What is agriculture backwardness

Under the colonial rule, India was basically an agrarian economy employing nearly 85% of its population. Nevertheless, the growth of the agriculture sector was meager. This was due to the prevalence of various systems of Land Settlement, particularly Zamindari system. Under this system, the zamindars (owners of land) were required to pay very high revenue (lagaan) to the British government, which they used to collect from the peasants (landless labourers, who were actually cultivating). The zamindars were mainly concerned with extracting high revenues from the peasants but never took any steps to improve the productivity of the land. Moreover, in order to feed British industries with cheap raw materials, the Indian peasants were forced to grow cash crops (such as, indigo, cotton, etc.) instead of food crops (such as, rice and wheat). This commercialisation of agriculture not only increased the burden of high revenues on the poor peasants but also led India to face shortage of food grains. Therefore, Indian agriculture remained backward and primitive.