Gendering The Opium Economy: Women’s Labour and Agrarian Extraction in Colonial Bihar 1770-1910

Abhijeet Baliyan

Gendering The Opium Economy: Women’s Labour and Agrarian Extraction in Colonial Bihar 1770-1910

Author(s)	Mr. Abhijeet Baliyan
Country	India
Abstract	The paper explores the hitherto unacknowledged contribution of women in the opium plantations of colonial Bihar. It aims to highlight the contribution of women in terms of their labour and experiences in the context of colonial agrarian policies and the opium trade and thus counter the dominant narratives of colonial labour history, which are male dominated. The study uses a historical and gender-informed approach, contextualizing women’s labour in the political economy of colonialism. It integrates a study of colonial economy with a deep dive into domestic and plantation society in Bihar from the late eighteenth to the early twentieth century. The research uses qualitative analysis of archival documents, revenue reports, settlement documents, administrative correspondence, missionary accounts, and other contemporary sources. It also uses feminist historiography and subaltern studies to be read existing data in a gendered way. And adopts an intersectional approach to understand the role of gender, caste, class, and rural hierarchies in women’s involvement in opium cultivation. The study shows that women were crucial but undervalued in the production of opium, from sowing to lancing and processing to subsistence work. The colonial records made their contribution invisible despite their importance in the production of opium. The study contends that women’s agency and subsistence work change our understanding of colonial agrarian economies in Bihar.
Keywords	Colonial Bihar; Women’s Labour; Opium Economy; Agrarian Political Economy; Gender History; Subaltern Studies.
Field	Sociology > Archaeology / History
Published In	Volume 8, Issue 2, March-April 2026
Published On	2026-04-23

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Gendering The Opium Economy: Women’s Labour and Agrarian Extraction in Colonial Bihar 1770-1910

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