and its Impact · Part 2

and writers suffered imprisonment and exile for expressing opinions. The Tsars were universally hated and everyone looked forward to their downfall. Conditions of Peasantry Russia was basically a peasant society. Nearly one-half of the population were serfs tied to the land. Russian peasants were forced to labour on their lords’ lands for a few days every week without any payment, and were not allowed to marry without the consent of the lords. Serfs were punished severely even for minor faults.During the reign of Nicholas I, there were more than five hundred serf riots in various parts of Russia, but they were all crushed ruthlessly. Alexander II issued an edict of emancipation in and freed the serfs. But they were not provided with land to eke out their livelihood. So the peasants became the combustible material for the revolution. Industrial backwardness and abominable living condition of working class Russia began to industrialise late. Russia lagged behind all great European powers. Russian workers laboured under oppressive conditions. Trade unions and strikes were completely banned. The Russian working class was looking for an opportunity to protest. Role of Nihilists The young, radical and non-gentry intellectuals who waged a merciless war against the Russian state were called Nihilists by their enemies. The first unsuccessful attempt on the life of Tsar Alexander II and innumerable trials that followed dubbing the suspected intellectuals as nihilists and sending them, both men and women, to Siberia did not stop their revolutionary activities in Russia. Revolutionary forces swelled, as many minority groups such as the Jews and Poles joined them. Nihilism represented a revolt against the established social order. It rejected all authority exercised by the state, by the church and by the family. It based its belief on nothing but scientific truth. Marxism and Its Influence Marx and Engels held the firm view that the existence of the bourgeoisie was as necessary a condition for the Socialist revolution as the proletariat. They never envisaged the possibility of a successful Socialist revolution in backward Russia. However, Marxist ideas, apart from other radical ideas such as anarchism and various