In recent years, the adoption of new technology in agriculture has led to important gains in production. However, the green revolution is still a phenomenon confined to a small part of Indian agriculture and it has yet to include within its sweep crops other than wheat. It has been noticed that despite its many beneficial and welcome features, the green revolution may have accentuated regional inequalities. Even in the same region, the largest benefits of new technology seem to have been reaped by large rather than small farmers. Fortunately, the new technology is basically neutral as to the size of the farm. Thus if small and marginal farmers can be provided with physical and financial resources as well as technical assistance, there is no reason why they should also not derive equitable benefit from the new technology. This is the principal objective of the Small Farmers Development Agencies which are now functioning in 46 districts and of the Marginal Farmers and Agricultural Labourers Programme now operating in 41 selected areas in the country. Simultaneously, through systematic research and development, we have to extend the benefit of the green revolution to more and more crops. This will not only increase agricultural output but will also contribute to a reduction in inequalities of income and wealth. Special attention will have to be paid to devise suitable techniques of dry farming in order to raise productivity of agriculture in those 128 districts of India which receive less than 125 mm of rainfall and have also no assured supply of irrigated water. High priority has also to be given to speedy implementation of land reforms, to reduce the gap between the poor and the rich in rural areas.
Institutional reforms are an essential element of growth process which subserves social justice. In capitalist societies, profits have been the biggest source of accumulation of capital as well as of inequalities in income and wealth. Profits cannot be abolished in any society which wants to grow. At the same time, if profits are not to accentuate inequalities in income and wealth, it is essential that they ought to be increasingly socialised. This is the basic justification for the expanding role of the public sector in our development strategy. The expansion of the public sector has made a major contribution in diversifying our industrial structure, and in strengthening our domestic capabilities.