On May 16, 1951, exactly 71 years ago, Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru expressed wonderment in the Lok Sabha about Vinoba Bhave’s courageous start of the Bhoodan movement in the politically volatile Pochampally village in the Nalgonda district of Andhra Pradesh. PM Nehru said the physically-weak and unarmed Vinoba had succeeded in the equitable distribution of land in a politically-sensitive region, where strong army contingents have found it difficult to initiate law and order.

PM Nehru was not the only fan of Vinoba’s non-violent land reform; the entire nation was astounded by his sheer faith in the idea of danam samvibhaga (equal sharing), which he applied not just in terms of land distribution, but also with regard to intellect, time and physical labour.  No wonder, Vinoba’s walking tour (1951-1972) across the length and breadth of India yielded fantastic cooperation from landlords, peasants, landless labourers, politicians across parties, law enforcement agencies and the news media of a newly-independent India.  Never earlier and nowhere else in recorded history have people donated land—47 lakh acres/4.7 million acres—without coercion or force. The distribution of 2.5 million acres to the landless is a feat in itself.