All India Kisan Sabha

The All India Kisan Sabha (AIKS), initially established as the All India Kisan Congress, was formed in April 1936 at the Lucknow session of the Indian National Congress (INC). This development marked a crucial transition in the history of peasant movements in colonial India, moving from localized, unstructured agrarian protests toward a centralized, class-conscious national organization.

The Impact of the Great Depression

The global economic depression of 1929 collapsed agricultural commodity prices by 50% to 60%. While the income of the peasantry fell drastically, the colonial state’s land revenue demands and the rents extracted by feudal landlords (Zamindars and Talukdars) remained rigid. This economic squeeze led to widespread rural debt, land alienation, and mass poverty, creating an ideal environment for radical agrarian mobilization.

Proliferation of Regional Kisan Sabhas

The national organization developed out of several pre-existing provincial peasant bodies that had already established grassroots networks:

• The Andhra Provincial Ryots Association (1928): Founded by N.G. Ranga and B.V. Ratnam, this organization pioneered structured agitations against the upward revision of land settlements in the Madras Presidency.
• The Bihar Provincial Kisan Sabha (1929): Established by Swami Sahajanand Saraswati to resist the oppressive rent-collection practices and arbitrary evictions (Bakasht land disputes) enforced by native Zamindars.
• The Punjab Kisan Committees: Formed primarily by radical left-wing activists associated with the Kirti Kisan Party and the Ghadar movement, focusing on canal colonies and water taxes (Abiana).

Institutional Structure and Leadership Matrix

The foundational conference of the AIKS in Lucknow brought together a diverse group of agrarian radicals, socialists, and left-wing Congressmen, establishing a unified national leadership.

Foundational Executive Committee (1936)

• President: Swami Sahajanand Saraswati, the radical sanyasi and peasant leader from Bihar.
• General Secretary: N.G. Ranga, the pioneer of the peasant movement in South India and an agrarian economist.

The Left-Wing Congress and Socialist Convergence

The formation of the AIKS was heavily supported by the Congress Socialist Party (CSP) and the then-underground Communist Party of India (CPI). Leaders like Jawaharlal Nehru, who presided over the concurrent 1936 Lucknow INC Session, gave his ideological backing to the Sabha, viewing it as a vital front to radicalize the broader national freedom struggle.

Leadership Matrix and Regional Influences

Ideological Manifestos and Statutory Demands

The AIKS formalized its economic and political goals through institutional documents that aimed to restructure the agrarian economy of India.

The All India Kisan Manifesto (August 1936)

Formulated at the Berlin conference of the AIKS executive and published from Allahabad, the Kisan Manifesto served as the definitive charter of peasant rights. It aimed to pressure the Indian National Congress into incorporating specific agrarian reforms into its election manifestos for the 1937 provincial legislative assembly elections.

Fundamental Long-Term Demands

• Abolition of the Zamindari System: The absolute elimination of all intermediary landlord systems, including the Permanent Settlement, Mahals, and Talukdari frameworks, without paying compensation to the landlords.
• Cancellation of Agrarian Debts: A total statutory liquidation of all past debts owed by cultivators to village money-lenders (Mahajans and Sahukars) and commercial intermediaries.
• Land Ownership Transfer: The redistribution of land titles directly to the actual tillers of the soil, ensuring permanent occupancy rights and preventing land alienation.

Immediate Minimum Demands

• Reduction of Land Tax and Rents: A minimum 50% flat reduction in all state land revenue demands and rent rates extracted from tenants.
• Abolition of Forced Labor and Extra Levies: Complete statutory prohibition of forced labor (Begar, Vetti) and all unauthorized illegal cesses (Abwabs) collected by landlords.
• Fixity of Tenure: Total legal protection against arbitrary summary evictions (Bedakhli) for all categories of occupancy and non-occupancy tenants.
• Fair Price Infrastructure: Establishment of state-regulated agricultural markets, credit cooperatives, and fair minimum support prices for cash crops.

Dynamics, Mobilization Strategies, and Major Agitations

The AIKS used both constitutional pressure and direct action to mobilize millions of smallholders, sharecroppers, and landless laborers across the country.

Coordination with the 1937 Congress Ministries

Following the victory of the INC in the 1937 provincial elections, the AIKS acted as a radical pressure group. When Congress ministries in Bihar, Bombay, and the United Provinces delayed implementing complete land reforms due to pressure from conservative landed elements within the party, the AIKS organized mass rallies, civil court picketing, and legislative marches to demand immediate action.

The Bakasht Land Struggles in Bihar (1937–1939)

• The Grievance: Bakasht lands were those ancestral plots that tenants had surrendered to Zamindars during the Great Depression because they could not pay their cash rents, but which the peasants continued to cultivate as sharecroppers.
• The Action: Under Swami Sahajanand’s direct leadership, the Bihar Provincial Kisan Sabha launched a militant movement to physically prevent landlords from evicting tenants from these plots. Armed with traditional staffs, peasants successfully harvested crops on disputed fields, forcing the Congress ministry to pass the Bihar Tenancy Act amendments to return partial occupancy titles.

Media and Radical Publications

The movement relied heavily on vernacular journalism to build class consciousness and share strategies across regions:

• Hundi (Patna): A Hindi weekly edited directly by Swami Sahajanand Saraswati, serving as the central media tool for the northern Indian units.
• Kirti (Punjab): A Punjabi publication that linked the grievances of local canal colonizers with anti-imperialist movements.
• Krishak (Bengal): A Bengali weekly that focused on the exploitation of jute-growing sharecroppers.

Institutional Evolution and Post-1940 Ideological Splits

The onset of the Second World War and changing geopolitical dynamics led to internal ideological divisions within the AIKS, eventually shifting its organizational alignment.

The Split with the Indian National Congress

The relationship between the AIKS and the conservative leadership of the INC broke down after 1938. At the Haripura and Tripuri Congress sessions, the INC leadership passed resolutions banning Congressmen from joining the Kisan Sabha’s radical agitations, accusing the organization of promoting class war and violating the multi-class alliance strategy against British rule.

The People’s War Shift (1942)

Following Nazi Germany’s invasion of the Soviet Union in 1941, the Communist Party of India (CPI) shifted its policy, declaring the war to be a “People’s War” and supporting the British war effort against the Axis powers.

• As the CPI gained majority control over the organizational apparatus of the AIKS, the Sabha refused to support Mahatma Gandhi’s Quit India Movement in 1942.
• This political shift alienated non-communist nationalist leaders, including Swami Sahajanand Saraswati and N.G. Ranga, who left the main organization to establish separate peasant bodies like the All India Industrial and Agricultural Peoples’ Organisation (AIIAPO).

Late Colonial Radical Struggles

Despite internal splits, the communist-led AIKS organized two of the largest militant agrarian movements during the late colonial era:

• The Tebhaga Movement (1946–1947): Organized by the Bengal Provincial Kisan Sabha, demanding that sharecroppers (Bargadars) retain two-thirds (Tebhaga) of the harvest, reducing the landlord’s share to one-third.
• The Telangana Insurrection (1946–1951): A militant armed rebellion against the feudal regime of the Nizam of Hyderabad and local land-barons (Deshmukhs), resulting in the temporary liberation of thousands of villages and the redistribution of agrarian lands.

Key Facts and Trivia for Civil Services Examination

The Emblem of the Red Flag

At its second national session held in Faizpur in December 1936 alongside the regular INC session, the AIKS formally adopted the Red Flag featuring a hammer and sickle as its official organizational emblem. This choice signaled its commitment to working-class politics and its shift away from traditional Congress symbols.

The Central Tractor Organisation Finance

To provide real financial relief to distressed farmers, AIKS leaders used their positions in regional legislative bodies to campaign for early agricultural modernization loans. These efforts contributed to the later setup of the Central Tractor Organisation via an international bank loan to reclaim unarable lands for resettled farmers.

The Indian Peasants’ Institute

Founded by N.G. Ranga at Nidubrolu in Andhra Pradesh, this institute served as the first formal training school for agrarian political organizers in India. It offered structured courses in rural economics, labor laws, history of land revenue systems, and techniques for organizing non-violent rural strikes.