Green Revolution and Inequality

P N Junankar An inevitable consequence of the Green Revolution has been increasing inequality in rural India. As the high-yielding varieties of crops require regular supply of irrigation and fairly large amounts of fertilisers, the advantage has been biased towards the large farms. These farms have also begun to substitute capital (e g, tractors) for labour. Since the new varieties are profitable there would be an increase in capitalist farming, an attempt by landlords to evict their tenants and cultivate the land with hired labour, and an attempt by large farmers to buy out small farmers as far as the land ceiling legislation will stretch.