Farming in India

Bengali society was divided between the zamendars and a broad base consisting of some landless laborers. The company started jacking up taxes really hard in the 17 fifties, and by the mid 17 sixties, they were like doubling every couple of years. So now, when famine hit, everybody worked for the company. Nobody had anything extra. There were no more insurance policies. They'd all been taken in taxes and sold from that same chapter.