Static Quiz 24 May 2024 (Modern Indian History)

The Bardoli Satyagraha movement sparked off in 1926 when the authorities decided to increase the land revenue by 30 per cent. The Congress leaders set up a Bardoli Inquiry Committee to go into the issue. The committee found the revenue hike to be unjustified. Vallabhbhai Patel was called to lead the movement for the withdrawal of the enhanced land revenue.

The revolutionary activity in 1920s was dominated by the Hindustan Republican Association/Army or HRA (later renamed Hindustan Socialist Republican Association or HSRA). The HRA was founded in
October 1924 in Kanpur by Ramprasad Bismil, Jogesh Chandra Chatterjee and Sachin
Sanyal, with an aim to organise an armed revolution to overthrow the colonial government. The most important action of the HRA was the Kakori robbery in 1925. The men held up the 8-Down train at Kakori and looted its official railway cash. The Government arrested a large number of young men and tried them in the Kakori Conspiracy Case. Ashfaqulla Khan, Ramprasad Bismil, Roshan Singh and Rajendra Lahiri were hanged, four others were sent to the Andamans for life and seventeen others were sentenced to long terms of imprisonment.

Warren Hastings –
• Warren Hastings (1732 – 1818) became the first Governor of the Presidency of Fort William (Bengal) in 1772 and the first Governor-General of Bengal in 1774 till he resigned in 1785.
• He started his career as a writer (clerk) in the East India Company at Calcutta in 1750.
• In 1758, he became the British resident at Murshidabad, the capital of Bengal, after Mir Jafar was installed as the Nawab after the Battle of Plassey.
• During his term, the First Anglo-Maratha war and the second Anglo-Mysore war were fought.
• The Regulating Act of 1773 was passed during his term.
• He supported Sir William Jones in the formation of the Asiatic Society of Bengal in 1785.

Hastings abolished the Dual System that had been established by Robert Clive. In the Dual System, the company had Diwani rights (rights to collect revenue) and the Nizam or Indian chiefs had the administrative authority.

Warren Hastings was the 1st Governor-General of Bengal. William Bentinck was India’s first Governor-General.

The land assessment was not done properly and land revenue was fixed arbitrarily. This meant that both productive and unproductive land was expected to furnish revenue at the same rates. This created a burden on the farmers of unproductive land. Also, in the case of productive land, it was a loss of revenue to the government.

The land assessment was not done properly and land revenue was fixed arbitrarily. This meant that both productive and unproductive land was expected to furnish revenue at the same rates. This created a burden on the farmers of unproductive land. Also, in the case of productive land, it was a loss of revenue to the government.

Mahalwari system
• The Mahalwari system was introduced by Holt Mackenzie in 1822 and it was reviewed under Lord William Bentinck in 1833.
• This system was introduced in North-West Frontier, Agra, Central Province, Gangetic Valley, Punjab, etc.
• This had elements of both the Zamindari and the Ryotwari systems.
• This system divided the land into Mahals. Sometimes, a Mahal was constituted by one or more villages.
• The tax was assessed on the Mahal.
• Each individual farmer gave his share.
• Here also, ownership rights were with the peasants.
• Revenue was collected by the village headman or village leaders.
• It introduced the concept of average rents for different soil classes.
• The state share of the revenue was 66% of the rental value. The settlement was agreed upon for 30 years.
• This system was called the Modified Zamindari system because the village headman virtually became a Zamindar.