KHADI CURTAIN WEAK CAPITALISM AND OPERATION RIOT - SOME AMBIGUITIES IN FARMERS DISCOURSE, KARNATAKA AND MAHARASHTRA 1980-93

This article examines programmatic, strategic and ideological ambiguities in the discourse of the farmers' movement in Karnataka and Maharashtra. It focuses specifically on the way in which both the KRRS and Shetkari Sanghatana claim to be 'new' agrarian mobilisations, how they identify potential/actual membership and alliances, the manner in which they confront and/or collaborate with the state, and in particular how they conceptualize externally-derived exploitation. The latter is linked to the continued existence in India of a subordinated 'weak' capitalism which perpetuates not only colonial dependency on foreign capital but also endemic rural poverty and urban bias, and the eradication of which requires either a 'Khadi Curtain' or an 'Operation Ryot'. That is, inter-national egalitarianism based on non-exploitative relations (favourable terms of trade and remunerative prices).