Operation Barga Gains and Constraints

Kalyan Dutt While the agrarian policies of the left Front government in West Bengal have enabled the poorer sections of the rural population to become more conscious of thir rights, what is missing is a broader sense of direction. It is still not clear if these policies are intended to bring about a small peasant proprietor economy, or whether these aim at a mixed economy where the agricultural labourers and poor artisans will have communal ownership of hind, with the government extending support to small producers' cooperatives.