ABSTRACT
This chapter argues that the majority of Pallars have become steadily more proletarianized and the landless Pallars risk becoming pauperized today. Historical evidence demonstrates clearly that there has been a strong correlation between caste and landlessness. “Untouchable” landless laborers, through the centuries, have been preserved as a landless group. The most land reform legislation enacted in the preceding decades by the Tamilnadu government, though ostensibly intended to bring about a more equitable distribution of land, had done little for the poor. The channel-irrigated lands around Aruloor have much in common with the paddy-growing areas of Thanjavur District described by Gough. Byres is quite right, therefore, in his evaluation of land legislation. Statistics on resumption of land from small Pallar tenants are strikingly high. In 1970, the Land Ceiling Act was amended to reduce the maximum holding for a family of five members from thirty to fifteen standard acres.
