NCERT Solutions For Class 8 Social Science Chapter 6
Ruling the Countryside

(i)       The ryots were reluctant to grow indigo because the planters paid a very low price for the indigo produce.

(ii)      With their meager income, the ryots failed to even recover his cost; earning a profit was a really difficult task. This meant that the ryots struggled always to pay back their loans.

(iii)     The indigo planters forced the peasants to cultivate indigo on the most fertile parts of their land, but the peasants wanted to grow rice on the best soils.

(iv)     The reason was that after an indigo harvest, the land could not be used for the rice cultivation.

The two problems which arose with the new Munro system of fixing revenue were:
(i)     Driven by the desire to increase the income from land, revenue officials fixed too high a revenue demand.
(ii)    Peasants were unable to pay, ryots fled the countryside and villages became deserted in many regions.

ryot       –     peasant

mahal    –     village

nij         –     cultivation on planter’s own land

ryoti      –     cultivation on ryot’s lands

(i)       In March 1859, thousands of ryots in Bengal refused to grow indigo and attacked indigo factories with weapons.

(ii)      They attacked the gomasthas (agents of planters) and swore they would no longer take advances to sow indigo.

(iii)     In 1859, the indigo ryots felt that the local zamindars and village headmen supported them against the planters.

(iv)     In many villages, headmen mobilised the indigo peasants and fought against the lathiyals. The zamindars encouraged them to resist the planters.

(v)      The indigo peasants expected support from the British government against the planters.  During this time, Lieutenant Governor was touring the region. The ryots saw the tour as a sign of government support for their plight.

(vi)     In Barasat, the magistrate Ashley Eden issued a notice to protect the ryots from the indigo contracts.

(vii)    Intellectuals from Calcutta visited the indigo districts and wrote about the ryots and the tyranny of the planters, and the horrors of the indigo system.

(viii)   The government brought in the military to protect the planters from assault and set up the Indigo Commission to enquire into the revolt. The Commission held the planters guilty.

 (ix)    The Commission asked the ryots to fulfill their existing contracts, and to refuse to produce indigo in future. After the revolt, indigo production collapsed in Bengal.

(i)      The East India Company introduced the Permanent Settlement in 1793.

(ii)     By the terms of the settlement, the rajas and taluqdars were recognized as zamindars.

(iii)    They were asked to collect rent from the peasants and pay revenue to the Company.

(iv)    The amount to be paid was fixed permanently and it was not to be increased ever in future.

(v)     The purpose of fixing the amount was to ensure a regular flow of revenue into the Company’s coffers and at the same time, to encourage the zamindars to invest in improving the land.

(vi)    Since the revenue demand of the state would not be increased, the zamindars paid the Company only the fixed revenue and kept the surplus production from the land.

(a) Growers of woad in Europe saw indigo as a crop which would provide competition to their earnings.

(b) The demand for indigo increased in late eighteenth-century Britain because of the expansion of cotton production and industrialisation.

(c) The international demand for indigo was affected by the discovery of synthetic dyes.

(d) The Champaran movement was against indigo planters.