Gramdan Movement
The Gramdan movement is the most recent phase of the Bhoodan movement. It is the most important advance in the Bhoodan movement. This movement began spontaneously in 1952 in the village of Mangroth in Uttar Pradesh. The residents of this town banded together to dedicate their entire community to society and live a cooperative existence. Only during and after Vinobaji’s foot march through Orissa did it become a mass movement.
On January 30, 1953, the first Gramdan in Orissa was gained in Manpur, Cuttack district. Soon after, the movement gained traction in the Koraput area, where 26 Gramdans had been received by the time Vinobaji arrived in Orissa on January 26, 1955. In the districts of Balasore, Mayurbhanj, Ganjam, and Sambalpur, a few gramdans had also been received. The Gramdan movement involves the donation of an entire town to society as a whole. Private ownership of land is no longer possible. All of the villagers work together to the best of their abilities and receive anything they require. The surplus is used to benefit the community as a whole. The ideology of collective ownership and communism underpins this movement. The movement is not limited to Orissa. However, it has continued to spread in other states as well.
Another recent trend in Tamil Nadu is “Gram Sankalpa,” in which villagers make four pledges:
- To provide land to all landless people.
- The abolition of untouchability and casteism.
- To enter the Khadi and Village industries within a certain time frame.
- Providing basic education in the village
Objectives
- Reconstruction of society
- Economic advancement
- The establishment of a new social order based on equality and cooperation.
- Founded in the spirit of the abolition of private ownership
- Based on the principles of collective ownership and communism.
The success of the Gramdan movement is based on the following lines
- It can aid in the abolition of illiteracy and interpersonal conflict.
- Litigation can be resolved, and people can mutually help and assist one another.
- The rural indebtedness problem is solvable.
- The rural economy and agriculture have the potential to improve.
- The moral level of the population will rise.
- The initiative has had greater success among the Adivasis, who have a long tradition of social cohesion.
Issues
- The villagers have shown no strong interest in donating to the entire community.
- Because India is a caste-based society, people from different castes are unwilling to work together.
- Local politics has its own set of rules.
- People are illiterate and uneducated. They do not recognise the significance of this initiative. It was quite tough for them to abruptly shift their way of life and thinking.
- Gradually, the Gramdan movement failed to gain the support of the villagers. The rural elites have decided to avoid it. The movement came to a standstill after Vinobaji’s death.
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What do you understand by “Bhoodan” and “Gramdan”?
Vinoba Bhave’s Bhoodan and Gramdan campaigns attempted a “non-violent revolution” in India’s land reform programme. These integrated groups aimed to enact land reforms by encouraging the landed classes to voluntarily give up a portion of their land to the landless. Acharya Vinoba Bhave, an Indian religious icon, founded the Bhoodan movement. While studying Sanskrit in Varanasi, he became a fan of Mohandas K. Gandhi. Bhave broke British Wartime regulations in 1940, at Gandhiji’s request, and spent nearly five years in prison.
Following Gandhi’s death, Bhave was widely regarded as his heir. In 1951, he founded the Bhoodan Movement, or land-gift activism, since he was more interested in voluntary land reform than politics. He travelled hundreds of kilometres in order to collect land donations for redistribution to the landless. By 1969, it had gathered over 4 million acres (1.6 million hectares) of land for distribution.
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