Studies show that strong administrative institutions, backed by democratic and property-oriented
regimes, and secure systems of property rights have been found to have a positive association
with the rate of economic growth. Furthermore, studies suggest that countries with
advanced property rights regimes are also more likely to have an equitable and even distribution
of land ownership as a result of institutional arrangements that foster private property,
which in turn fosters economic growth. On the other hand, the concentration of land ownership
as a result of weak property rights regimes and the prevalence of administrative structure
grounded in ideas such as feudalism have proven to be non-conducive to economic development.
Research shows that countries which are former colonies might have inefficient institutions,
which results in unequal distribution of land ownership, extractive feudalism and
landlordism, which ultimately curtails the socioeconomic emancipation of the masses. Thus,
to further explore this idea and to contribute to the global body of literature on the evolution
of land administration in post-colonial states, this research note attempts to descriptively explicate
and underline various historical changes in the land administrative and revenue system
in the province of Sindh, Pakistan. It reviews the historical evolution of land administrations
from ancient Sindh to the present, along with analysing the contemporary implications of such
changes in the system. The findings indicate that while the unequal dynamics of landownership
in Sindh are centuries old, the British policies during the 18th and 19th centuries legitimised
and legalised the concentration of land ownership through the establishment of a highly extractive
system of land administration. Such policies obliterated the centuries-old customs of
the region, which protected the landless peasants and the agrarian classes from perpetual socioeconomic
subjugation.
