What was the Limitation Law of 1859? State its impacts on the ryots.

The Limitation Law was passed by the British to check the accumulation of interests of time and the exploitation of ryots by the moneylenders. According to the Limitation Law, the validity of the loan bonds signed between ryots and money lenders would be only three years. Following were the impact of Limitation law on ryots:

• It made the life of peasants miserable. The moneylenders turned the bond upside down and tricked ryots by forcing them to sign a new bond after every three years, wherein the unpaid balance was entered as the principal amount. Thus, the unpaid balance piled up and the debt mounted over time.

• The ryots were illiterate and weak. They were not strong enough to resist this system of bonds. Moneylenders entered fictitious figures in bonds, acquired the peasants’ harvest at low prices, and ultimately took over peasants’ property. Thus, the new system turned out to be oppressive.

• Since moneylenders refused to give loans without legal bonds, the peasants were trapped in a vicious circle from which it was impossible to get out. They feared every written word in the document and thus, their life was nade disastrous.