Circular
Telegram
Simbirsk, Astrakhan, Tsaritsyn, Saratov, Samara, Ufa, Uralsk, Vyatka
To the Provincial Sowing Committees: Marksstadt, Cheboksary,
Krasnokokshaysk, Astrakhan, Izhevsk
To the Regional Sowing Committees: Kazan, Orenburg, Sterlitamak
To the People's Commissariat of Agriculture

For the past month you have ceased providing any information whatsoever on the progress of the sowing campaign, on the struggle against famine. The People's Commissariat of Agriculture, presently occupied chiefly with work to liquidate the consequences of the crop failure, needs regular and as complete as possible information about your activities and the actual state of agriculture in your province far more than in previous months. Therefore, categorically reaffirming the directives previously issued concerning information deadlines, I propose to place the information apparatus on the proper footing and, as a matter of urgent order, within forty-eight hours from receipt of this telegram, transmit by telegraph the following information: 1) the approved area of winter grain; 2) the quantity of winter grain actually sown; 3) the quantity of desyatinas prepared for winter fallow; 4) the quantity of seeds received through requisitions from the center and through barter exchange; 5) the quantity of seeds actually distributed; 6) the method of distribution; 7) what measures have been taken to save livestock farming and the results achieved; 8) the measures taken to save dead inventory and the results achieved; 9) the public works planned and their implementation; 10) the situation with resettlement; 11) the condition of the village committees and their participation in the general work. Following the telegram, send a courier with a full report. In provinces that fail to provide replies within the deadline, responsible leaders will be subjected to disciplinary penalties.

On items six through eleven, send by telegraph the briefest possible answer or an exact date for sending a written reply 283.

Chairman of the Council of Defense Lenin*

Written October 4, 1921

First published in 1933 in Lenin Collection XXIII

Printed from the typewritten text, supplemented and signed by V. I. Lenin