The widespread aspect of Globalisation of agriculture is the entry of multinationals into this sector as sellers of agricultural inputs such as seeds, pesticides and fertilisers. Over the last decade or so, the Govt. has scaled down its agricultural development programmes, and agricultural extension agents have been replaced in the villages by agents of seeds, fertilisers, and pesticides companies. These agents are often the sole source of information for farmers about new seeds or cultivation practices with of course interest in selling their product. This increased dependence of farmers on expensive fertilisers and pesticides, which has reduced their profits and put many farmers into debt and created ecological crisis in rural areas.

Due to these economic and ecological crisis the spate of farmer's suicide have been occurring in different parts of the country since 1997-98. These suicides can be linked to changes in economic and agricultural policies. These include : the changed pattern of landholdings, changing crop patterns, shift to cash crops, liberalization policies that have exposed Indian agriculture to the forces of Globalisation; heavy dependence on high-costs inputs and individualisation of agricultural operations. According to official statistics, there have been 8,900 suicides by farmers between 2001 and 2006 in Andhra Pradesh, Karnataka, Kerala, Maharashtra.

Choose the transformations that happened in rural society after independence.

(A) Increase in intensive cultivation

(B) Rayatwari system was adapted

(C) Rise of free wage labourers

(D) Payment shift from cash to kind (grains)

(E) Bonded labour was banned

Choose the correct answer from the options given below :

(1) (A), (B), (E) only

(2) (A), (E), (C) only

(3) (A), (C), (D) only

(4) (A), (D), (E) only

2

THE CORRECT ANSWER IS OPTION 2: (A), (E), (C) only

Several profound transformations in the nature of social relations in rural areas took place in the post-Independence period, especially in those regions that underwent the Green Revolution. These included:
a. an increase in the use of agricultural labour as cultivation became more intensive;
b. a shift from payment in kind (grain) to payment in cash; (A)
c. a loosening of traditional bonds or hereditary relationships between farmers or landowners and agricultural workers (known as bonded labour); (E)
d. and the rise of a class of ‘free’ wage labourers’. (C)