(i) Waste Land Rules: From mid- nineteenth century, Waste Land Rules were enacted in various parts of the country. By these Rules uncultivated lands were taken over and given to selected individuals. The colonial state wanted to transform all grazing lands into cultivated farms. Land revenue was one of the main sources of the colonial government. By expanding cultivation it could increase its revenue collection. It could at the same time produce more jute, cotton, wheat and other agricultural produce that were required in England. Colonial officials considered uncultivated land as unproductive, as it produced neither revenue nor agricultural produce.

(ii) Forest Act: Forest Acts were also enacted in different provinces during the mid-nineteenth century. Through these Acts, some forests which produced commercially valuable timber like ‘deodar’ or ‘sal’ were declared reserved. No pastoralist was allowed access to these forests. This act changed the lives of the pastoralists. The colonial officials believed that grazing destroyed the saplings and young shoots of trees that germinated on the forest floor.

(iii) Criminal Tribes Act: The British officials were suspicious of nomadic people. They distrusted mobile craftsmen and traders who hawked their goods in villages, and pastoralists who change their places of residence every season, moving in search of good pastures for their herds. The colonial government wanted to rule over a settled population. They wanted the rural people to live in villages, in fixed places with fixed rights on particular fields. Such a population was easy to identify and control. Those who were settled were, seen as peaceable and law abiding; those nomadic were considered to be criminal. In 1871, the colonial government in India passed the Criminal Tribes Act.

(iv) Grazing Tax: To expand its revenue income the colonial government looked for every possible source of taxation. So, tax was imposed on land, on canal water, on salt, on trade goods and even on animals. Pastoralists had to pay tax on every animal they grazed on the pastures. In most pastoral tracts of India, grazing tax was introduced in the mid-nineteenth century. The tax per head of cattle went up rapidly and the system of collection was made increasingly efficient. In the decades between the 1850s and 1880s, the right to collect the tax was auctioned out to contractors. These contractors tried to extract as high a tax as they could to recover the money they had paid to the state and earn as much profit as they could within the year. By the 1880s the government began collecting taxes directly from the pastoralists. Each of them was given a pass. To enter a grazing tract, a cattle herder had to show the pass and pay the tax. The number of cattle heads he had and the amount of the tax he paid was entered on the pass.