Socio-cultural Processes and Livelihood Patterns at Tirurangadi - CDS

category of ‘dependents’. The employment of the head of the family could be deemed to
be the occupation of the entire family, unless the family has gone through the process of
partition. As we have seen, the process of partition was prominent among the landlord
families, and the ordinary families never had the means to go in for a partition suit. Hence
the families had to survive with limited resources under their command, which increased
their misery and resulted in conditions which we discussed in the context of out-
migrations. In the case of the Muslims, the implementation of the Mappila
Marumakkathayam Act in 1933 had very little influence in this area, as very few of the
families had adopted matrilineal system. However, all the families maintained strong
links among themselves, even though their economic status and social standing may be
different. The Cultural implications of this process will have to be discussed later.
We reproduce below the occupational profile of Malabar from the 1931 Census:
Table XLVIII
Category male Female Total
Total earners 853567 400032 1253599
Total
dependents
working 8970 109808 118778
Total non-working 853601 1307966 2161567
dependents
Total earners with
subsidiary
occupation
43262 14425 57687
Total population 1716138 1817806 3533944
The figures indicate that majority of the dependents were women, although we also find
that a substantial number of women were working as well.
Literacy and education
Another solution was that of looking for means of upward social mobility using the living
patterns of modern society. Education was the obvious stepping stone to such a process.
The rebellion had convinced the British Government that one of the major reasons for the
‘outbreak’ was lack of education, particularly among the Mappilas. The solution was the