Page 232 - Histories of City and State in the Persian Gulf_Neat

212 Histories of City and State in the Persian Gulf

property rights obstructed a comprehensive legal settlement of disputes. A

useful parallel can be drawn with Transjordan, where a modern land

department was established by the British mandatory administration in

1927. Here, the British authorities were able to solve disputes over tribal

land after they completed a land survey in the mid 1930s. In the villages of

Bahrain, land settlement was still a top priority in 1957 before the

Department of Rural Affairs set out to enforce health provisions and to

establish modern educational facilities. Soon after independence, approx-

imately 99 per cent of cases brought before the Bahraini courts dealt with
disputes over real estate. 42 Moreover, the Department of Rural Affairs
acquired complete jurisdiction over those areas which were not under
municipal administration, that is major urban centres, only in 1967, four
years before independence. 43
The protection of the rights of Shi‘i agriculturalists played a consider-
able part in British thinking about reform before World War I. By the
1890s the land regime in force in Bahrain’s agricultural estates was placing
an increasing burden on the peasantry, as suggested by their frequent
complaints to the British agency in Manama. The condition of servitude
of the cultivators was worsened by the demographic growth which affected
the ruling family and by the increasing number of matrimonial alliances
with other tribes which had enlarged the rank and file of the inner circle of
Shaykh ‘Isa. As more individuals entered the entourage of the ruler, they
demanded their own share in the Al Khalifah family estate. 44 Yet political
considerations prevented the new Land Department from undertaking
registration outside Manama until Belgrave arrived in Bahrain in 1926.
Major Daly, the first political agent in charge of land matters, often
refused to recognise title deeds, and became renowned for his inclination
to tear up certificates in front of applicants, including members of the
ruling family. At the same time he showed little or no sympathy for the
plight of the cultivators. The Political Resident A. P. Trevor summarised
in 1923 the considerations which underscored this course of policy: ‘We
should not involve ourselves in this matter [land registration, survey and
revenue in the villages] because most of the land belongs to the al-Khalifa
42
For land policies in Transjordan see M. R. Fischbach, State, Society and Land in Jordan
(Leiden: Brill, 2000). ‘Annual Report for the Year 1958’ in The Bahrain Government
Annual Reports, 1924–1970, vol. VI, p. 113; interview with Majid Asghrar, Manama, 20
April 2000.

43
‘The Bahrain Government Rural Affairs Department (Powers and Duties) Ordinance
1967’, annex to ‘The Bahrain Government Rural Affairs Department (Powers and
Duties) (Amendment) Regulation 1968’, 8 August 1968, FCO 8/123 PRO.
44
See file R/15/1/336 IOR for peasants’ complaints; Political Agent Bahrain to Political
Resident Bushehr, 31 December 1904, n. 204, R/15/2/10 IOR.