The Hindu Business Line : Not by private property alone

Dwelling in private spaces and frolicking in the commons. How enticing! But that's the experience of growing up in villages, writes Rita Brara in Shifting Landscapes, from Oxford University Press (www.oup.com) . The book, sub-titled `the making and remaking of village commons in India' is a `journey into the realm of villagers' in the Lachhmangarh region of Rajasthan, where livelihood depends on `private farms and common grazing lands'.

But why a focus on commons? Because "the commons are often eclipsed in writings about the village as an object and an institution," says the author, a Reader in Sociology at the University of Delhi. The village not only supplies "the scaffolding of a life-order that enables villagers to distinguish themselves from other villagers, nomads, shifting cultivators, and hunter-gatherers," but also enables residents to draw upon pastoral commons, points out Brara.

"Human beings do not live by private property alone," reminds the author. "Village commons become life-sustaining assemblages composed of the bric-a-brac of interrelations of people, flora and fauna that invoke the space of sharing and dialogue." The book brings out "the recurring motifs of private, culturable lands and their juxtaposition alongside the uncultivated commons within the formation of the village."

Tracing the history of property rights, Brara informs that in Rajasthan, the proverb that held good during the feudal regime was, "bog ra dhanni raj ho; bhom ra dhanni ma cho". That is, "The wealth of the harvest is the state's to consume but the wealth of the land is mine." One learns that ancient texts recognised two types of land ownership, viz. ownership through conquest of territory; and ownership that grew out of the first clearance of land.

How should villages be constructed? On this, there are Manu's guidelines, which are eons old. Accordingly, "An area of 100 bow-lengths should be reserved as pasturage." Also, ponds, wells, and temples should be located where the boundaries of villages meet. "The king is advised to mark out boundaries between villages by physical features, such as a stream, a ridge, a row of trees or better still by pebbles that do not disintegrate easily."

The commons mitigated the hardship that the village residents suffered despite or owing to the lack of private property. However, rights in the commons have been `nebulous, variable, and disorderly' in comparison to the `private and exclusive rights in cultivated fields'. Thus, the history of the commons is one of `mutations and discontinuities' because of `shortage of culturable land and forage resources'. It is a consolation, though, that commons have not yet been swallowed up `in the rush towards privatisation'.

A chapter on `village commons and the public sphere' records that "every depression in the village, in the past, had been exploited to catch the natural run-off rainwater." Wish we too devoted attention to the waterways, especially after the recent experience with flooding in Chennai.

Notwithstanding caste stratification, Brara observes that the concept of `village' exists, with regard to "shared concerns in pastoral or water provisioning." Many rites were collective too. For instance, each household/ family at Khedi sent "an adult with a piece of wood for the cremation rite in the event of the death of a villager, irrespective of caste."

Brara devotes attention to topics such as commons' encroachment, fodder provisioning, and grazing lands, in separate chapters. She reminds, in conclusion, that each village is unique, historically.

Legislation may mightily declare the state to be the owner of all lands within a demarcated territory, but that's often an imagined state effect, says Brara. For, agencies designated to administer the commons "often lack the social and financial wherewithal to fence the vast territories that nominally belong to it."

An uncommon book on commons, which stirs up wistful memories of days when we might have frolicked in the commons.

TitleFeed@Rediffmail.com

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