Bargadar
Also called: Adhiyar · Topic: Colonial Economy: Land Revenue, Drain, Deindustrialisation · NCERT: Class 12, Ch 1 "Colonialism and the Countryside"
Meaning
A bargadar was a sharecropper in Bengal, also called an adhiyar. A sharecropper farms someone else's land and pays with a share of the crop. Bargadars worked land that belonged to the jotedars, the rich peasants. The bargadar brought his own plough and labour. After the harvest, he handed over half the crop to the jotedar. Bargadars were among the poorest people in the countryside.
Example
In early 19th-century North Bengal, Francis Buchanan surveyed Dinajpur. He found jotedars holding several thousand acres. Much of this land was farmed by adhiyars or bargadars, who gave half the produce to the jotedar.
Don't confuse with
- Under-ryot: a tenant who paid rent to a ryot for land. The bargadar paid with half of the harvest, not with a fixed rent.
Related concepts
- Francis Buchanan
- Jotedar
- Gantidar
- Haoladar
- Mandal
- Under-ryot
- Patta and qabuliyat
- Kist
- Munsiff
- George Chinnery