How Jayaprakash Narayan's Sarvodaya Plan laid roots for economic planning in India

As we remember Jayaprakash Narayan on his birth anniversary (11 October 1902), the Sarvodaya Plan that Narayan —popularly called ‘Lok Nayak’ — drafted in 1950 is not far behind in memory. As we celebrate this freedom fighter, socialist and political leader’s life let us also take a glance at the Sarvodaya Plan and how it aimed at changing people’s lives. Who is Jayaprakash Narayan? Jayaprakash Narayan also known as Jai Prakash or just JP to people close to him, JP Narayan or Lok Nayak was born on 11 October 11, 1902 in the village of Sitabdiara in the Saran district of Bihar. In 1929, after he had finished his studies and returned to India, he received an invitation from Pandit Jawaharlal Nehru to join the Indian National Congress. During his association with the Indian National Congress, Mahatma Gandhi became his mentor and guide. He was jailed and tortured many times by the British for his active involvement in the freedom struggle. In 1932, he became friends with other political leaders such as Ram Manohar Lohia in jail. After his release, the Congress Socialist Party was set up and JP was appointed as the general secretary. After India gained her independence and the death of Mahatma Gandhi, Narayan, along with others directed the Congress Socialist Party out of the Congress to create a strong opposition and it went on to become the Praja Socialist Party. Sarvodaya Plan In 1954, Narayan left electoral politics, to focus on the Sarvodaya movement based on the Gandhian principle and and the  Bhoodan Yajna Movement , founded by Vinoba Bhave, which demanded that land be distributed among the landless. The plan emphasised small and cotton industries alongside agriculture and suggested freedom from foreign technology. It also stressed upon land reforms. As per historical records, he gave up his house and other personal pleasures and set up an ashram in the village of Hazaribagh and gave a new life to the Gandhian concepts by combining them with the technology of the time. Based on Gandhian techniques of constructive work by the community and trusteeship as well as the Sarvodaya concept of Acharya Vinoba Bhave, the plan also included foresight on self-dependent villages and decentralised participatory form of planning and economic progress. Some of the acceptable ideas of the plan got their due importance when the Government of India, helmed by Jawaharlal Nehru, promoted the five-year plans. Narayan believed that the high ideals of socialism could only be established in India if political consciousness was cultivated among workers, peasants and poor middle-classes to end foreign slavery. He believed that socialism could only be established when class-consciousness emerged among the weaker sections, farmers, Dalits and the poor. But what is Sarvodaya? In layman’s terms, Sarvodaya means ‘welfare for all’. Mahatma Gandhi coined the term ‘Sarvodaya’ from John Ruskin’s book ‘Unto the Last’. The essence of this book is - “Everyone has their own good.” As one website has succinctly put it: “The outcome of violent struggle based on the conflict of selfish aims can achieve collectivisation or distribution of land and wealth, but the selfish ends would still remain as a selfish struggle cannot give rise to unselfishness which is the essence of “Sarvodaya”. Narayan said , “Sarvodaya Yojana is a suggestion of social revolution rather than any sentimental plan. Simultaneously, the ideal of class-less and caste-less socialism is also included in the notion of Sarvodaya.” Narayan wrote on Sarvodaya, “If we feel conflicted in the interests, then the reason is our assumptions and wrong conduct. If we create faith in the unity of human interests, then we will be able to reach closer to the reality of Sarvodaya. There is a belief in Sarvodaya that the human soul is pure and we should give more importance to the ideals of freedom, justice and brotherhood. Sarvodaya is a life-long revolution. Sarvodaya’s ultimate goal is to bring radical changes in all aspects of personal and social life.” Why did the Sarvodaya Movement come into effect? India, immediately post-Independence, was overwhelmingly agrarian. The countryside reeled in deep poverty and polarisation reigned high in some regions. Government plans for land reform lagged behind expectations. In present-day Telangana, civil war broke out in 1950-1951, in which communists carried out armed seizures of land. Conflicts between Hindu and Muslim farmers fuelled the situation. It has been estimated that 3,000 villages and one million acres of land were ‘Sovietised’. It was during a journey on foot through Telangana in 1951 that Bhave stumbled upon the idea of Bhoodan and convinced a landlord to adopt him as a son. As a  result, he was granted land on behalf of a group of landless peasants. From that moment, Bhoodan became a central tenet of the Sarvodaya movement . Between 1951 and 1960, Bhave travelled 25,000 miles on foot, persuading 700,000 landowners to give up eight million acres. Bhoodan was enforced from 1952 onward by the concept of Gramdan, which entailed granting land to whole villages to be worked collectively, to allay the criticism of socialists. Other notable post-independence contributions Narayan’s life has been a dedication to the cause of democracy. He is well-known for his criticism of power-hungry measures of politicians. As a check on arbitrary action of the then Indira Gandhi-led government, Narayan organised the Student movement of 1974 which ultimately led him to be jailed and the declaration of Emergency in 1975. This, however, paved the way for Indira Gandhi’s unseating in 1976. Jai Prakash Narayan’s final stage of development of political ideology is the concept of his complete or Total Revolution to establish a society that is free from exploitation and oppression. His Total Revolution - social, political, cultural, theoretical, ideological, educational and spiritual - is a mixture of seven revolutions. This concept is an extension of his ideas of Sarvodaya Socialism, Democratic Socialism and Dalit-less democracy. He believed that the entire revolution would emphasise the moral and cultural values of the people and would prove to be helpful in establishing true socialism. With inputs from agencies