NAME – YASHIKA ANEJA

ROLL NO – 1701909
MA (H) ENGLISH – F
Zamindari in Krishnakant’s Will

With the introduction of the Permanent Settlement Act (1793), under the British rule, the age-old
spirit of mutual dependence between landlords and tenants shattered completely. The
Zamindars with their wide powers exploited the peasants with taxes and unlawful charges, thus
prospering themselves and making the peasants’ lives miserable, altering the balance of rural
society altogether.

Bankim’s novels are set in such rich Zamindar households. Though a direct address to the
issues related to the agrarian life went largely missing from his novels but he makes the
character delineation of the various Zamindars in which their thoughts, acts of donations,
perceptions and generosity are juxtaposed with descriptions that of their life full of affluency,
flaws of character and property-based clashes. One such family is that of Krishnakanta Roy.
The very first line of the novel “There was... the head of the family...” speaks volumes about the
patriarchal and feudal setup of the society that the novelist endeavors to portray. The spatial
setup of Krishnakanta’s house, where the “chaste women” of the house lived in antahpur or the
inner space separated from the outside space of men, presents how patriarchy worked in the
Zamindars’ household. Any violation of this segregation was doomed to destruction as it
happens when Haralal enters Rohini’s kitchen or when Rohini enters Krishnakanta’s room or the
private garden of Govindlal. It also enabled the elite Bengali Zamindar to exercise supreme
authority in the domesticity of his house which otherwise to him was denied under the British
rule.

Krishnakanta, on being asked if he would send Rohini to the police, names himself as the
police, magistrate and the judge in his estate showcasing his power and influence. He exercises
his authority over his land and family by changing the will many times at his will, thus altering
the equations between the family members and invoking clashes. Also depicting how the land
and its ownership becomes the root of all problems.
In the novel, Bankim also provides a narrative picture of a protest organized by the peasantry of
Bandarkhali against their exploitation by the steward who does not provide them with the rent
receipts. Though the incident is not much developed and is left just as a reference but it points
towards the evils of Zamindari system, that of absentee landlordism, of how in the absence of
Zamindars, their appointed stewards exploit the tenants and get away with it. He also makes a
reference to the oppressive Indigo planters, who acquired large areas for the cultivation of cash
crops like Indigo that were in much demand in England and tortured and tyrannized the
peasants in every possible way, by referring to the dead Indigo planter’s house in Prasadpur.
This reference points towards his own courageous suppression, as a deputy magistrate of
Khulna district, of a riot engineered by one such planter against the long suffering peasant
rebels.

Bankim, being a westernized Bhadralok, was a rational thinker and a cautious admirer of the
positivists on one hand and was a Bengali with nationalist consciousness on the other. This split
consciousness is what marked his ambivalence on such social problems and issues. Though
the rational nationalist in him accused the Zamindars as “the enemy of the Bengal peasants”
{But he was also careful enough to not make all the Zamindars culpable and so he differentiates
between landlords that are truthful and mindful of their peasants’ welfare ( Satyanishtha) and
those that are rogues (Atyachari).} and saw the Zamindari system as a mistake but the middle
class elite in him feared the terrible disorder that would unleash in society if any attempt to
correct the error is made. His was an anti-revolution stance. His nationalism was neither meant
to oust the British rulers from India nor was it dependent on this alien government for any
reforms but it was a plea for better living conditions for his people within the periphery of
Hinduism and under the protective umbrella of Just law.

Bibliography:
1. ‘Bankim Chandra Chattopadhyay’s nationalist thoughts’ – Narasingha p.
Sil
2. ‘The Rise and Growth of Economic Nationalism in India’ – Bipan Chandra