§ 2. Sir NICHOLAS GRATTAN-DOYLEasked the Under-Secretary of State for India whether he has any information respecting the no-tax campaign in the Bardoli sub-divisional district of the Bombay Presidency.
§ The UNDER-SECRETARY of STATE for INDIA (Earl Winterton)In July last year, after more than usually careful inquiry and consideration, extending over more than two years, the Government of Bombay fixed the new assessment of the Bardoli Taluka at an average enhancement of 20 per cent. on the old as compared with the 30 per cent. originally proposed by the Settlement Officer. This decision was made the subject of considerable public criticism, and in February last Mr. Vallabhai Patel, President of the Ahmedabad Municipality, opened a no-tax campaign in the Bardoli Taluka which had been the scene of Mr. Ghandi's experiment in civil disobedience in 1921. By methods which have become familiar since that date Mr. Patel has achieved a certain success in defeating the efforts of the officials of Government to collect the revenue, but, despite the interruption of communications caused by the monsoon, the law is being enforced against the tenants who have refused payment and the Government of Bombay are in consultation with the Government of India as to the steps to be taken to deal with the situation and with the gross misrepesentation to which the action of the Bombay Government has been and is being subjected.
I am circulating in the OFFICIAL REPORT a fuller statement of the position.
§ Following is the statement—
§ The settlement of the land-revenue assessment which has been in force in the Bardoli Taluka of the Surat District in the Bombay Presidency (which has an area of 222 square miles and a population of some 80,000), being due to expire in July last year, the Bombay Government in the ordinary course of their revenue administration appointed an experienced Deputy Collector in the cold weather of 1924–25 to prepare proposals 1823 for a new settlement. The Settlement Officer submitted his report to the Collector of the District in June, 1925, by whom it was passed on in the following November to the Settlement Commissioner, who in his turn forwarded it to the Commissioner of the Division in May, 1926. The Report reached the local Government in August, 1926, about a year before the new settlement was due to take effect. The result of the examination and re-examination by the officials mentioned was that the proposals of the Settlement Officer for an average increase of 30 per cent. of the current assessment were reduced by 1 per cent. to 29 per cent.
§ Meanwhile, as the result of publication for criticism of the Settlement Officer's report in the Taluka, objections to the proposals began to be received from the persons affected and continued throughout the year 1926, and in February, 1927, steps were taken to ventilate them in the Bombay Legislative Council, with the result that the member of the Governor's Executive Council in charge of the Revenue Department received in March, 1927, a deputation of agriculturists from the Bardoli Taluka and from the adjoining Taluka of Chorasi (which was also under resettlement), headed by two members of the Legislative Council. As it transpired that the deputation, though purporting to be fully representative and having had several months in which to prepare their case, were not fully armed with figures in support of their contention that the proposed reassessment was excessive, they were given time to produce these, and occupied two months in the process, and the documents containing them were thereupon sent to the Settlement Commissioner for investigation. In July, 1927, the local Government, having fully investigated the original report, with the criticisms of the Settlement Officer's superior officers upon it, the original petitions of complaint, and the case submitted by the deputation with the Settlement Commissioner's recommendation upon it, passed orders the effect of which was to fix the new assessment at an average enhancement of 20 per cent. on the old, as compared with the 30 per cent. originally proposed by the Settlement Officer. This was in July last year.
1824§ Thus the Bombay Government satisfied themselves, after a more than ordinarily careful and prolonged scutiny of the facts and circumstances, that the assessment finally adopted erred, if at all, on the side of leniency, and that its adoption would not prove burdensome to the inhabitants of the area. It should be borne in mind that, along with the resettlement of Bardoli, proposals were made and approved for the resettlement of the Chorasi Taluka which adjoins Bardoli and the conditions in which are precisely similar. The new settlement of the Chorasi Taluka is at a slightly higher rate than that of Bardoli, but at Chorasi no serious objection has been raised, and nine-tenths of the newly-assessed land revenue due from Chorasi have already been realised in the ordinary course.
§ In February, 1928, Mr. Vallabhai Patel, the President of the Ahmedabad Municipality, who had embarked on the enterprise of organising opposition to the new Bardoli settlement, presented the Bombay Government with an ultimatum to the effect that unless they consented to re-open the matter and to institute a fresh inquiry he would advise the inhabitants to withhold, not merely the enhanced demand, but all payments of land revenue, and demanded compliance within a week. This demand the Bombay Government naturally declined to meet, whereupon Mr. Patel launched, with the aid of numerous friends and helpers, a systematic campaign, first to secure the withholding of payments due and secondly to thwart the legal consequences of default. By the middle of March it became clear that these efforts were successfully frustrating the first steps ordinarily taken in such cases by the revenue authorities—namely, the service of demand notices and the attachment of cattle and other movable property, whereupon the Bombay Government decided to exercise the powers given them by the Land Revenue Code to forfeit occupancies and to dispose of land so forfeited to other persons, lands held by non-cultivating owners—moneylenders and others—being selected as the first objects of this policy. This process took time, and meanwhile Mr. Patel and his lieutenants were able to consolidate their position so that by the middle of April they had established a tyranny in the taluka, compelling the inhabitants to 1825 remain along with the cattle within their houses with locked doors to prevent seizure and attachment, and bringing extreme pressure in the shape of fine, threats and boycott both upon any who showed a disposition to pay and also upon the subordinate revenue staff and village servants, if they refused to default in their duties. These methods were countered by the Government by the importation of fresh subordinate staff, and by the middle of May 1,600 acres of land had been forfeited and transferred to fresh tenants on the payment of occupancy price. Further, up to the end of May about 1¼ lakhs of land revenue had been realised out of the 6¼ due under the new assessment.
§ Faced with the failure of their campaign, Mr. Patel and his friends then endeavoured to enlist all the resources of the Indian National Congress organisation throughout the country, and a little later several members of the Bombay Legislative Council resigned their seats to mark their sympathy. Meanwhile, with the arrival of the monsoon, communications in the taluka are as usual at that period interrupted. But the forfeiture of defaulters' occupancies continues, and arrests and convictions are taking place where the law is being broken. The Government of Bombay are in consultation with the Government of India as to the steps to be taken to deal with the situation, and with the gross misrepresentation to which the action of the Bombay Government has been and is being subjected. Up to date the amount of land revenue is Rs.1,38,000 and the amount still outstanding is Rs.4,84,000.