Master thesis

5.0Introduction of Cases

Rajasthan/Rajputana literally means "the land of kings" or "the land of kingdoms", with the dominating cast being Rajput, and it is the largest state of the Republic of India by area¹¹⁵ and it covers much of the area of the Thar Desert. The state is bordered by Pakistan to the west, Gujarat to the southwest, Madhya Pradesh to the southeast, Uttar Pradesh and Haryana to the northeast and Punjab to the north. Rajasthan covers 10.4% of India´s land mass, an area of 342,269 km².¹¹⁶ The present State of Rajasthan was formed after a long process of integration which began on March 17, 1948 and ended on November 1, 1956¹¹⁷.

One of the world's oldest mountain ranges, the Aravalli Range dominates the landscape from the south-west travelling north-east towards Delhi and Punjab, from the districts of Udaipur and Sirohi towards the district of Alwar, for more than 850 km¹¹⁸. The Aravalli hills create a natural barrier to the desert and divide the state into two ecological "zones"; the arid north-west and the semi-arid south-east¹¹⁹.

In Rajasthan, Hindus account for 88.8% of the population, Muslims make up 8.5%, Sikhs 1.4% and Jains 1.2% of the population¹²⁰. The state of Rajasthan is also populated by Sindhis, who came to Rajasthan from the Sindh province (now in Pakistan) during the India-Pakistan separation in 1947¹²¹. The total population of Rajasthan is estimated to be more than 68 million according to the 2011 census¹²².

Common Property Resources (CPRs/Commons) are land resources owned and managed by a local community, rather than controlled by governments (public/government resources), or owned by individuals (private resources). "Rural common property resources are broadly defined as, resources towards which all members of an identifiable community have inalienable user rights. In the Indian context CPRs include Community Pastures, Community Forests, Government Wastelands, Common Dumping and Threshing Grounds, Watershed Drainages, Village Ponds and Rivers etc. The first three resources are particularly important because of their large area and their contribution to people's sustenance."¹²³

It is helpful to distinguish between the type of property right and the type of resource, to allow for the fact that the same type of resource may be exploited under a range of property rights. Common pool resources are to be understood as a sub-set of public goods (as that term is used in economics). All public goods have the property that many can use them at the same time, because exclusion is difficult. Some public goods yield infinite benefits, in the sense that if A uses more there is no reduction in the amount available for others (e.g. lighthouses and weather forecasts). Common-pool resources, by contrast, are public goods with limited or subtractive benefits; if A uses more, less remains for others. Common-pool resources are therefore potentially subject to congestion, depletion, or degradation, i.e. extraction which is pushed beyond the limits of sustainable yield.

Fresh water, for example, is a common property resource: it can be used jointly, because of the high cost of excluding a landowner with nearby land; and its consumption is subtractive in the sense that water applied to A's land is not simultaneously available for B's¹²⁴.

The rural poor with limited alternative means of income, depends largely on the benefits from the CPRs. Whereas, the rural rich have a very low dependency on the CPRs¹²⁵. This dependency is even more significant in India’s arid and semi-arid regions, such as Rajasthan, due to the harsh environment¹²⁶. According to Jodha´s study, the poor households dependency on the CPRs for fodder and food items rages from 84% to 100%, the equivalent dependency for rich households in Rajasthan rages from 10% - 19%¹²⁷. Despite the CPRs significant and valuable contribution to the livelihood of the rural population, they are among the most neglected areas within development planning in India¹²⁸.

The previous Indian literature regarding the CPR (Jodha) consider the significant importance of the commons revolve around two major points; the importance for ecology and to the livelihood of the rural poor¹²⁹. The CPRs contribution are abundant, and includes; local employment, income generation and asset accumulation. Nevertheless, due to the daily routines these are seldom recorded or recognized¹³⁰. They range from the direct and more visible contributions in terms of physical supplies to the less visible gains implied by sustainability of agro-ecological systems. This sort of invisibility of CPR contributions, according to Jodha, is more prominent in the case of long-term social and ecological processes characterising dry areas¹³¹. According to Jodha´s field study, the CPRs in Rajasthan contributes to the poor households on an average with 71% of the fuel wood used for the year, 84% of the annual fodder, 165 days of employment and 23% of the annual income¹³² per household¹³³. However, CPRs in India´s arid and semi-arid regions face a significant crisis and at the present status, the CPRs cannot meet the local needs. This is reflected through their general shrinkage in area, decline in productivity and general degradation and breakdown in local management systems¹³⁴. According to Jodha, the decline in area has been fairly easy to observe through village interviews and records of land use. On the other hand, the decline in productivity, although clearly felt in the villages, is difficult to quantify due to the productivity have never been recorded in the past¹³⁵.

The local ecology and community receive direct benefits from a well vegetated CPR, through the lessened soil erosion and the higher level of soil moisture, as well as effective water conservation efforts to keep the water supply up for the harsh summer period. The erosion and soil moisture are interconnected through vegetation¹³⁶. A high level of vegetation, and thereby a large root network from the top soil to deeper levels, will prevent much the soil run off during the monsoon as well as, lessening the evaporation of water and in arid regions, such as western Rajasthan, this is of critical importance¹³⁷.

Farming in rural Rajasthan is mainly rain fed, and therefore subsistence orientated in nature. The continued degradation of the forest has affected the soil and water system in the agricultural lands located in the plains and downstream. This leads to more frequent droughts, and food and income shortages as result of the top soil being washed away by the monsoon. Another trend towards overgrazing has been the change in the farming techniques; instead of letting livestock graze on the crop fields after harvest, farmers sow a second or third crop, without letting the land pause to regenerate¹³⁸. In effect, this means that the fodder obtained from the post-harvest fields is not available and additional fodder must be obtained from the CPRs.

Due to the farming based livelihood of the rural population, the levels of soil moisture, silt run off and a stable and nutritious layer of top soil will have significant effects on the farming productivity, both in agricultural and livestock based farming. Although the livestock farming is not directly affected by e.g. erosion, they are affected indirectly through the availability of fodder for grazing and harvesting. As mentioned the landless households in Rajasthan are especially dependent on the CPR's to make ends meet.

The problems concerning common lands in the state are not merely physical in terms of degradation or sub-optimal productivity, which can be addressed with relative ease through technological options, but also socio-political in nature, often requiring long drawn attempts at reconciliation of stakes of various sections of the community and advocating for accommodation of these interests.