• Indian society is primarily rural, though urbanisation is growing.

• 69% of India’s population (2011 Census) lives in rural areas, mainly dependent on agriculture or related occupations.

• Agricultural land is the most important productive resource and form of property for many Indians.

• Land is not just a means of production or property; agriculture is also a way of life.

• Many cultural practices and patterns have agrarian origins.

• Harvest festivals like Pongal (Tamil Nadu), Bihu (Assam), Baisakhi (Punjab), and Ugadi (Karnataka) celebrate the main harvest season and mark a new agricultural year.

• Agriculture and culture are closely connected, with variations in agricultural practices across regions reflected in regional cultures.

• Social structure and culture in rural India are deeply tied to agriculture and the agrarian way of life.

• Agriculture is the primary source of livelihood in rural areas, but rural life includes many other activities that support agriculture and village life.

• Artisans such as potters, carpenters, weavers, ironsmiths, and goldsmiths were once integral to the village economy but have declined since the colonial period due to the influx of manufactured goods.

• Rural specialists included story-tellers, astrologers, priests, water-distributors, and oil-pressers.

• Occupational diversity in rural India was reflected in the caste system, which included specialist and service castes like dry cleaners, potters, and goldsmiths.

• Some traditional occupations have declined, but rural-urban interconnections have introduced new occupations.

• Many rural residents work in non-farm activities such as government services (postal, education), factories, or the army, earning through non-agricultural activities.

Agrarian Structure: Caste and Class in Rural India

• Agricultural land is the most important resource and form of property in rural society but is unequally distributed.

• In some regions, most households own small plots, while in others 40–50% of families own no land and depend on agricultural labour or other work.

• A few families are well-to-do, but the majority live just above or below the poverty line.

• Women are largely excluded from land ownership due to patrilineal kinship and inheritance systems; legally entitled to an equal share, but in reality have limited rights and access only through male-headed households.

• Agrarian structure refers to the distribution of landholding and shapes the rural class structure.

• Access to land determines one’s role in agricultural production.

• Medium and large landowners can earn good incomes from cultivation (depending on prices, monsoon, and other factors).

• Agricultural labourers often earn below minimum wage, have low incomes, insecure employment, and face underemployment.

• Tenants (leasing land) have lower incomes than owner-cultivators because they pay 50–75% of crop income as rent.

• Caste and class are closely linked in rural areas, but not always directly.

• Brahmins in many areas are not major landowners, falling outside the agrarian structure despite being part of rural society.

• Major landowning groups belong to upper castes, often one or two dominant castes per region (term by M.N. Srinivas).

• Examples of dominant castes: Jats and Rajputs (U.P.), Vokkaligas and Lingayats (Karnataka), Kammas and Reddis (Andhra Pradesh), Jat Sikhs (Punjab).

• Marginal farmers and landless labourers mostly belong to lower castes – SCs, STs, or OBCs.

• Former ‘Untouchable’/Dalit castes were historically barred from owning land and provided most agricultural labour for dominant groups.

• This labour force allowed intensive cultivation and higher returns for landowners.

• Rough caste-class correspondence meant upper/middle castes had best access to land, resources, power, and privilege.

• In many regions, a proprietary caste owned most resources and could command labour.

• Practices like begar (free labour) required low caste members to work for the landlord a fixed number of days yearly.

• Many poor workers were bound in hereditary labour relationships to landowners.

• Though legally abolished, such practices still persist in many areas.