economics of on-farm development - Institute for Social and ...

competent and responsible agency with well-defined functions to carry out
irrigation works in the three regions. This seems to have been compounded by
the absence <strong>of</strong> essential data like rainfall, run-<strong>of</strong>f, catchment area and
classification <strong>of</strong> soils for planning and designing irrigation projects. which
resulted in abandoning <strong>of</strong> projects half-way through and revising their estimates.
In the year 1068 <strong>of</strong> Malayalam Era (began in 825 AD), only 15 per cent <strong>of</strong> the
outlay on irrigation could be expended (Government <strong>of</strong> Travancore, 1068 as
cited in Netto. 1990:54). Thus. administrative bottlenecks as well as the peculiar
agrarian relations 14
that existed have deterred the development <strong>of</strong> irrigation
systems in Kerala during the colonial era.
1.4.2 Post - independence period
However. the post-independence period witnessed tremendous changes in respect
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<strong>of</strong> policies towards irrigation devclopment in the State. This has been due to the
canals, tanks and reservoirs in the Southern taluks <strong>of</strong> Travancore (Gazetteer <strong>of</strong> India,
1962: 314). The erstwhile Travancore state had an irrigation project in Southern
Travancore, which was transferred to the Madras state at the time <strong>of</strong> State's
reorganisation in 1956 (GOK, 1967). In the Cochin region, irrigation development had
marked its beginning only during the 1860s when the construction <strong>of</strong> embankments and
drainage canals were taken up by the government. Whereas, the history <strong>of</strong> irrigation in
Malabar since the beginning <strong>of</strong> the 19 'h century is a story <strong>of</strong> gross neglect by the Madras
Government (Joseph, 1983: 18).
U With the prevalence <strong>of</strong> absentee landlordism on the one hand and the defective land
tenure system by which the tenants faced the threat <strong>of</strong> eviction on the other in all the
three regions, there was no sustained interest in improving cultivation through
development <strong>of</strong> irrigation systems.
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