AGRICULTURAL LABOURERS IN INDIA 23 virtually ruined producers in certain areas who were heavily specialised in these crops. When talking of the general tendency for agricultural prices to rise, which continues unabated, we must note that throughout the period, commercial crop prices have risen at a much slower rate than foodgrain prices; and the commercial crops (jute, cotton, sugarcane) are invariably grown on a system of contracts to processors and manufacturers organised in monopoly associations. This implies that favourable fluctuations in prices are not passed on to the grower but the benefits are pocketed by the monopolists, while unfavourable fluctuations are fully passed on to growers who bear the brunt of them. The enormous arrears of payments by sugar mills to cane growers totalling crores of rupees is one clear indication of the way the primary producers are exploited. Typically, crops like jute and cotton have been traditionally grown, and continue to be grown, on a system of advances. Another way in which the grower is commonly cheated is through short-weighing when his produce is sold. It must also be noted that, the relative terms of trade for commercial crop producers have been deteriorating in the last few years: the prices of manufactured jute and cotton yarn have risen at a faster rate than that of raw jute and raw cotton, for example. The collapse of sugarcane prices two years ago unleashed the Sbimoga agitation last year as did the adverse effects of sugarcane and cotton price fluctuation fuel the agitations in Maharashtra. There does exist, therefore, an objective economic basis for the peasant movements on the price question, and dismissal of these movements as of no account because they are "led by landlords and rich peasants", is basically misconceived. The problem is to ensure that the movements—spontaneous in its genesis—is guided as far as possible along lines that will not harm the interests of the rural poor, including the class of labourers, and this can only be done, as far as we can see, by the intervention of the working class parties in the movement, to wrest its leadership from the rural exploiters, and to impress the class demands of the rural poor upon the movement. To this end, the most important questions are with respect to food grain prices and agricultural wages. The demand for higher prices, though originating in the commercial crop price collapse, has inevitably become a generalised demand embracing all crops. Hence it has to be combined with the demand for compulsory procurement and operation of a subsidised public distribution system in rural areas, so that the rural poor who are dependent on the market for foodgrains, do not suffer any loss of real income. Finally, the price of labour-power itself— namely, agricultural wages—must also be raised whenever the demand for higher commodity prices are put forward. Wherever the working class movement is strong, it has shown that the demands of agricultural labour and the rural poor can in fact be impressed upon a