Saurashtra Khedut Sangh ('Saurashtra Farmers League') was a farmers' movement in Saurashtra, India. The organisation was founded under the leadership of Ratibhai Ukabhai, a modest social worker and an erstwhile Indian National Congress member. It had strong support amongst the Leua Patidar community.[1]

Initially the Khedut Sangh was intended to function as a general farmers' body within the Indian National Congress framework. But the organisation failed to obtain support from the Congress leadership and developed into a separate movement. The Socialist Party leader Jaswant Mehta was amongst the supporters of the Khedut Sangh. In its initial phase the group had a more leftist outlook. It accused the Congress Party of pro-urban and pro-Girasdar (landlord) bias, that the party neglected rural and tenants' interests. The Khedut Sangh opposed the mandatory food levy on the peasantry.[1] Once the Girasdari system of land tenancy was abolished, the Khedut Sangh moved to a more rightist outlook and the socialists deserted the organisation. The organisation entered into an electoral alliance with Samaldas Gandhi's Praja Paksha.[1] Nevertheless, the Saurashtra Khedut Sangh maintained more leftist postures than the Gujarat Khedut Sangh (which focused more on landowners' rights than the right of tillers to the land).[1]

In the run-up to the 1951 elections the Saurashtra Khedut Sangh was the main contender against the Congress Party in the state. It had some 42,000 paying members. But it lacked prominent leaders.[2] The organisation presented 37 candidates in the 1951 Saurashtra Legislative Assembly election. It total the candidates of the party obtained 139,449 votes (14.66% of the votes in the state). One candidate of the party was elected, Mohanlal D. Vaghia from the Liliya constituency. The organization was the second-most voted party contesting the election.[3] It fielded one candidate in the 1951 Lok Sabha election, Vinubhai Jagannath Bhatt in the Madhya Saurashtra seat. He obtained 29,766 votes (21.27% of the votes in the constituency).[4]

By mid-1966 the Saurashtra Khedut Sangh had merged into the Swatantra Party.[5]

References

  1. 1 2 3 4 Devavrat N. Pathak; Mathuradas Govindji Parekh; Kirtidev Dahyabhai Desai (1966). Three general elections in Gujarat: development of a decade, 1952-1962. Gujarat University. pp. 23–24.
  2. ↑ Richard Leonard Park (1956). Reports on the Indian general elections, 1951-52. Popular Book Depot. p. 237.
  3. ↑ Election Commission of India. STATISTICAL REPORT ON GENERAL ELECTION, 1951 TO THE LEGISLATIVE ASSEMBLY OF SAURASHTRA
  4. ↑ Election Commission of India. STATISTICAL REPORT ON GENERAL ELECTIONS, 1951 TO THE FIRST LOK SABHA - VOLUME I (NATIONAL AND STATE ABSTRACTS & DETAILED RESULTS)
  5. ↑ Political Science Review. Vol. 6–7 (4 ed.). Department of Political Science, University of Rajasthan. 1968. p. 175.
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