One of the most dramatic changes in developing countries during the last twenty years has been the steady growth of food grain production. Some have celebrated this "green revolution" as the best hope for development in the Third World. Others have criticized it as aggravating inequalities and neglecting needed industrialization. This study examines the consequences of this agricultural growth on several dimensions of social stratification: landlessness, women's labor force participation, changes for minorities, literacy, urbanization, and growth of the service sector. The proposed research involves the study of changes across 300 districts within India, using panel data collected at three points in time -- 1961, 1971, and 1981. India provides an especially favorable research environment because agricultural growth has varied greatly across regions withing India, and because India's sophisticated statistical system has produced some of the best data available anywhere.
