulture and pissiculture etc. About 986.29 acres of Government land have been set apart for this purpose. The Govt. has given strees on resettlement of landless and homeless persons. Four colonies have been set up near Agartala Town for this purpose. The Government has decided to set up at least one colony in or near each sub-divisional town.

The State Govt. has given stress on restoration of Tribal land and already in 3,000 cases of restoration, orders have been passed and physical possession of land has been given. Pending cases of restoration are being processed on priority basis.

Tripura Government has given emphasis on the recording of Bargdars (Share-croppers) and to facilitate this amended the Tripura Land Revenue and Land Reforms Act, in 1979 on the lines of West Bengal Govt. Uptil now 4674 bargadars have been recorded. The State Govt. has also enncted the Tripura Agricultural Indebtedness Relief Act, 1979 to give relief in the matter of indebtedness of peasants and rural artisans whose annual income does not exceed Rs. 2,400.

These concessions have been made possible because of the peacefull peasant movement in these States and the struggles conducted by the peasants and agricultural workers. As a consequence the mass base of the All India Kisan Sabha has been widened.

The 24th. Session of the All India Kisan Sabha appeals to all its units to popularise these measures throughout the country and organise united actions of the peasants for the implementation of such measures in their respective States.

The 24th. Session of the All India Kisan Sabha expresses its deep concern over the large scale damages to crops, houses and a her property, loss of human lives and cattle as a result of unprecedented drought, severe floods, devastating cyclones, untimely rains and hailstorms that have left in their wake untold misery, destitution and starvation for the millions for our countrymen in the current agricultural year, in large parts of the country.

Untimely rains in March and April 1982 caused a loss of about 2 million tonnes to standing wheat crop in Punjab, Haryana, Delhi and Western U.P. besides partially damaging another 2 million tonnes. The cyclone in June 1982 caused a damage, according to official estimates of about Rs. 100 crores in Orissa. Then came the unprecedented drought, worst in living memory which caused loss to 346 lakh hectares in the monsoon period. According to the Minister of Agriculture Rao Birendra Singh’s own statement in Parliament 187 districts out of 405 districts in the country, in seven States viz. West Bengal, Orissa, U.P., Bihar, Maharashtra, Andhra Pradesh and Tamil Nadu were effected by severe drought. This is obviously an underestimation as States like Rajasthan, Karnataka, Haryana, Himachal Pradesh, Gujarat and Jammu & Kashmir are not included in the list. It is well known that in Rajasthan which had the fifth consecutive year of drought this year more than 2 crores people living in about 23,000 villages, suffered heavily.

According to the Central Irrigation Minister Sri Kedar Pandey, floods this year affected 76 lakh hectares of cultivated land and a total population of about 8.35 crores. The total damage to crops, houses and other properties was officially estimated to be of the order of Rs. 1159 crores. The loss of life was reported to be 932 and 49 persons were reported to be missing.

Severe cyclones again caused extensive damages to crops and houses in Tamil Nadu and Andhra Pradesh (and recently in Gujarat) in the month of October, causing heavy loss to crops, houses and human lives.

This Conference notes that year after year the area affected and the damage caused by floods are rapidly increasing. While the average area affected and damage caused per year was 70 lakh hectares and Rs. 64 crores only in years between 1953 to 1960, they became 110 lakh hectares and Rs. 776 crores in the decade 1971 to 1981. The same is true about droughts which shows that our agriculture is becoming more and more precariously dependent on the vagaries of nature and the Govt. has failed to provide both flood protection bunds to flood prone areas and stable means of irrigation to nearly three fourth of the cropped land.

The worst sufferers of these natural calamities are always the agricultural workers and poor peasants, who lose everything they have, who get no jobs and whose crops on tiny plots of land lie generally in rainfed areas. When they protest against conditions of starvation they are given bullets instead of food-grains. On October 7, 1982 there was a brutal police firing on starving Santhali tribal people of Bihar who were demonstrating for relief at Palajori in which 6 persons were killed. Again another firing had taken place on starving and demonstrating people in Singhbhum district of Bihar. There were reports of lathi charges on starving people demanding relief from Orissa after the June 1982 cyclone. Reports of discrimination in distribution of relief in favour of supporters of ruling Congs.(I) party and its local legislators have also been received from many States due to which the actually needy people were denied even the meagre relief provisions. Reports of rampant corruption in relief have also been reported frequently.

How meagre is the Govt. relief is clear from the fact that whereas the affected State Governments have asked the Centre to provide Rs. 800 crores for relief activity, the Centre has released only Rs. 13.84 crores. While the West Bengal Government is again and again asking the Centre to provide at least 3.70 lakh tonnes of foodgrains per month, the Centre is supplying 2 to 2.5 lakh tonnes per month only.

Famine conditions have set in some of the severely drought affected areas where crops are completely destroyed. In some places even drinking water is not available and in most places there is actue shortage of fodder for cattle and it is reported that lakhs of people have migrated with their cattle from Rajasthan and some parts of Bihar is search of job, food and fodder.

As a result of drought and flood it can be safely said that there would be a shortfall of at least 20 million tonnes of food grains this year, from estimated food production. In Andhra Pradesh it is expected to be of 5.2 million tonnes, in Bihar of 4 million tonnes, in West Bengal of 2.5 million tonnes, in Tamil Nadu of 2.3 million tonnes, in Orissa of 2 million tonnes and in Rajasthan, Haryana, Punjab, U.P. and Maharashtra of one million tonnes each. Prospects for Rabi sowing and production are no less bleak.

Even in this situation of heavy shortfall in estimated food production, the Central Government has not taken so far any Directive step to mop up the surplus foodgrains now coming in the market in order to supply it through an extended public distribution system so that a rise in price may be effectively checked. The bulk of the grain is being governted by hoarders and black marketeers in the hope of raising prices. The Central Government has refused to fix support prices for paddy at Rs. 140 to Rs. 160 per quintal. but has fixed a price as low as Rs. 122/- per quintal. This makes it easier for these black marketeers to pay a little more and build up their hoards and mint money later by pushing up prices.

The Conference is of the firm opinion that the Central Government should immediately take over wholesale trade in foodgrains, abolish multi-point sale tax on them, open purchase centres in such numbers that they are easily accessible to the peasants and pay them remunerative price. This alone will enable it to have sufficient food stocks at its disposal to be able to make foodgrains available to the people through the public distribution system at reasonable prices by granting adequate subsidies. The Public Distribution System should also be freed from rampant corruption to make it more effective. Stocks of foodgrains must be immediately rushed to all drought and flood affected States and regions to make them available to starving people.

The Conference also notes that too much time is taken by the Centre to process reports sent by States, in sending study teams for on the spot study and studying their report and in arriving at the quantum of funds to be released to States for relief activity. This causes long delays in starting relief operations which brook no delay.

This Conference demands that the following steps be taken to meet the worsening situation in an effective manner and provide relief to the suffering millions in large parts of the country:-

1. Wholesale trade in foodgrains must be nationalized and purchase centres be set up in large numbers so that they are easily accessible to peasant producers. This is necessary to mop up the bulk of their marketable surplus and prevent the grain from passing into the hoards of the black marketeers. The purchase price of coarse variety of paddy should be enahnced to Rs. 140 per quintal and of the other grains to suitable remunerative levels.
2. Public distribution system should be extended so that there is at least one shop for each 2000 population, supplying foodgrains, sugar edible oil, cloth and other essential commodities at reasonable prices on the basis of persons as units, in quantities which are the same in the rural and urban areas.
3. Adequate stock of foodgrains and funds must be rushed to affected States and regions for implementing on a sufficiently wide scale such employment oriented schemes as NREP. Persons engaged in these works must be ensured at least the statutorily fixed minimum wages for agricultural workers in cash or kind or both, whose proportion should be left to the option of the beneficiaries.
4. Agricultural workers, poor peasants, artisans and other rural poor who have lost their entire means of living must be provided with gratuitous relief and consumption loans on easy terms pending the starting of job giving schemes to ward off starvation deaths.
5. Realisation of all taxes, government dues and cooperative or bank loans must be supended immediately in affected areas. While the taxes and other dues should be completely written off where damages to crops exceeds 25% heavy relief depending on the extent of damages should be granted to all sufferers, in matters connected with cooperative and bank dues.
6. All inputs like seeds, fertilizers, diesel, pesticides etc. must be supplied to peasants at controlled rates and where necessary on crop loan basis or as subsidies so that the next crop may be sown. There should be no rise in electricity rates or in prices of other inputs in view of the large scale of damages caused by natural calamities this year in any State affected by drought, floods, cyclones etc.
7. Adequate grants and loans should be provided to all those whose houses have collapsed or have suffered heavy damages.
8. Where land has been damaged by water logging, gullyformation, sand casting or saline inundation, the State must immediately take steps to reclaim such lands at Government cost, in the shortest possible time.
9. Adequate sanitary and medical relief measures in affected areas.
10. Plans should be drawn up for constructing irrigation projects and flood protection bunds and their speedy implementation on a time bound basis, to prevent future damages.
11. Popular Committees including representatives of different kisan organisations working in the State or regions concerned should be set up. These popular committees should see that daily necessities of life are mede available to the people at controlled prices and distributed in a manner, viable and effective schemes are drawn under NREP etc. to provide maximum number of jobs and ensure that relief activity is carried an in an impartial and efficient manner.

This Conference wants to point out to its State and District Units that in view of the vast magnitude of the problem the Government effort alone will not be able to cope with the problem in an adequate and effective manner. Hence the Conference directs its concerned units to run united campaigns on the above demands. They should carry on relief activity in cooperation with as many mass organisations as possible.

The devastation caused by the cyclonic storm in last 2 days in Gujarat has very badly affected the coastal area wherein hundreds of people have lost their lives, thousands of houses have been washed away and crops and property worth lakhs of rupees have been destroyed. Life has been completely disrupted due to severe damage to roads and electricity.

A.I.K.S. expresses its deep sympathy with those who have suffered and calls on the Government to initiate immediate relief measures and rush financial help to compensate for the losses incurred in the calamity.

The 24th. Session of the All India Kisan Sabha regrets that even after 30 years of planning and spending nearly ten thousand crores of rupees for development of irrigation facilities, the potential created covers only 26.7% of the cropped land, the rest being precariously dependent on the mercy of nature. Only a small portion of the surface and ground water resources has so far been harnessed. Most of the projects take 5 to 20 years more than stipulated for completion with the cost escalating five to six times originally estimated. Due to faulty plannirg most of the dams and reservoirs are getting silted up and their life spans are getting reduced. Many construction projects get held up due to infights inside the ruling party. The prestigious Rajasthan Canal Project is a case in point.

The working of power projects is no better. Even the meagre plan targets of additional power installation have never been fulfilled and have to be slashed down during the plan period. At no time even half the capacity installed has been utilised and 20 to 25% of the energy generated is lost in transmission or due to thefts. Due to bad maintenance and manufacturing defects there are frequent breakdowns. The gap between supply and demand goes on widening and power crisis has become a permanent feature in all States. Despite repeated hikes in electricity charges, such is the low level of efficiency of our power plants that State Electricity Boards always show losses, the total amount running in to four figures. The tube wells stop functioning when they are most needed and it is reported that as many as 504 tube wells in Bihar were out of commission during the worst days of drought. Either the transformer is burnt or some mechanical defect has occurred or there is a cut in power supply and in many States peasants have to give heavy bribes to get the defect removed.

Due to delay in commissioning of irrigation and power projects, low capacity utilisation, heavy loss of energy in transmisson and due to thefts, due to rampant corruption and inefficiency in running of plants etc. the nation has to pay a heavy price in the shape of colossal damages to crops.

The Conference demands that:—

1. All the irrigation and power projects pending before the Central Government be sanctioned immediately and necessary funds provided.
2. All on—going projects be completed within the Sixth Plan period and high officials be held responsible for the delay in construction everywhere. New projects should be prepared for providing irrigation to heavy drought prone areas and they should be completed under a time-bound programme which should be given a top priority.
3. In the period of power shortage agriculture should not be allowed to suffer.

The 24th. Session of the All India Kisan Sabha views with gave concern the repeated recurrence of communal riots in

The horrible roits in Meerut is the latest example of the worst of communal and religious frenzy causing great havoc for the common people.

This Conference severly condemns the failure of the Central Government to prevent these roits because of their own policies and manoeuvers to placate these disruptive forces while trying to supress the forces of democracy in the country.

These communal forces are trying frantically to divert the pent-up discontent of the people against their exploitation and opression at the hands of the ruiling classes, into fratricidal communal clashes in order to disrupt the unity and struggle of the peasant and labouring masses in defence of their vital interests.

The RSS is seeking to spread the poison of Hindu Communalism and religious fanaticism against the minorities.

The Jamait-Islami on the other hand, is harping on Muslim fundamentalism and separatism.

There are some Christian missions which are including in disruptive activities to split the people under the cover of religious freedom. They also take up militant positions and mouth militant slogans to penetrate the mass organisation and then disrupt them. Posing as real benefactors of the tribal people, specially in places where the tribal people are under the influence of the Left they disrupt and disunite the tribal organisation and inject the poison of separatism. Kisan Sabha has to be very vigilant to defeat the Left manoeuvers of the disruptive forces.

The chauvinist separatist movement in Assam on the issue of foreign nationals seeks to alienate the people of Assam, from the people of India and is being supported by reactionary forces and imperialist Agencies.

The Khalistan movement in Punjab, engineered by Sikh extremists is a big danger to the traditional unity of Hindus and Sikhs of Punjab and at the same time posses a serious threat to the unity and integrity of Indian people.

All these communal and divisive forces are raising their ugly heads just when the peasants, workers and other sections —-–— and becoming increasingly aware of their rights to a decent life and are being drawn into mass democratic united movements on common demands.

The 24th. Session of the AIKS condemns all these communal and divisive forces and calls upon the peasantry and labouring classes and others to unitedly fight these evil forces With great determination and vigour.

This Conference points out to all fellow citizens that the advance of the cause of the people is inextricably linked up With a relentless fight against these forces of disruption and separatism.

This Conference calls upon all units of the Kisan Sabha, in unity with all forces and organisations that could be united to carry on continuous struggle against these anti-democratic disruptive forces and in defence of communal unity, minorities, of unite of common class and mass organisations of our country.

All India Kisan Sabha 12-B, Feroze Shah Road New Delhi—110001.

Behalf millions of agricultural workers of Soviet union we cordially greet participants 24th Session of All India Kisan Sabha. We express confidence that decisions adopted by session will contribute into cause of further struggle for interests of Indian peasantry. We wish all participants of session every success health well being. Long live friendship between working people of Soviet union and India for Presidium Central Committee USSR Agriculture Workers Union.

Nikolay Dezhinov, Secretary.

All India Kisan Sabha 12-B, Feroze Shah Road New Delhi—110001

Convey participants 24th Session and through you to All India Kisan Sabha members solidarity and friendship greetings stop wish you best successes in struggle for Indian agricultural workers legitimate interests social progress peace stability in Asian region and the world over-Vietnam State Workers National Union.

00-301 Warzara (Poland) Warszawa, dnia 29.10.1982 r. ul. Nowy Zjazd 1 Mr. Benoy Krishna Choudhury, President All India Kisan Sabha 12-B, Feroze Shah Road, New Delhi—110001

Dear Comrade,

On the occasion of the 24th Session of your organization. I would like to convey on behalf of agricultural workers of the Polish Peoples’ Republic best greetings and cordial wishes of fruitful debate to all its participants.

I am convinced that the session will contribute to further development of agriculture and improvement of work and living conditions of the Indian peasantry. I am also sure that it will strengthen the resistance of the working people in India against American imperialists, Zionists and racists all over the world, and against their supression of national liberation movements in other countries as well as against their crazy plans of a nuclear war.

Long live and grow the solidarity of the working people all over the world in our common struggle for peace and friendship among the nations!

sd/-

All India Kisan Sabha 12-B, Feroze Shah Road New Delhi-110001

Guyana agricultural and general workers union sends fraternal greetings on occasion of 24th Session of All India Kisan Sabha and wishes deliberations every success.

Ramkarran General Secretary

General Secretary, All India Kisan Sabha New Delhi

We wish fraternal success to your organisation. The group for the disarmament, peace and new international cooperation against the impending menace in Asia, Africa and Latin America requires the united strength. From Italian agricultural Labour Organisations.

All India Kisan Sabha New Delhi

On behalf of its members trade union of agricultural working people express our international solidarity with your struggle in defence of interests of peasants agrainst transnational monopolies, for peace and democracy wishing the session to be a success-Permanent Council of Agricultural Workers of MPR.

All India Kisan Sabha 12-B, Feroze Shah Road New Delhi—110001.

Central Executive of Agricultural Foresty and Food Processing Workers’ Union of GDR conveys cordial fraternal greetings to 24th. conference of your organisation of behalf of 640000 members wish successful proceedings and be assured that our friendly relations and cooperation will be deepened in spirit of fraternal anti imperialist solidarity—Mueller, President.

All India Kisan Sabha 12-B, Feroze Shah Road New Delhi—110001

Convey participants 24th conference of Kisan Sabha warm greetings and wishes of success for its proceedings we wish you ever new achievements in struggle you are waging for safe-guaraing peace and defeat imperialist policy of force and dictat for furtherence Indian agricultural workess interests for stengthening unity of actions development of agriculture in your country on way modernization and progrees—

Committee Agriculture Food Industry Workers Union, Romania.

All India Kisan Sabha 12-B, Feroze Shah Road New Delhi—110001

Cordial greetings and best wishes for successful deliberations of 24th session of your trade union. Federal Committee Agricutural Food and Tobacco Workers Union, Yugoslavia.

A very warm Struggling and Fighting Greeting:

The Executive Committee of the General Union of the peasants in the Syrian Arab Republic presents your organization very warm greetings and wishes for you the continuity of progress and suceess in your efforts and fight aiming to achieve your purposes and aims. Starting from the relationship of fight which links between our organizations; we send to you this letter to inform you about the varied crimes which were committed by the Zionist invaders against the Syrian and Palestinlan and Lebanese Peasants.

The military Nazist Zionist tyrant came up to invade Lebanon to achieve its expansionist aims in the frame work of the plans of the Imperialism following the strategic alliance between the United States and the National Zionist entity. These plans which aim to spread the Imperial Control on the Arab area; and imposing surrender and defeatist solutions on our people; leaning to conquer our people and stealing their patriotic and legal rights which were defined in the decisions of the United Nations.

The agreements‘ of Camp David were aimed at imposing these solutions which do not concur with the permanent national rights the Palestinian People. When these plans were opposed by the Patriotic, Nationalistic and Progressive fronts in the area headed by the Syrian Arab Republic; the National Zionist entity began hatching accidents and looking for chances to launch and destroy the Syrian steadfastness.

He found that in invading Lebanon there is a good opportunity so that he can launch and destroy all fronts which refuse to follow the imperial plans including the Palestinian Resistance and the Lebanese Nationalistic and Progressive Fronts.

And at the highest point of the Barbarian Zionistic invasion of Lebanon, the Israelian forces come to commit the ugliest crimes against the Palestinian, Lebanese and Syrian peasants. The peasants were opposed to Campaigns of arresting and killing and attacking by all kinds of weapons and total crushing; so that every one of those peasants became, in general, either a martyr or arrested in jail or wounded. These Crimes reached their utmost peak, when the Israeli invaders committed their Ugly crime against the two people: The Lebaneses and the Palestinian people on the date of 17 and 18 September in the two camps of Sabra and Shateelah particularly and in the western part of Beirut in general. In this Catastrophe thousands of inocent victims were women and old men; and children were also its inocent victims.

The Camps of refugees were turned into total cemetries as a result of this catastrophe, piles of destroyed houses, pregnant mother wounded in their stomachs, and continuous rows of people killed by bullets, and mothers carrying their babies-kids on their breasts bullets were shot at them.

Damaging and destroying hospitals and fully killing the wounded doctors and nurses as well as. Shelters in which, women and children land old men were living and children running away from the Israeli random shelling killing everyone who were in it. Hundreds of our people were opposed to death breathlessly. Running images which are reluctant to the human soul. All that was done by the mad rational discrimination against everything which is against humanitarianism.

All the Observors, though they are from different nationalities and trends, have testified to the responsibility of the forces of the Israeli invasion about this ugly Catastrophe. It became sure that the terroristic Begin, Sharoon and Shameer have planned this ugly and dirty action and that they have prepared its stages and period. All that was an expression of their envy and hatred of the Arab people; and as punishment to him for his steadfastness in facing and opposing the tyrant and pride of the Zionistic fascist military.

The invading forces made their ugly action of which the whole of humanity is ashamed—after the Syrian forces which were in Beirut and the forces of the Palestinian Resistance evacuated their places due to the Concorde which was reached between the Lebanese government and the Palestinian Resistance by Mr. Philip Habib, personal representative, of President Reagan. The articles of the Concorde included: Security and safety for Lebanese and Palestinian Civilians, the prohibition for the entrance of the invading forces to the Western part of Beirut as a first step for the Lebanese Army to take its national responsibility. None of the provisions of this concorde were carried out, the Israeli forces committed their heinous crime, violating all—the international links and tearing the last mask showing the truth of the Israeli military tyrant that it is a bloody fascist group governed by the black envy and hatred and which in reality must be an inheritor of Nazism.

It is a reality that this policy was not to continue, and Israel could not continue in its pride and tyrany but for the backing and agreements which they receive from the American Imperialism, and from its present administration particularly, this administration which aims at intensifying tension in the International atmosphere and at challenging the will of the International society and that is the common bond between the two administrations.

All India Kisan Sabha 12-B, Feroze Shah Road New Delhi-110 001

After a delay we received your estimated letter informing us of the twentyfourth session of your Organisation. The National Association of Small Agricultural in the name of all the Cuban Farmers Extends the salute of solidarity to your organisation wishing you a lot of success in the completion of the tasks formulated in your important conference. We reiterate to all the leaders and members of the All India Kisan Sabha out best wishes for the achievement, of great and renewed triumphs in the course of your work, which undoubtedly would be to the advantage of the farmers and agriculture of India.

Jose Ramirez Cruz President

Dear Comrades,

Greetings to the 24th Session of A.I.K.S.

Nava Lanka Communist Party extends its warmest fratermal greetings to the 24th Session of the All India Kisan Sabha.

Our Party along with all the progressive forces in Sri Lanka is carrying on a big struggle against the neo-colonialist and dictatorial policies of the pro-U.S., imperialist government in power. India People’s solidarity is a powerful support to us in our struggle.

We take this opportunity to extend our hand of solidarity and friendship with A.I.K.S., Indian peasantry and all the progressive forces in India.

We hope A.I.K.S. Sessions will be a total success and achieve all the desired aims.

With revolutionary greetings,

Sd/- Kalyananda Tiranagama General Secretary N.L.C.P.

Sri Lanka All India Kisan Sabha New Delhi

Dear Comrades,

24th Session of All India Kisan Sabha

On the happy occasion of the holding of the 24th Sessions of the All India Kisan Sabha, the premier organisation of Indian peasantry, All Ceylon Peasants Congress, the main organisation of peasantry in Sri Lanka, extends its warm fraternal greetings to the All India Kisan Sabha and the Indian Peasantry.

All Ceylon Peasants Congress and All India Kisan Sabha have a long history of militant solidarity and friendship. Since its founding in 1943. All Ceylon Peasants Congress had freternal relations with A.I.K.S. Many cadres of All Ceylon Peasants Congress attended the Trichur Session of A.I.K.S. in 1963. In November 1980 the visit of the All Ceylon Peasants Congress delegation to India renewed this friendship. In the past many A.I.K.S. delegations have visited us.

In Sri Lanka the peasantry is going through a very tough time. Stringent laws have been passed to evict 800000 peasant families from the lands which they were cultivating for decades and the lands thus recovered are distributed among foreign multi-nationals in thousands of acres to each. Thousands of peasants are taken to courts for the recovery of loans for cultivation and sent to jail for non-payment. Along with other peasant organisation in our country we carried on a massive agitational campaign against these policies.

The activities of A.I.K.S. and the struggle of the Indian peasants are a strong moral support to us.

We hope the A.I.K.S. Session will adopt a suitable line of action which will carry forward the Indian People’s march towards progress.

We wish that the 24th Session of A.I.K.S. will be a grand success.

With revolutionary greetings,

Fraternally yours, Sd/- D.W. Appuhamy General Secretary

To

Com. Chatunni Master, General Secretary, All India Kisan Sabha, New Delhi-110 001.

Dear Comrade,

On behalf of the CITU, I warmly greet the 24th Session of the Kisan Sabha and wish success to its deliberations.

The Conference is meeting in the midst of an all prevading crisis facing the country. Only the mighty organised strength of India’s peasants and agricultural workers, aided by City’s Working Classes can find a way out of the situation defeating the policies of Indira Gandhi and frustrating the attempts of India’s foreign creditors to enslave and exploit our country.

Today millions of peasants and rural masses in our country face outright starvation and slow death due to widespread famine and drought. The CITU calls upon the Central Government to rush adequate food to be supplied to the affected areas, expresses its high appreciation of the steps taken by the West Bengal Left Front Ministry to fight the famine conditions in the State and fully supports its demand of a monthly quota of 1 lakh tons of foodgrains for the State. While demanding adequate steps from the Central Government the CITU calls upon all its unions to collect maximum relief to help the people in distress.

India’s peasants and rural masses have been the worst victims of the present csisis. Their discontent was expressed In hig agitations in which several fell victims to police bullets. Its concrete expression was the kisan march of 26th March 1981.

But the authoritarian Government has learnt nothing. Its 20 point programme does not include remunerative prices for the peasant and protection to the peasant against inflation. It makes farcical provision for implementation of minimum wage for agricultural workers and talks about land reform only as a ritual.

The Conference meeting in West Bengal can easily see two lines in operation in the country—the line of oppression of the peasants and agricultural workers followed by the Congress(I) Governments and the policy of defending and supporting the peasants and agricultural workers followed by the Left Front Government of West Bengal. The measures taken by your President Benoy Krishna Chowdhury West Bengal Revenue Minister is relation to distribution of land and sharecroppers rights stand in sharp contrast to what is happening in Congress (I) States.

The CITU lends its full support to the struggles of the peasants and agricultural workers and hails the mighty organisational advance of West Bengal Kisan Sabha.

The workers and peasants constitute the basis of the Left and Democratic forces of our country. They are faced with three major challenges—the challenge of the authoritarian forces represented by the Congress(I) Government, the challenge of divisive forces disintegrating the unity of the country for the benefit of imperialism; and the challenge of nuclear war being organised by U.S. imperialism against the Soviet Union,

I am confident that your Conference will take appropriate decisions on these questions to guide the kisan movement and raise its voice emphatically against the U.S. designs of war against Soviet Union.

With revolutionary greetings,

Fraternaliy yours B. T. Ranadive President

All India Kisan Sabha 10.11.1982

Fraternal greeting to the 24th Conference of A.I.K.S.

Com. President & Delegates,

I feel it a proud priveleges on my part on behalf of my Peasant & Worker’s Party’s Peasant organisation namely Maharashtra State SHETKARI SABHA and agricultural labourers organisation Maharashtra State LAL-BAWATA SHET MAJOOR UNION.

I wish to convey our warm greetings to the brave Com. Delegates who assembled in Midnapore Town which has a glorious revolutionary historical past.

1 am highly impressed by this Conference organised by the strong West Bengal Kisan Sabha Unit. I experienced so many things which will definetely help us to achieve agrarian revolution in Maharashtra through the Democratic revolutionary path.

I am very glad to note the correctly realised directive given by the Hon. Com. E.M.S. Namboodiripad, The General Secretary of Communist Party of India (Marxist) on the demand of remunerative prices to peasants agricultural products.

Comrades, Our Peasants & Workers Party was born in 1947 on this basic issue agrarian revolution without which the Democratic Revolution would not be complete in a country like India—which is a country of villages. Our Party had done number of big movements on this issue in Maharashtra during independent era. I am proud to bring to your notice that in Peasants & Agricultural labourers joint-action movements we lost numbers our comrades in police firing of Congress Government. I am one of the victims of 303 gun bullet of Police which has gone through my right leg.

Before freedom, on 3rd August 1947 Late Hon. Com. kranti Singh Nana Patil & his right hand revolutionary Senapati of Tufan Sena Com. G.D. Lad who is now the President of M.S. Shetkari Sabha, and his followers came out of National Congress and established Peasants & Workers Party in Maharashtra. Late Com. Nana Patil and Com. G.D. Lad had established Parallel Government in 500 villages of Satara District which is well known as PATRI SARAKAR PRATI.

Our both the organisations Shetkari Sabha and Lal Bawata Shet Majoor Union are working jointly with all other progressive democratic peasants and agricultural labourers organisation of fraternal parties in Maharashtra.

I assure you all That in future also we will work unitedly against the authoritarian forces.

I heartly wish this Conference will definitley come of with fliyng colours in its delibrations.

Thanking you Comrades,

Sarjerao Sagar General Secretary M.S. Lal-Bawata Shet-Majoor Union

Dear Comrades delegates to 24th Session of

All India Kisan Sabha

On behalf of the West Bengal Association of Democratic Lawyers I greet the 24th Session of All India Kisan Sabha.

As democratic lawyers, we welcome your movement for radical land reforms. It is true that law is a part of the superstructure almost directly reflecting the relations of production. But, at the same time, we are not fatalists when we say that law is determined by the relations of production. In fact within the relations of production there is enough scope for making the law more and more progressive though the limits of such progress are determined by these relations of production.

In Tndia, we are witnessing a peculiar situation of a mixture of capitalist as well as feudal relations of production though, it may be said, the capitalist relations of production are showing powerful impulses. But, whether the feudal relations of production will completely be overcome and be destroyed ultimately depend upon the militant struggles of the peasantry particularly the poor peasants and agricultural labourers. As and when feudalism gets eroded and feudal relations of production are destroyed in land relations, law in the superstructure is bound to be more and more anti-feudal.

We democratic lawyers, are fighting the battle against feudalism and for socialisation of law in our limited way in Courts, though our fight is bound to be lesser in scope and intensity than yours but as the same time it can be gainsaid that the struggle of the democratic lawyers is at least supplementary to your struggles on the mass front. We are fighting in Courts the laws based upon feudal relations of production by concretely defending the position of the tillers as against the position of the land-lords who are interested in continuing the feudal methods of production even though they are doomed by history.

Please accept the democratic lawyers, Comrades, as your legal arm for bringing about vital and necessary changes in society.

Demacratic lawyers will watch with attention and avid Interest the proceedings of the Conference because they will help us understand the inner most processes of law-making through mass movements.

We once more greet you and wish your deliberations all success.

Comradely yours Arun Prakash Chateerjee General Secretary

To,

All India Kisan Sabha

On behalf of the A.I.D.W.A. I extend my hearty and revolutionary greetings to the 24th. Conference of the AIKS.

On this occasion we remember the brilliant record of the mighty kisan struggles of the past against imperialism and feudalism. We note their struggle of the present against separatist and divisive forces. We do hope that this Conference will how the way to a still mightier kisan movement throughout the country.

In India democratic Women’s movement has grown and developed as an auxiliary to kisan movement. Wherever the Kisan has become powerful, conditions have been created for powerful women’s movement and a powerful women’s movement has added strength to the Kisan movement.

The Kisan Sabha is fighting mainly against feudal relations, oppressions and backwardness in society. Women are also lighting mainly against such oppression and relations. While thus fighting they are also fighting for radical reforms, for increase of wages for agricultural labourers and this is he pivot of their movement.

The A.I.K.S. should also sponsor programmes for removing feudal oppression and injustice on women in society and in their families. It should see that equal remuneration is paid to women labourers. The property night and women including their right of cultivation is protected, hatred is created against the dowry system, no wife is maltreated or deserted, that there is an improvement in the status of women in their families.

We are sure that if this is done both the movements will get a momentum and it will serve as a boost to the democratic movement as a whole.

Manjari Gupta President A.I.D.W.A.

Secretary, All India Agragamy Kisan Sabha Chathunni Master, General Secretary All India Kisan Sabha

We greet the conference now unity of peasant masses is urgent we belief conference shall address itself to fulfill the task wish success.

Rs. Ps.

1. Opening Balance 93,957.34
2. 23rd Conference Delegates Fee 2,238.00
3. From 23rd Conference Reception Committee 2,875.00
4. Affiliation Fees 6,09,212.19
5. Sale of Literature 1,995.50
6. Sale of Old Papers 427.00
7. Travel expense receipts 122.00
8. Bank Interest 14,348.50
9. Received by repayment of loan(July 1979) 500,00.00
   

   ---

   Total Rs. 7,75,175.56

   ---

Rs. Ps.

1. News Paper & Periodicals 3,529.83
2. Stationary 6,696.20
3. Travelling & conveyance 22,293.00
4. Wages, Medical Aid & Allowances 26,728.39
5. Postages & Telegrams 3,839.43
6. Printing Charges 25,757.06
7. Electricity & Water Bills 2,196.51
8. CKC, AIKC meeting expenses 9,138.68
9. Typewriter, Duplicator, furniture 22,048.65
10. Library Books 2,141.55
11. Subsidy to States A/C 45,000.00
12. A.I.A.W.U. Joint Convention 590.40
13. Delhi Kisan March-expenses 11,002.00
14. To A.I.A.W.U. 5,000.00
15. To Bihar Sherif Relief Fund 1,000.00
16. Phone Charges 1,181.67
17. Office Rent 5,993.10
18. Loan to Com. Muzaffer Trust 1,50,000.00
19. Loan given-1979-June 50,000.00
20. Miscellaneous 2,847.62
21. Bank Commission 521.00
    

    ---

    Total Rs. 3,97,585.09

    ---

    Expenditure Rs. 3,97,585.09 Balance Rs. 3.77,590.47

    ---

    Total Rs. 7,75,175.56

    ---

Sd/- K. Chathunni Master, General Secretary, All India Kisan Sabha.