This article seeks to analyse the current business model of FPOs to understand socio-economic consequences for individual members. The study selected 10 farmer producer organisations from Uttar Pradesh, India considering diversity along with geographical location, the field of operation and business model. In total, 10% of the villages covered by each chosen FPO and 5 members from each selected village were randomly selected for data collection. Two separate schedules for FPOs and members were administered for data collection. The study found that FPO members, particularly small and marginal farmers, experienced a positive socio-economic impact on their lives due to exposure to new techniques and enhanced bargaining power due to collectivisation. However, lack of capital due to constraints in accessing finance from banks was found to be a major challenge. The article concludes by underlining what needs to be done to make FPOs sustainable.

Through a revisit study in 2013, this article attempts to explore agrarian relations in Senapur, a village located in eastern Uttar Pradesh. Research reveals that landlessness remains concentrated amongst dalits as does the continuing hold of ‘upper castes’ on land. When inheritance acts as the primary mode of transfer of landed property in the absence of market-mediated and state-mediated transactions, two results are evident: a decrease in the size of holdings due to the subdivision of property and simultaneously the land remains with the original group of land owners resulting in continuing group inequalities. Given this skewed landownership pattern, one-fifth of the total input cost in cultivation by the landless class is usurped by the landed class in the form of land rent. Another interesting feature of agrarian relations that is observed is the occasional rise in cash agricultural wages which accompany falling incomes from agricultural labour wages. The study also reveals that the ‘eradication of the small farmers’ is not a perceptible phenomenon in Senapur with farming families augmenting their income from other sources to keep their small farms going. The biggest change appears in the composition of the labour force marked by a massive movement from agriculture to construction in the last one decade.

Land reform studies have often found wanting for not paying adequate attention to the close correspondence between land relations, gender and caste; all of them reinforcing each other and State polices extending legitimacy to this complex web of relationships. These complexities betray theorisation on State intervention in property relations that consider land only as an economic asset, overlooking its sociopolitical significance. The article argues that land reforms in India have been designed to protect landed property. The article further argues that the impact on the bottom rungs could be the crucial criteria for the assessment of any land reforms programme in a third-world country. In Indian conditions, Dalits and women constitute these segments.

Assembly elections in Uttar Pradesh are coming closer as India's largest state has to vote before May 2007. Before elections different political parties have to come out with their election manifestoes and it is high time for researchers to present the true picture of development in the state so that development issues find a place on the agenda of the coming assembly elections. Voting on development issues may influence priorities of the coming government. There have been numerous studies regarding development issues in India and many of them cover UP as well. These studies focus on one or the other aspects of the development and fail to cover different dimensions of development. In this situation this paper attempts to present an overall picture of development in the state on the basis of secondary data provided by Census of India, National Sample Survey Organisation, National Family Health Survey and different reports, papers and books published on the subject. To present the true state of development this paper covers different aspects of development including poverty, land possession, employment, per capita consumer expenditure, education, health, structure of dwelling, access to drinking water and electricity. It also tries to capture differentiation that exists at regional, rural-urban, caste, class and gender levels. After the Introduction, the main body of the paper discusses various development indicators and ends with a few observations of different scholars. This paper notes that despite some development in a few dimensions, UP lags far behind other Indian states. It still houses a large poor population and disparities among different groups are substantially high. This situation is related to the dominant caste-class structure.

From Dalit standpoint land reform is not just transfer of an economic asset in their favour but it also involves upsetting of the existing socio-political structure. Land reform through market skips this crucial element. This article argues that in a state like Uttar Pradesh where land ownership pattern still follows caste hierarchy reflecting the dominance of upper caste and a few sections of OBCs on agrarian structure and where scope of distribution of ceiling surplus land still remains wide, land reforms through market would perhaps prove counter-productive. This article submits for further discussion that with increasing productivity of arable land, land ceiling should be lowered down especially in irrigated areas.