The above observations convey some of the gains enjoyed by the tenants following their recording of names. It, however, needs to be noted that tenancy reforms as through the O.B. programme has been only one segment of whole agrarian policies being implemented by the LFG. The other associated programme has been recovery of ceiling surplus lands and their distribution to the landless and land-poor. Another priority area of the LFG has been promoting the interests of the agricultural labourers through, inter alia, periodic revisions of minimum wages and their enforcement with the intervention of the organisations of rural labourers. As the LFG restored the panchayati raj system in the state, it enabled more active participation of the people in planing and implementation of various rural development programmes. Greater and greater proportion of state budget have started to be allotted to the panchayats so as to further strengthen the decentralised system of governance as has been established by the LFG.

The agriculture in West Bengal as a whole progressed remarkably during the period following implementation of institutional reform measures (of which tenancy reforms is a part). Thus while the annual compound growth rate of agricultural output in the state for the 1949 to 1980 is estimated at 1.74% (Boyce, 1987), the same for the period 1980-81 to 1994-95 is calculated to be 4.98% (Rashid, 1996). The performance of the state appears to be specifically impressive in the sphere of food-grains production. This single performance has led the state to the topmost position among major states of India in recent years. For the period 1981-82 to 1991-92, the annual compound growth rate of food-grains production is West Bengal is found to be 6.5%. this is significantly higher than Haryana 4.3%, Punjab 4.0% and Uttar Pradesh 3.5% - the three important Green Revolution states of the country. Considering a larger time span (1980-95), however, the growth rate of food-grains production is found to be 4.56% which still appears to be impressive as compared to other states of India. What is more important is that such a boost in food-grains production has come about through significant expansion in yield (particularly, in respect to yield of Aman paddy) rather than area (Rawal and Swaminathan, 1998).

Another important feature that is often not recognised in the literature is that the unprecedented production gains in West Bengal agriculture has been brought primarily by its marginal and small farming categories (they together constituted 92% of all holdings and controlled about 71% of total operated area in 1991-92). This is contrary to the experience of the green revolution states where the farmers from higher categories played greater role in bringing production increases following adoption of new agricultural inputs. Furthermore, there has been rapid decline in rural poverty in the state following the implementation of agrarian reform programmes over past couple of decades or so. During the period since 1972-73 or 1977-78, West Bengal recorded the highest decline in poverty in percentage point terms among the major states in India.

Nevertheless, there have serious discussions among the scholars over the issue of connection between agricultural progress and institutional changes in the context of West Bengal. Some good reviews on the literature is available elsewhere.

Thus West Bengal experience clearly underlines the potential of institutional reforms not only for achieving better agricultural growth but also to establish distributive justice thereby obtaining some solution to the problem of poverty in backward agrarian economies. Some of the lessons emerging from West Bengal experience of tenancy reforms are the following:

1. It is to be noted that the most important prerequisite for successful implementation of land reforms programmes (including tenancy reforms) is the political will on the part of the parties in state power. To reiterate, the relatively better performance of West Bengal in this regard could be attributed to sincerity on the part of the ruling LFG to strike at rural vested interest. Unless the parties in state power acquire the will to protect the tenants’ lot, the scheme of tenancy reforms would continue to remain as mere paper exercise.
2. Even when the government in power is not unwilling to implement some degree of reforms so as to protect the interest of weaker sections, it may not be possible to achieve desired results in the face of stiff opposition from vested interest groups. In this context, the West Bengal experience suggests for launching organised movement of the tenants in collaboration with other weaker sections (agricultural labourers, petty farmers and so on) for protecting their interests. For successful recording of the tenants’ names in other states to protect their rights (non-eviction by the landowners, allowance of legally stipulated share of crop etc.), mass mobilisation along that direction could be a useful strategy. In any case, the recording of tenants’ names should not be viewed as a purely juridical-cum-beauracratic exercise. In the event of organisational weaknesses of weaker sections in most areas, the restoration and strengthening of panchayati raj institutions appear to be a workable strategy for tenants’ mobilisation for struggles against vested rural interests.
3. The West Bengal experience of tenancy reforms also suggests that in the matter of implementation of any programme favouring the weaker sections, there is no room for adopting a dilly-dally approach. Since the tenants mostly belong to the weaker socio-economic category, there always remains the possibility of such programmes being foiled by their superior masters. Thus any scheme drawn for protecting tenants’ interest need to be enforced with a sense of urgency.
4. Appropriate detection of tenancy and the tenants in rural areas has been always a difficult problem. To the extent that tenancies represent informal arrangements between the lessors and the lessees, the possibility of tenancies remaining undetected becomes even higher for the official surveys. Thus it is not surprising to find that in a state such as Bihar, which is known for continuing semi-feudal production relations in agriculture, only 3.9% of operated area is reported to under tenancy in 1991-92 as per N.S.S.O. surveys. The problem of concealment of tenancy could perhaps be overcome to some extent through involvement of local self-governing institutions (the panchayats) along with the usual official machinery at the time of recording of tenants’ names.
5. The issue of ‘reverse tenancy’ assumes significance in the context of implementation of tenancy reforms measures in the future. As is well known, in many area of India, there have been a gradual tendency of cultivators from higher farm size categories leasing in huge areas from those belonging to lower categories in order reap greater benefits of new production technology. Clearly, protecting interests of these tenants implies serving the economically better off tenants in rural areas. In this context, it might be argued that the course of tenancy reforms could not be uniform across different regions of India. In states that still continue to remain agriculturally backward, perhaps a tenancy reform policy of West Bengal type would be the one of emulate. However, in those regions/states where incidence of ‘reverse tenancy’ appears to be high/increasing, only those tenants whose operated area does not exceed a given limit could be chosen for recording and extending other facilities (credit etc.). In the matter of implementation of differential schemes of tenancy reforms, we foresee no difficulty – constitutional or otherwise. Land reforms (including tenancy reforms) being the state subject, each state of India could devise its own course of action keeping in view the regional specificity. However, there should be a national consensus for implementing the programmes devised for protecting interests of poor tenants.