Written in opposition to the adoption of joint farming as India’s agricultural policy at the Indian National Congress’ Nagpur Resolution of January 1959, which was a culmination of high-pitched propaganda led byjawaharlal Nehru in favour of collective/cooperative farming, Joint Farming X-rayed presents Charan Singh’s substantive intellectual break with the political party he had served for 35 years.

Published in September 1959, this is a devastating critique of joint farming as a means of increasing agricultural productivity. Singh finds it unsuitable for the Indian countryside based on varied geography, limited land and capital, a complex social structure, a vast population and commitment to democratic principles. He also brings to bear an extraordinary amount of evidence from multiple continents and numerous disciplines to present a picture of the havoc collectivisation unleashes on farm productivity, in which he presciently anticipates the failure of collective farms across the Communist world.

His alternate vision identifies land as the limiting factor in capital production, and posits agriculture, not industry, as the priority for sustainable capital formation. The book locates independent small owner-cultivators, decentralised village industries, intensive farming and population control as the solutions for India. Singh puts forth a cogent plan for a new India constructed from the bottom-up, in opposition to the Nehruvian top-down plan aping alien models unsuited to her genius and limitations, made by men who Singh considered were themselves alienated from the ground realities of the country.