Note: Percentages to total in each category
are given in brackets 3.2.6 Political leaning of sample farmers The left political parties always supporting the paddy
farm labour movements in Kuttanad had a retorting effect of driving farmers towards right parties. During the year 1965 when KM George along with leaders like, R Balakrishna Pillai and KR Saraswathyamma parted ways with the then congress chief minister R Sankar and formed a separate regional
party called Kerala Congress, the new political outfit had the wholehearted support of the Central Travancore farmer’s lobby. The Syrian Christian and Nair leadership of the new party could wield its influence among the rank and file of the two communities. At that time a major portion of the wetlands in Ramankari village was in the possession of the large farmers who belonged to anyone of the above two communities. The Kuttanad Karshaka
Sangam which was led by the late Kerala Congress leader E John Jacob turned out to be a vibrant organization to uphold the interests of paddy farmers and acted as a solid forum to counter the growing militancy among farm labour unions. The
reign of kayal rajakkanmar (Kings) ended in the study area with the implementation of the Kerala Land Reforms Amendment) Act in 1970, which contained provisions for the takeover of surplus paddy lands from landowners. Even though, in course of time the vigour of paddy farmers organizations supported by right political parties had lost and many
of them have become dormant, avast majority of the medium and large farmers in the study area are still supporters of right parties like Indian National Congress and Kerala Congress. However, 50 percent of the marginal farmers and more than one-third of the small farmers who had revealed their allegiance to political parties are supporters of left parties like CPI (M) and CPI. One- third of the 90 respondents we had interviewed as part of the present study declined to disclose their political affinity. Table 3.12 shows the political inclination of sample farmers in the study area.
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