Tenants' fight for rights

Tenants on state-owned lands in Khanewal and the Punjab government remain embroiled in a fight over ownership rights. Farmers in seven villages of Khanewal district are on a hunger strike led by the Anjuman-e-Mazareen (association of tenants) to press for ownership rights as well as the release of 41 protesters, including the Kissan Board district chairman, Yousuf Khattak, who were arrested on March 28 while trying to stage a long march to Lahore for the realisation of their demands.
The police stopped the protesters right within the limits of Khanewal district by blocking the route to Lahore and using excessive force to break up the marchers, arresting many of them. The police did not stop at that; they resorted to yet another intimidation tactic, and registered cases against scores of tenants under the anti-terrorism law.
It may be recalled that the previous military government too had used excessive force when the tenants at Okara's military farms waged a similar fight. It is sad, indeed, that a democratically elected government should employ such high-handed tactics against a weak and vulnerable section of the society. The issue is not restricted to Khanewal and Okara. As press reports point out, there are some 70,000 acres of state land in 10 districts of Punjab that tenants have been cultivating since 1905. The tenants' representatives allege that the government plans to sell these fertile lands to multinationals, in particular some Gulf-based entities.
That argument though is irrelevant to the present discussion. What is relevant is the commitment successive governments have been making to empower landless peasants. These are state lands tilled by these farmers for several generations. If the government has good enough reason to privatise them, fairness demands that the tenants get the first preference.
The government also needs to remain mindful of the fact that poverty is at its worst in our rural areas. Evicting farmers from the state-owned lands, spread over 70,000 acres, will only aggravate the problem. On the other hand, considering that these people are well-experienced in working on agricultural lands, giving them ownership rights can act as a big incentive for them to increase the productivity, which would be good both, at the individual level for the families and collective level for the communities involved.
It is pertinent to recall here that over the years different governments distributed a substantial acreage of state lands among landless peasants. But much of it has remained unutilised because these were barren lands, and making them cultivable required resources poor peasants could ill-afford. Granting tenants ownership over lands they know well and have been cultivating for a long time can help uplift many from poverty.