The Dissemination of Modern Agricultural Knowledge in the Colonial Period: A Review of the Marathi Monthly Shetki aani Shetkari

In the early twentieth century, British colonial policy on agriculture began to focus on the dissemination of modern scientific knowledge and practices through extension services, including experimental farms and exhibitions. Colonial administrators soon realised that these alone were not sufficient to bring about agricultural improvement. The Government then strengthened another arm of agricultural extension, namely, science propagation through leaflets in English and local languages, bulletins, journals, and calendars published by the Department of Agriculture. Alongside, agricultural associations, linked directly or indirectly to provincial Agricultural Departments, were encouraged to undertake agricultural extension in some Provinces. The Deccan Agricultural Association in Bombay Presidency was one such forum, and it played an important role in propagating the idea of agricultural improvement and disseminating information about scientific agriculture. Shetki aani Shetkari, the Marathi periodical published by the Association, was its most consistent means of the propagation of scientific information. The journal disseminated knowledge on modern methods and techniques of agriculture, and articulated, over the forty-one years of its life, the meaning and scope of agricultural modernisation. It is this two-pronged approach, namely, dissemination through the written word, along with other methods of agricultural extension, that this paper explores. The periodical did not deal with agrarian relations and the need to change them in order to fulfil the goal of agricultural modernisation. Equally stark was the absence of any mention of the relationship between caste and agricultural production, particularly at a time when a strong social reform movement under Jyotirao Phule and other leaders of the Satyashodhak Samaj was under way. Shetki aani Shetkari provided a window to the official understanding of agricultural modernisation and reflected the efforts taken to propagate that understanding among the landowning classes.