Bengali Report - Bengalee Association Bihar

than 3 percent) and so is their tendency to mortgage land for obtaining loans (less
than 4 percent). In contrast, the practice of leasing out land is much wider in both
West Champaran (19.4 percent) and East Champaran (38.0 percent). It was also
found out during the field work that these leasing practices are generally within the
Bengali population. It appears that Bengali households in these two districts with
relatively more amount of land lease out part of their holdings to other Bengali
households which are either landless or have very limited amount of land for self-
cultivation. It is not the usual type of tenancy where households with large account
of land lease out part of their holdings to small or medium farmers. It also appears
that, for various reasons, the income from agriculture for the Bengali households is
rather limited and, consequently, they often have to mortgage their land for
obtaining loans. The proportion of households mortgaging land was as high as 23.5
percent in West Champaran; in East Champaran it was lower at 9.6 percent.
Table 9 : Leasing Out and Mortgaging of Land by Landowning Households
Districts
Percentage of
Landowning Households
Leasing
out land
17
Mortgaging
land
Purnea 1.2 3.7
Katihar 2.7 0.1
West Champaran 19.4 23.5
East Champaran 38.0 9.6
All Districts 21.8 17.5
Note : Bhagalpur is excluded from the table, since it had all urban households
Taking into account all the sources of income, either agricultural or non-agricultural,
the overall economic status of the Bengali households seems to be rather low
(Table 10). More than half (56.6 percent) of the Bengali households had reported