Peasant Conference at Nagulapalli

During the second world war, the British government forcefully collected massive levies and food grains from Indian peasantry as war funds which pushed them down to extreme poverty. Hence, a peasant conference was conducted at Nagulapalli in the Anakapalli district of Andhra Pradesh to address the problems faced by the peasants of the region. The conference was attended by leaders such as Malla Narsimhamurthi and Penkota Sriramulu. Certain critical demands were made in the meeting to resolve the peasants' grievances. One of the most important among them was to stop the collection of tax in the form of food grains from poor peasants. The meeting also made demands to repair the canals of the Sarada basin, which were not properly maintained by the government and were causing serious problems to agriculture. But since the Defence of India Act prohibited any activities of organization in India during the second world war, police reached the spot to violently disperse the meeting. They were welcomed by the singing of songs praising peasant movements by the conference workers. The infuriated police tied up their hands and arrested activists such as Ramalingayya, Y. Vijayakumar and K. Govindrao. The meeting and the incident that followed proved to be pivotal for the peasants of the region as it inspired them to engage in further agitations and programs to resolve their problems.