Was Green Revolution a True Agricultural Revolution?

Green revolution was not an agricultural revolution in true sense. The new strategy brought a revolution in production of a few crops only. Initially it was limited to wheat, maize and bajra only. India’s largest crop rice responded to green revolution much later. However, progress in major commercial crops viz. Oilseeds, cotton and jute remained much slow. The pulses accounting for 10% of the total food grains production did not register any increase in the production. Thus, it cannot be called an agricultural revolution because the upward trend in production was confined to a few crops and it was not pervasive in all major crops. Further, its spatial distribution was also uneven. It happened mainly in Punjab, Haryana, Western Uttar Pradesh and some districts of Andhra Pradesh, Maharashtra and Tamil Nadu. It spread to some other parts of the country too little and too late. This implies that the already better off areas were able to make their economic position still better. In many ways, the green revolution initiated a process of unbalanced growth in the country. Today, eastern part of the country is still to catch up with those which marched ahead. Unless these states enter the take-off stage; it will be really unjust to call green revolution an agricultural revolution.