A joint conference under this name was held on September 7-9, 2008 in Delhi. It was organized by the Indian Council for Historical Research and the Center for Indian Studies of the Institute of Oriental Studies of the Russian Academy of Sciences as part of the Year of Russia in India in accordance with the Program of Scientific and Cultural Cooperation between Russia and India for 2006-2008.

Opening the conference, Member-Secretary of the Indian Council for Historical Research Amar Farooqi spoke about the relevance of the conference's issues, as well as the need to exchange research results between historians of Russia, Central Asian countries and India. In his welcoming speech, the Chairman of the Indian Council for Historical Research, Sabyasachi Bhatacharya, stressed that the Indian Council and the Institute of Historical Studies of the Russian Academy of Sciences are linked by years of fruitful work, and regular joint scientific forums are an integral part of this cooperation. I. V. Deryugina (IB RAS) noted the importance of studying the historical stages of development of the peasantry, and in particular agrarian economic relations. In the era of globalization, it is the peasants who are deprived of state support (or have it in insufficient volume) that bear the greatest economic and moral losses.

At the conference, 12 reports of Indian and Russian historians on various problems of the history of agrarian relations, the peasantry and its struggle from the early Middle Ages to the XXI century were heard and discussed.

Irfan Habib's report "The Peasantry and revolutions: the experience of the XX century" was devoted to a comparative analysis of revolutions in France, Russia, India and China. His approach, based on the concept of historical materialism, made it possible to highlight the general and special features of agrarian transformations. The French Revolution of 1789 only affected property relations in the agricultural sector, which affected all classes. The class of large proprietors was destroyed, but the remnants of the old relations in the agricultural sector persisted for a long time. The same scenario was repeated in a number of agrarian revolutions of the 19th and early 20th centuries. The main conclusion of the speaker was that the rise of the struggle of the peasantry, both armed and nonviolent, largely led to the elimination of landownership in a number of developing countries in the second half of the twentieth century.

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Sridula Mukherjee (Memorial Museum and Univ. Jawaharlal Nehru) in the report "Peasants in the Indian Revolution". The criticism focused on the activities of communists and other left-wing political activists in the peasant movement of the 1920s and 1940s. The speaker pointed out that the efforts of Gandhi and the INC, along with the demand for national freedom, were aimed at raising the democratic consciousness of the peasants, while the" left " oriented the peasantry to armed actions. S. Mukherjee stressed that this in no way belittles the role of the peasant movement and its political leaders-communists, socialists from the INC and other figures Congress participated in the implementation of a number of agrarian reforms in independent India, including the elimination of traditional large-scale land ownership, and measures in favor of the rural poor. The report pointed out that religious-communal and caste solidarity of certain social groups may initially help to raise their struggle against social oppression, exploitation and discrimination, but later such solidarity was often used to "plant" communism.

A.V. Gordon (INION RAS) 'Modernization and Peasant Studies in the XIX - XX centuries' considered one of the key problems of the history of the peasantry - the significance of Modern Times as an epoch (Modern Times) and as a civilization (Modernity). Agricultural modernization is defined in peasant studies more or less uniformly - as a transition from managing for survival to an economy of growth and efficiency, accompanied by a change in the system of needs, ethical norms, rural community and the identification of a new economic entity. However, most historians believe that with the advent of the New age of "modernity" the history of the peasantry ends. Other researchers, including the author of the report, describe "modernity" as its most important stage. In the first case, the author emphasizes the historical gap in the life of the rural population, the emergence of new economic agents that are qualitatively different from the traditional peasantry. In the second case, radical innovations do not exclude historical continuity.

Both positions are represented in the history of Russian social thought. The first one was justified by Marxists, who were guided by the concept of initial accumulation as "expropriation of the direct producer" and the laws of capital concentration. They were opposed by the" organizational-production " direction, which proceeded from the non-capitalist nature of the peasant economy. The weakness of this position was the underestimation of the dynamics of the latter in market conditions, which was demonstrated by the materials of the study of the modern Asian village, especially the realities of the"green revolution". Research in recent decades has contributed to a change in the methodological paradigm. Modernization theories based on the experience of Western Europe, primarily the absolutized "English model", are giving way to approaches based on the experience of Eastern countries, where the transforming village retains a clear continuity with its past.

Sri Prakash (Jamia Milia Islamia University, Delhi) in his report "The role of the peasantry in social and political transformation in Russia and India in the XX century" noted certain similarities in the situation of the peasantry in tsarist Russia and colonial India. This concerns mainly the exploitation and social oppression of the landlords, who were the mainstay of the tsarist autocracy in Russia and the British government in India. The overthrow of the tsarist autocracy in Russia and the colonial rule in India was largely due to the mobilization of the peasantry by a well-educated political leadership.

I. V. Deryugina's report "Transformation of the agricultural growth model at turning points in the history of Kazakhstan" examines the dynamics of the development of the agricultural sector of Kazakhstan from the end of the XIX century to the beginning of the XXI century. There are four key points in the development of the agricultural economy. The first - the end of the XIX century-characterized the transition from the nomadic form of organization of agricultural activities to its sedentary forms, initiated by the annexation of Kazakhstan to the Russian Empire and the resettlement of the Russian-speaking population. In social relations in the agricultural sector, the ethnic factor came to the fore. Antagonistic relations between the nomadic and sedentary populations, manifested in competition for production resources (land, water), coexisted with adaptive relations - the gradual penetration of the sedentary form into the Kazakh economy began. The second point is the 1920s. By the end of the 1920s, the agricultural economy of Kazakhstan was dominated by four types of farms: 1) patriarchal-natural, it included farms of nomadic and semi-nomadic areas; 2) chalk-

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kotovarnoe economy, which concentrated the middle peasant farms (average in income) of Russian villages, Cossack villages, and settled Kazakh villages; 3) private capitalist economy, represented by rich farms of immigrants and bais; 4) emerging socialist economy, based on collective (most often state) ownership of the means of production. At the turn of the 1920s - 1930s, forced collectivization was carried out in Kazakhstan: all the variety of economic types was leveled. The third point - the mid-50s of the XX century - is the largest transformation of agricultural production: the development of virgin land, the creation of large grain state farms, a new round of resettlement. The gradual evolution of agriculture was interrupted by an abrupt transition to a new technical and economic stage of its development. In agricultural production, the features of a "labor-saving" technological method of production began to appear. Since that time, the agricultural sector has developed as an export-oriented complex, providing many republics of the USSR with the most important food resources. The fourth point is the 90s. XX century - transition from the socialist form of organization of agricultural production to market forms. In Kazakhstan's agriculture, three types of farms are beginning to co-exist on an equal footing. On the basis of the disintegrated state and collective farms, agricultural enterprises are emerging - a new type of large (collective) economy, whose members and employees have a share in the ownership (land) of this agricultural enterprise. There is a farm (peasant) farm. Farms that were previously known as private subsidiary farms and farms with low marketability, focused mainly on personal consumption, remain strong.

In the report of L. N. Denisova (IRI RAS) "The fate of the Russian peasant woman in the XX century", it is noted that throughout Soviet history, women were the main labor and social force of the village. This concerned agricultural production, personal subsidiary farming, and the formation of public opinion. At various times, their influence on rural life waned or increased and depended on the migration of men, the choice between working in the public sector and at home, the education of peasant women, and state policies in the field of motherhood and child protection. In addition to traditional employment, rural women became skilled tractor drivers, drivers, agricultural specialists, and even collective farm managers, yet three-quarters of the female population was engaged in manual labor. Further, L. N. Denisova considered the demographic policy in the USSR concerning the women's issue during the rule of Stalin, Khrushchev, and Brezhnev. In conclusion, she noted that the village maintained its status as long as there were still peasant women in it. The disappearance of the Russian countryside is directly related to the outflow of rural women.

In the report of E. N. Komarov (IV RAS) " Agriculture and peasantry of medieval India. Comparative perspective " considered the features of Indian agriculture and, accordingly, the work and type of the peasant, as well as the social structure of the Indian rural community in medieval India. The author has made some comparisons with the countries of Europe in the Middle Ages. The multiple superiority of the productivity of Indian agriculture (per unit area) is due not so much to favorable climatic conditions, but rather to the high level of agriculture dating back to antiquity, as well as to the special intensity and continuity of the work of the Indian peasant. Accordingly, many peasants were exclusively farmers. This determined the characteristic type of the Indian peasant and was ensured by the intra-communal division of labor between farmers and village artisans, which was mediated by natural exchange. However, the Indian rural community was not exclusively "self-sufficient", as is often believed. Iron for the ploughshare and sickle, as well as some other tools, was purchased from outside, and in any case, in the XVIII century, the village often received fabrics from settlements where they were engaged in the production of fabrics. Community leaders had weapons, in the XVII-XVIII centuries. even muskets. The high productivity of Indian agriculture, achieved, in particular, due to the intra-communal division of labor, made it possible to withdraw many times the mass of the peasant's surplus product compared to European countries, including Russia. At the same time, the seized mass of the product of the Indian peasant increased as a result of various and very sophisticated methods of seizure. In medieval India, there was no serfdom, but the "serfdom" of peasants and rural workers was quite common. Non-economic coercion was carried out not only by private landowners, but also by the entire power of the state-

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state power, which took a significant, and often predominant, part of the surplus product in the form of taxes.

The isolation of many peasants in medieval India to agricultural labor, which was consciously imposed by the authorities from ancient times, narrowed their horizons and made it difficult for peasant resistance. Nevertheless, while until about the seventeenth century, very numerous rural revolts against the Mughal power and its tax oppression were led by socially privileged intra-communal landowners, who often had weapons and military skills, as a result of the changes that took place in late medieval India, armed uprisings against the Mughal power in a number of regions in the seventeenth century were involved in the development of simple peasants who mastered weapons. In the second half of the 19th century, the peasants-exclusively farmers without weapons or military skills - began to organize to resist the oppression of landlords and arbitrariness, as well as the tax exploitation of colonial power. The turn of the XIX-XX centuries was a time of activation of the rural poor from the lower castes. In the XX century. The growing peasant protests became an important part of the national liberation movement, receiving political and organizational support from party activists and leaders of various ideological and political trends, primarily from the "left" inside and outside the INC.

Shirin Musvi (Aligarh Muslim University) in her report "Marx on the rural community in Russia and India" drew special attention to the complexity of the social structure of the Indian rural community, which, according to Marx, was marked by caste differences and slavery and was by no means primitive. At the same time, the speaker implicitly followed Marx's well-known position about the "self-sufficient" Indian rural community. She pointed out that the use of iron in a medieval Indian village was small and did not change the self-sufficient nature of the Indian rural community.

R. P. Rana (University of Delhi), in his report "Types of Rural Uprisings in Northern India during the Mughal Era", considered mainly uprisings in three sub-districts Mughal India (Agra, Delhi and Ajmir) in the second half of the XVII - first third of the XVIII century. He puts them on a par with medieval village uprisings in both France and China, while pointing out that the forms that rural uprisings took in India were largely determined by the peculiar social structure of Indian society. From the report's description of rural uprisings in these areas, it follows that the social nature of the zamindars there, who belonged to various castes, both high and middle agricultural, cannot be clearly defined. Some of them were socially privileged intra-communal landowners of the feudal type, especially those who belonged to the highest castes, as well as some members of agricultural castes (for example, among the Jats), others were actually peasants with ownership rights (also Jats). Zamindars enjoyed tax privileges, but often gave up to a third of the crop as a tax, while the bulk of farmers with ownership rights gave half of the crop, or even more. The speaker noted various forms of resistance of the villagers-from numerous appeals, a kind of petition to the sovereign court, to refusal to pay taxes and armed uprisings that covered many dozens of villages. The appearance of muskets in the villages contributed to the growth of armed uprisings, whose participants belonged to different castes. Yet " often the peasants followed the zamindars from their own castes." Some of the speeches of the Jat peasants were led by Jat community elders, who were responsible for collecting taxes in the village and even took over the collection of tax on the farm in several villages. But even the successful Jat revolts did not change the social system that existed in the Mughal state. The Jat Zamindars were mastering the mechanism of removing the surplus product of the peasants, which had previously been used by their Mughal rulers.

The report by B. R. Sahu (University of Delhi) focuses on some aspects of the social structure of early medieval Orissa villages in two sub-regions of the Orissa ethnic region (now an Indian state), mainly in the fourth and thirteenth centuries. One of these sub-regions, Kalinga, on the flat sea coast, has been agricultural since ancient times. The other is Khijjaingakotta, a mountainous, wooded area. The speaker comes to the conclusion that in both sub-regions there was a similar process of increasing social inequality.

The study mainly contains a description and analysis of grants made by the rulers of initially small or small state entities. Grants were made personally to brahmins and in a few cases to temples and shrines. Awards, predu-

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Those who considered the development of new land - a fairly common occurrence in many regions of India at that time - were not typical of the developed Kalinga, where grants of pre-existing villages to brahmins from Kalinga itself predominated. In the less developed sub-region, grants for the development of new lands were practiced, usually they were given to brahmins who came from Kalinga.

As a rule, the owner of the grant received not the land itself in an existing village or part of it, but tax revenues from it. The author notes that inherited grants to Brahmins, often free from taxation, accounted for only a small part of the share of cultivated land.

However, B. P. Sahu believes that, despite the small share of grants to Brahmins in the land fund, they played an important role-they strengthened the authority of the ruler and contributed to the formation of state formations of the early Middle Ages in Orissa. The speaker refrains from any formal definition of the practice of granting "religious" awards. Some Indian and Russian historians consider this practice to be one of the indicators of the formation of the feudal system.

The report by A. Satyanariayan (Osmania University, Hyderabad)" The emergence of dominant peasant castes in South India " examined the changes in the social structure of the South Indian village during the colonial period, mainly in the second half of the 19th century, and briefly described further changes that occurred in independent India. The author sees these changes in the economic and socio-political strengthening of higher caste communities-satshudras ("pure sudras"), which traditionally belonged to the low varna of sudras, in contrast to the castes that belonged to the high Varna - brahmanas and kshatriyas according to the ancient system of estates - varna. The Satsudra castes were considered peasant castes, but they were superior to other peasant castes and traditionally dominated the South Indian village, and the village was dominated, as in the rest of India, by the serving agricultural nobility from the upper varna castes.

As a result of the growth of commodity production in the agricultural sector of colonial India, people from Satshudras, who combined agriculture with trade and usury, increased their money capital and created enterprises for processing agricultural raw materials. Their elevation and partial displacement of the upper Varna castes from their former dominant positions was promoted by the land and tax policy of the colonial government, and later, in independent India, the elimination of traditional large-scale land ownership as a result of agrarian reforms. As the speaker points out, these changes led to the emergence of a new social class consisting of dominant peasant castes. Even in colonial times, people from the Satshudra castes were educated, dominated local government, and formed a political party that declared its goal to counter the traditional predominance of Brahmins in public and political life, and at first in the INC, although many of the activists and leaders of the INC were also from Satshudras. In independent India, Satshudras formed the majority in the leadership of the INC in the South Indian state of Andhra Pradesh, among its government ministers, and among the heads of local governments, although the Satshudra castes formed a minority of the state's population. At the end of the colonial period, and especially in the conditions of independence, people from Satsudras established themselves among industrial entrepreneurs and merchants.

In the report of A. Saikia (Technologist, Institute of Technology, Gauhati, Assam) " The peasantry of Assam. Historical changes of 1886-1986" changes in agrarian relations, land and tax policy and shifts in the social, ethnic and religious composition of the peasantry were considered. The speaker analyzed the very complex course of development of social contradictions and peasant struggle over 100 years in Assam (an ethnic region, now one of the Indian states), first under colonial conditions, and then under the conditions of independent India.

From the time of the establishment of colonial power in Assam (in 1826) to the 1980s of the 19th century, the tax policy of the British administrators was aimed at increasing the land tax, which was levied in Assam, as in a number of other regions of India, directly from landowner communities (Rayats, mainly peasants), various social groups, usually in rural areas. according to their caste affiliation (Rayatwari system), and the possessions of large landowners who were above the villages and were responsible for collecting tax from them were eliminated, except for the traditional grants to priests and temples. Since the 80s of the XIX century under pressure-

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As a result of the village's actions against tax oppression, land tax rates were limited and became more or less constant. The possessions of communal landowners, both caste-privileged and economic peasants, acquired the character of private property, became the object of purchase and sale. There was a process of land concentration and differentiation among the community members, including the peasants themselves. New large estates of the landowner type appeared. Their owners-often various employees and entrepreneurs-lived in cities. Although the traditional middle peasantry of the agricultural castes, which had long had ownership rights and now became owners, remained largely intact,the number of sharecropper tenants and landless rural workers from low and lower castes grew. Since the 19th century, a plantation economy (tea) has been growing in Assam. Planters rented out part of their possessions to sharecroppers. Plantation workers were recruited by indentured labor from Bihar and some other regions of India, which increased the ethnic diversity of Assam's population. By the end of the colonial period, especially in the years of independence, it was growing even more as a result of the influx of Muslim peasants from neighboring East Bengal (now Bangladesh), who settled on the newly developed lands.

In 1948-1952, immediately after the declaration of independence of India, a wave of peasant protests led by left-wing political activists rose up in Assam, as in a number of other regions. In 1952 and 1956, laws were passed that in one way or another dealt a blow to the landowning of the middle class, and this landowning gradually disintegrated.

N. Khadria (im. Jawaharlal Nehru, Delhi) in a short report "Peasant communities of North-East India: the Bramaputra Valley in the XIX century." gave a brief description of agrarian relations, the situation of the peasantry on the eve of the establishment of British power, considered the tax policy of colonial administrators until the early 60s of the XIX century. and its consequences. The description of the situation in Assam in the XIX century in the report of N. Khadriya largely coincides with the content of the speech of A. Saikia.

S. E. Sidorova's report "The Indian peasantry and the agrarian policy of the British authorities through the eyes of the Russian press of the second half of the XIX century" provides a detailed picture of how India was seen by Russian readers in the century before last. Some general trends in the socio-economic development of the two countries related to the development of capitalist relations, in particular in agriculture, Russia's desire to intensify economic relations with India, and interest in the practical experience of Indian agriculture led to the fact that in the second half of the XIX century, the agricultural problems of India were widely presented in the Russian press, and they aroused particularly close interest in Russia. The assessment and interpretation of certain aspects of Indian reality were different, and sometimes diametrically opposed, which was determined by the affiliation of publications to certain socio-political trends.

The conference participants noted that the reports presented at the conference cover complex topical issues of the history of the agrarian system, the peasantry and its struggle, and that such meetings of Indian and Russian historians should continue. As Sabyasachi Bhattacharey, Chairman of the Indian Historical Research Council, pointed out, cooperation should not be delayed.

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