In May and June, 1875 peasants of Maharastra in some parts of Pune, Satara and Nagar districts revolted against increasing agrarian distress. The Deccan Riots of 1875 targeted conditions of debt peonage (kamiuti) to moneylenders. The sole purpose of the rioters was to obtain and destroy the bonds, decrees, and other documents in the possession of the moneylenders. The Deccan peasants mainly directed their revolt to the excesses of the Marwari and the Gujarat moneylenders.
The Deccan riot was the upshot of a number of adverse circumstances. The excessive government land revenue, slump in the international cotton prices at the end of the American Civil War etc made the economic condition of the Deccan peasants extremely miserable. They were immersed in enormous debts. The greedy Marwari and the Gujarat moneylenders adept in the art of manipulation drew unjust tax and money from the peasants. The peasants being illiterate unknowingly signed the bond without having a proper knowledge of what is there in the bond. The civil courts invariably gave verdicts in favor of the exorbitant moneylenders.
The trouble of the Deccan Riot was first originated in the village Kardeh in Sirur Taluk in December 1874. When a Marwari moneylender Kalooram obtained a decree of eviction against Baba Saheb Deshmukh, a cultivator in debt to him for Rs.150. The oppressive attitude of the moneylender in pulling down his house provoked the rage of the villagers. The entire Poona district was burning by June 1875. The peasants attacked the moneylender`s house, shops and burnt them down. The chief target were the bond of documents deeds and the decrees that the moneylenders held against them. The peasant uprising spread to most of the Taluks of the Ahmednagar district. The Government of India put the Police assisted by the military into action in order to put an end to the revolt. By June 1875 nearly a thousand peasants were arrested and the uprising was completely suppressed. The Deccan riot was a fragmented revolution. Finally the Government of India appointed the Deccan Riots Commission to investigate into the causes of the uprising. The Agriculturists Relief Act of 1879 passed several measures for the betterment of the Deccan peasants. The Act put restrictions on the alienation of the peasants land and imposed some restrictions on the Civil Procedure Code. As a result the Peasant could not be arrested and sent to the civil debtors jail owing to the failure of paying debts.
The Deccan riots had received a great deal of attention. The Deccan riots revealed the oppressive nature of the British Government also induced a change in the rural society; through this uprising peasants became united to raise a cohesive protest against the moneylenders and the British Government of India.
