Page:Twelve men of Bengal in the nineteenth century (1910).djvu/265

Rh argument as we have heard from your honourable friend, Maharaja Jotintra Mohan Tagore. I have shown that conviction in the most practical way by succumbing to his arguments in committee and voting with him on his proposal to alter Bill No. IV."

Again as the largest landowner in Bengal, he was especially interested in the long discussions that finally led to the passing of the Bengal Tenancy Act in 1885. It had long been obvious that the law regulating the relations between landlord and tenant called for thorough revision and amendment. These relations had been gradually growing more and more strained, both parties complaining of injustice and hardships. The zemindars complained of the failure of the tenants to pay their rents and of the difficulties they experienced in enforcing payment, while the ryots on their part complained of oppression, the exaction of illegal cesses and illegal ejectment from occupancy rights. There can be no doubt that there was a considerable amount of truth on both sides but constant friction had so embittered relations between them that matters were fast coming to a deadlock. This was particularly the case in Behar and in the Indigo districts. In 1893 serious agricultural disturbances occurred at Pabna, while the Behar famine of the following year reduced the ryots to a hopeless condition of poverty. The Famine Commission urged the necessity of the immediate introduction of measures to fix definitely