Legally stipulated maximum size beyond which no individual farmer can hold any land is

Question

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Correct — C, Land ceiling. The stem is the textbook definition of a ceiling, word for word: a statutory upper limit on the area of agricultural land a person or a family may hold, with anything above the limit declared surplus, vested in the State and redistributed to the landless and to marginal cultivators. It is the third of the four planks of India's post-Independence land reform, and it is the only one of the four that fixes a *quantity*. That is the whole discrimination in this question — the other three options each describe a change in the *relationship* between people and land, not a cap on how much of it one household may own. Because land is a State subject under Entry 18 of the State List, there is no single national ceiling: every State passed its own Ceiling Act, mostly in the 1960s and 1970s, and each set its own limits, graded by the quality of the land, so an irrigated double-cropped holding faces a much lower ceiling than dry unirrigated land. The ceiling laws were also the most litigated part of land reform. Parliament had already had to insert Articles 31A and 31B by the Constitution (First Amendment) Act, 1951, precisely because agrarian reform measures passed by State legislatures were being held up by 'dilatory litigation'; the same amendment retrospectively validated thirteen zamindari abolition enactments. Ceilings then met the same resistance a decade later, and in Bihar the surplus land actually redistributed fell far short of what the Acts promised.

Why the other options are wrong — (a) The first plank of land reform and the one that came earliest — it removed the zamindars, jagirdars and other rent-collecting intermediaries who stood between the State and the tiller, bringing the cultivator into direct contact with the government. It changes who the peasant pays, not how much land anybody may keep. Bihar's own zamindari abolition legislation belongs here, and it is the measure the First Amendment of 1951 was written to protect.  (b) The second plank: regulating the rent a tenant pays, giving security of tenure so a tenant cannot be evicted at will, and in several States conferring ownership on the tenant of the land he cultivates. It governs the terms on which land is leased and worked. A tenant made secure under these laws may still be farming a very small plot, and a landowner is not capped by them at all.  (d) The fourth plank, chakbandi — merging a farmer's scattered fragments into one compact block so that irrigation, mechanisation and boundary maintenance become economical. It changes the shape and location of a holding while leaving its total area exactly as it was, which is the precise opposite of what a ceiling does.

Concept: India's land reform programme after 1947 had four distinct components, and questions of this type test whether you can keep them apart. First, abolition of intermediaries — removing zamindars and jagirdars so the cultivator dealt directly with the State. Second, tenancy reform — fixing fair rent, granting security of tenure and, in places, conferring ownership on the tenant. Third, ceiling on holdings — a statutory maximum with the surplus acquired for redistribution. Fourth, consolidation of holdings — reassembling fragmented plots into compact blocks. The first two were reasonably successful in law if not always in fact; the third was the least successful anywhere in India, because ceilings were fixed high, exemptions were numerous, and landholders reorganised titles among relatives, trusts and benami holders faster than the revenue machinery could measure them. The voluntary alternative ran alongside the statutory one: Vinoba Bhave began the Bhoodan movement at Pochampally on 18 April 1951, when a landlord gave 100 acres for the landless, and Bihar became one of its largest theatres.

State PCS 2025 Q56 — Economy PYQ with Answer

State PCS 2025 Q56 — Economy PYQ with Answer