Frontier Vol.40; No.19 November 25- December 1, 2007.
More on Amartya Sen
How the argumentive Indian failed by Abhijit Guha
In his long interview (1682 words) published in The Telegraph (a Kolkata based English daily) on 23 July, Nobel laureate economist Amartya Sen unequivocally supported the acquisition of fertile agricultural land for industries
in West Bengal1. It is quite shocking to find that nowhere in his interview the Nobel laureate, who is known as a welfare economist, did utter a single sentence on the need for resettlement and rehabilitation of the peasants who are
dispossessed from their only source of livelihood.2 Professor Sen, like the bureaucrats and ruling party politicians, but unlike resettlement researchers, confined himself only within the domain of monetary compensation, which is awarded to the landlosers by following a 112-year-old colonial law–The Land Acquisition Act, 1894. He also seemed to be totally oblivious about the various categories of the peasantry, viz. landless agricultural workers, unrecorded bargadars, artisans and small traders who though badly affected, are not paid any compensation (according to the law) against land take-over for modern technologically sophisticated and capital-intensive industries which do not have the capacity to absorb even a small portion of the population engaged in labourintensive agriculture. Undoubtedly, Sen's blatant support to the acquisition of fertile land at the cost of the sufferings of thousands of poor peasants in a widely circulated newspaper would not only strengthen the hands of the bureaucrats and ruling party politicians who want to keep the colonial law intact, but it would also spread confusion among the ordinary people who search for a balanced view on this very important issue.
Omissions
In reply to a question regarding his views on farmland acquisition, Sen went back to the pre-colonial and colonial history of Bengal. He stated: 'It is also very important to recognise that production of industrial goods was based on the
banks of the Hooghly and the Ganges, which are fertile areas anyway. So, to say that "this is fertile agricultural land and you should not have industry here" not only goes against the policy of the West Bengal Government but also against the 2000-year history of Bengal'. This sweeping statement is not only simplistic but it also obscured the qualitative differences between pre-British and post-colonial industries which grew on the banks of rivers. It is now a well known fact of history that pre-colonial and indigenous industries of India were small scale family and caste based enterprises which had an organic relationship with the then agriculture and one should not forget the fact that India was one of the world's most urbanised countries during the Mughal period. R G Hambly Gavin, an historian estimated that in Akbar's Kingdom there were 3,200 big cities, and towns whose hinterlands reached far out into the rural areas and many of these cities developed along the rivers or major trade routes (Gavin 1982). The famous French historian Fernand Braudel estimated that the total urban population in India during 17th Century was about 20 million which was approximately the total population of France in 17th century(Braudel 1984). But did all these mean that agricultural land was rampantly grabbed and destroyed in the medieval period in India for the sake of building industries and townships as it happened during industrialisation in England? Braudel's observations are pertinent in this context. According to him in 1600 AD, rural India was farming only a portion of its best available land and the uncultivated land, where new villages were later built, had then offered peasants extra space to support more grazing which in
turn meant more draught animals for ploughing, and more dairy products (Ibid). The authoritative historian of Mughal India, Irfan Habib has found that with two annual harvests, cereal yields in India were higher than those in Europe until the 19th century and the modest quantity subtracted from the harvest for the peasant's own subsistence left a larger surplus available for marketing (Habib 1963) . So, markets, urban centres and industries in pre-colonial India were all
organically linked with agriculture which in turn was based on the prudent use of land, water and forest (Agarwal and Narain 1997). This organic relationship was broken and almost shattered during the colonial period when indigenous crafts and cottage industries were destroyed for the interest of the large scale heavy industries of England. Amartya Sen has spoken about the growth of Manchester and Lancashire on fertile farmland. But where from cotton for the mills of these industrial cities came? They came from the agricultural fields of the British colonies where the peasants were forced to give up cultivation of food crops to supply the raw materials for the industries in Great Britain. So the question is not simply whether agricultural lands were acquired for industries or not, but for whose interest and at the cost of whose sufferings? Professor Sen seems to have forgotten the economic history of India!
The second observation that Amartya Sen made in his interview dealt with compensation. Here again, one finds him totally silent on the anti-people, undemocratic and extremely authoritative nature of the colonial Land Acquisition Act. Regarding the payment of compensation at Singur for the small car factory of the Tatas, he said : 'The government paid much higher price than the value of the land in the free market. From that view it was fair.' This sentence simply revealed Sen's ignorance about land acquisition in India in general and Singur in particular. Because, the value of the privately owned land to be acquired (whether it is in Singur or in any place of India) for a project is calculated on the basis of the average sale data (usually 3 years) of the land in the market prior to the date of notification for land acquisition. After the calculation of the land value, a solatium of 30 percent and a requisition compensation of 12 percent is added on the land value. The provision for 30 percent solatium on land value was made by an amendment in the colonial law in 1984 in the Lok Sabha. Before that it was 15 percent. The point of paying 'higher' price for compensation as Sen has claimed in favour of the Left Front Government [LFG] is therefore, out of question.
In Singur, however the LFG had added an extra complexity by offering a bonus of 10 percent in addition to solatium and requisition compensation for those peasants (some of whom were absentee landowners) who gave consent to give
away their land for the industry. There is no scope in the law to offer this sort of
bonus. Court cases are now being filed on this point and other procedural flaws
which is plaguing the government regarding Singur land acquisition till today. An
economist, Abhirup Sarkar of the Indian Statistical Institute, in his paper
published in the Economic and Political Weekly has shown that the
compensation paid to the farmers of Singur for their multicrop land is much less
than the current agricultural return from the land if one takes into account the
savings bank interest and the prevailing rate of inflation(Sarkar 2007).3 The
basic lacunae in the calculation of land value through previous land sale data lie
with the fact that the colonial law ignores the future potential of a particular piece
of land whether in terms of providing food security and empowerment to a family
for successive generations or in terms of the escalation in the price of the land
after the building of industries, real estates and townships. The affected peasant,
therefore, is always a loser in this mighty game of industrialisation which
Amartya Sen viewed as a panacea for countries all over the world.
The third observation of Amartya Sen dealt with agriculture in Bengal. It is
better to quote him first before one disects his views : 'The prosperity of the
peasantry in the world always depends on the number of peasants going down. It
is not that historically agricultural production goes up so much that they become
hugely rich on that basis. Bengal has done very well in terms of agriculture
compared to other states. But that has not made Bengal immensely prosperous'.
One, who is slightly familiar with Sen's own contribution in the field of economics
and the history of land reforms under the initial years of the Left Front
Government would be simply astonished by this statement for two reasons.
Firstly, prosperity does not only mean a rise in agricultural production but it
also includes poverty reduction, which was achieved largely through land reforms
and decentralisation of power through panchayats in West Bengal, it may not be
out of place to quote from a recent book. "India : Development and Participation"
(2002) written by Jean Dreze and Amartya Sen : 'Changes were rapid after the
Left Front coalition came to office at the state level in 1977 ... This change in the
balance of power has made it possible to implement a number of far-reaching
social programmes that are often considered "politically infeasible" in many other
states. Two notable examples are land reform and the revitalization of democratic
institutions at the village-level. The Left Front's commitments and initiatives
appear to have achieved some important results. In particular, there has been a
comparatively rapid decline of rural poverty in West Bengal since 1977' (pp. 94-
95). It is a real irony that the idea of prosperity which Sen expressed in his
interview did not contain one of its vital indicator, viz. poverty reduction.
Secondly, Amartya Sen's own concept of 'entitlement failures' applies well to the
staggering number of displaced peasants who are involuntarily deprived of their
livelihood by large scale acquisition of agricultural land. But strangely, Sen does
not seem to be interested in applying his concept of 'entitlement failure' to those
group of dispossessed peasantry; instead, he opined in favour of their reduction
in number, as if all these peasants are absorbed in gainful employment in those
industries!
The fourth and final observation of Amartya Sen which he expressed in his
interview was on violence practised by both government and the opposition
parties. He said: 'It is now very important for both the government and the
opposition to avoid violence. There is never a case for violence'. Interestingly, just
on the next day, after his interview was published, The Telegraph carried a news
item entitled : 'Farm OK but no force : Trinamul'. In the news item the Trinamul
MLA Sougata Roy stated : 'The question is whether fertile land can be taken by
force. Our state can't afford to move away from highly productive land as that in
Singur. Mamata Banerjee had demanded that the land of unwilling owners be
returned. Sen bypassed this crucial issue.' Here again one finds Sen's treatment
of the issue of violence centered round land acquisition highly superficial. The
reason behind the contention is simple. Because, when the only source of
livelihood of a person is taken away by the state with the help of a very powerful
law against which she/he cannot even appeal to a court in a democratic country
to nullify government action, then it is already an act of coercion backed by
physical force. If one resists land acquisition, the state would apply physical force
to evict him. A scholar of Amartya Sen's stature should have opined towards
changing the colonial Land Acquisition Act which does not contain provisions for
rehabilitation and consultation with the statutory panchayats instead of invoking
the spirit of Indian non-violence.
IRONIES
Amartya Sen's long interview evokes two interesting ironies. In an article entitled
'Portents of Famine' published in The Statesman (27 January 2007) D
Bandopadhyay mentioned : 'Did not Amartya Sen point out that in the Great
Bengal famine of 1943 it was not the absence of stock of food but inability of the
households to access such food through their own income (entitlements) that 3 to
4 million men, women and children died mostly on the pavements of what was
then Calcutta City due to hunger and starvation?' Mr Bandopadhyay referenced
Amartya Sen to criticise the policy of rampant acquisition of fertile farmland by
the Left Front Government, which the former thought may lead to the 'same
situation as was witnessed during the Great Bengal Famine in 1943'. Professor
Amartya Sen would now definitely disagree with D Bandopadhyay!
The second irony of Sen's interview was revealed when the Bureau reporter of
the daily in which the interview was published talked to Mr Nirupam Sen, the
industry Minister of West Bengal. Amartya Sen told in the interview that the
government has committed a 'tactical mistake' by not exploring the possibility of
maximising the land price in Singur. The economist, (Prof Sen) despite saying
that the government paid higher rates of compensation, also suggested that the
value of the land would have been higher had the land been made free for
competition among industries. Interestingly, on this point the Trinamul leaders
agreed with Prof Sen but Mr Nirupam Sen disagreed with him. The industry
minister rejected the Nobel Laureate's proposal by saying that government
intervention (i.e. land acquisition by the colonial law) is necessary since
'thousands of small plot owners would not be able to negotiate and extract the
best price from big companies and their agents'.
So, land will be acquired by the colonial law, there will be no rehabilitation,
people will protest, violence will continue and, people are back to square one!
Amartya Sen's flashy interview has not been able to convince the minister of the
Left Front Government in following the principles of free market capitalist
economy in allowing the peasants to sell their land to the highest bidder. The
minister of the LFG preferred to stay with the colonial law to acquire land for the
capitalists.
References :
Agarwal Anil and Sunita Narain. 1997 (ed.) Dying Wisdom (Chapter 3), pp.269-311. Centre for
Science and Environment. New Delhi.
Bandopadhyay, D. 2007 The Statesman 'Portents of Famine'. 27 January 2007.
Braudel Fernand 1984. Civilisation and Capitalism, 15th-18th Century, The Perspective of the
World, Vol-111. Collins/Fontana Press, London.
Dreze Jean and Amartya Sen 2002 India : Development and Participation, Oxford University
Press, New Delhi.
Fischer, S. 2003.'Globalization and its Challenges'. The American Economic Review, Vol.
93,No.2, pp.1-30.
Gavin RG Hambly 1982. Towns and Cities in Mughal India, in Tapan Roychaudhuri and Irfan
Habib (ed). The Cambridge Economic History of India, C. 1200-1750, Vol.1.
Habib Irfan 1963. The Agrarian System of Mughal India, 1556-1707, Asia Publishing House, New
Delhi.
Sarkar, A. 2007. 'Development and Displacement : Land Acquisition in West Bengal'. Economic
and Political Weekly, April 21, 2007, pp. 1435-1442.
Sen, A. K. 2006. Manab Unnayaner Pathe (Towards Human Development), pp. 1-36. Pratichi
(India) Trust and Institute of Development Studies Kolkata. Calcutta University, Alipore
Campus
The Telegraph. 23 July 2007.
The Telegraph. 24 July 2007.
Notes:
1. Just few months before The Telegraph interview Amartya Sen was in Kolkata to attend a
collaborative seminar of Pratichi(India) Trust and Institute of Development Studies Kolkata
(IDSK) and made an interesting comment on Singur land acquisition which was printed in a
booklet. Sen's statement literally translated being from Bengali reads: ... 'a lot of criticisms are
on regarding the land acquisition for the small car factory project of the Tatas at Singur in
Hooghly. But the middle and upper classes uprooted the adivasis from their agricultural land
in Santiniketan to build houses. I have not seen any protest against this incident.' (Sen 2006 :
p.12) Suffice it to say that this statement of Sen is factually incorrect since Mahasewata Devi
had been protesting against the take-over of adivasi land in Santiniketan since long. Secondly,
his statement is logically inconsistent because absence of protest against land acquisition in
one place should not prevent people to protest in another place. By this statement at IDSK Sen
simply tried to advance an weak argument against the political parties, affected farmers'
organization and other civil society groups who were protesting against the acquisition of
fertile land in Singur. On hindsight, Sen's IDSK comment however is consistent with his The
Telegraph interview.
2. Sen is however not alone to remain silent on resettlement and rehabilitation among the
celebrated economists while talking on development or globalization. Another celebrated
economist Stanely Fischer in his long paper 'Globalization and its Challenges' also did not
consider displacement of millions of people by development projects all over the world and the
need for their rehabilitation as one of the challenges of globalization(Fischer 2003).
3. It seems from Amartya Sen's statements which he made in the interview that he did
not seriously read the series of papers, letters and editorials published in EPW on the
issues of land acquisition, compensation and rehabilitation in Singur during 2006-
2007. When the reporter of The Telegraph asked him about the land acquisition in
Singur and Nandigram, Sen, after commenting elaborately on Singur said:
'Nandigram is a much more complex issue. There is a question whether that kind of
operation was needed, whether it was the right place. But I have not studied it in the
way 1 have studied Singur. So I won't comment'. Any layperson, would surely think
that the Nobel laureate has studied on Singur and since he is frank, he did not want to
comment on Nandigram.
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