Several profound transformations in the nature of social relations in rural areas took place in the post-Independence period, especially in those regions that underwent the Green Revolution. These included:
(i)  an increase in the use of agricultural labour as cultivation became more intensive;
(ii)  a shift from payment in kind (grain) to payment in cash;
(iii) a loosening of traditional bonds or hereditary relationships between farmers or landowners and agricultural workers (known as bonded labour);
(iv) and the rise of a class of ‘free’ wage laborers’.
Along with these changes in the class structure, the spread of higher education, especially private professional colleges, in rural and semi-urban areas, allowed the new rural elites to educate their children – many of whom then joined professional or white collar occupations or started businesses, feeding into the expansion of the urban middle classes.