History of India Page 1 of 14 HISTORY Subject : History (For under graduate student.) Paper No. : Paper - III History of India Unit : Unit 2 Polity Topic No. & Title : Topic - 2 Mughal Nobility Lecture No. & Title : Lecture - 1 Zamindari System: 1 Introduction Zamin in Persian means land and Dar refers to the one who holds it. So Zamindar means landholder. Can it then means that he holds the land? On the understanding and interpretation of these two concepts, hung the entire polity of the Mughal Empire. Who is the owner of the land? Let us examine the history of the Zamindari System.
History of India Page 2 of 14 Zamindari System flourished in the Mughal Empire although it has developed through centuries of various experiments. It has been stated that there is no Pargana in the Mughal Empire where there is no Zamindar. But there were certain villages ruled by the Panchayats where there is no zamindar although there is an official or head-man of the village or mukaddam. The differences between the Zamindars, not only between the different types of zamindars but also within the Zamindari System could be seen very clearly in the Mughal Empire due to the evolution of this system. Malikana Who is the Owner of the Land? The debate that came up in 1793 when the English tried to introduce the permanent settlement was actually started by mid 17 th century French traveler Francois Bernier. Bernier stated that the king is the owner of all land. This statement has been accepted by most of the travelers who came after Bernier. In the period before 1793, there was considerable dispute between the
History of India Page 3 of 14 English officials and the Indian officials. Philip Francis held the view that Zamindar is the malik / owner of the land. Warren Hastings and Richard Burwell agreed with this statement. But most of the Indian officials did not. Kshitab Rai who was the Nayeb-Diwan of Bihar stated that Zamindar is the malik of the land but king is the owner of the revenue. Another contemporary Indian official Ram Ram Chaudhury, who was a Qanungo said that the zamindar and the king were joint owners of the land. Raja Raj Ballabh, who played a leading role at one point of time and was ruling Bihar on behalf of the nawabs said that the king is the owner of all land. In the late 18 th century Reza Khan who was the Nayeb of the English in Bengal stated that the king is not the owner of all lands. Therefore there are various types of opinions prevalent among the contemporary Indian officials on the Malikana or the proprietary right of the Zamindar. W.H. Moorland, the English historian was also a land revenue official of the English company. He stated that there were semi-independent Zamindars during the Mughal Period and they were very powerful. In the recent days
History of India Page 4 of 14 Parmatma Saran, a noted Indian historian who had written Provincial Government of the Mughals said that Zamindars are not found in all parts of the Mughal Empire. Also they were not much powerful. Saran has a problem; the problem was that he had used a faulty translation of Abul Fazl s Ain-i-Akbari by Blockman and therefore came to this false conclusion. Features of the Zamindars Who needs whom? There were two contradictory features of the Zamindars under the Mughals: i) The zamindar wants the protection of the king but he does not want to obey his dictat. ii) The king wants the revenue raised by the zamindar but he does not want to give freedom to the zamindar.
History of India Page 5 of 14 Throughout the Mughal Period these two tendencies continue to work. Therefore in the Zamindari System there was co-operation and conflict. Regarding the malikana of the zamindar there is a considerable dispute. The Indian officials were not very sure about this. The English for their own justification of permanent settlement (introduced in Bengal) considered the Zamindars as the owner of the land. After making such formulation the English changed the land revenue system. The Mughal system was that they would take the revenue from a portion harvest, while the English company after 1793 began to take land revue from the land irrespective of the harvest. So from the English point of view the term land-revenue is perfectly all right. But from the Mughal point of view the term land revenue is not correct because the revenue was not from the land; it is from the harvest. That also depends on the kind of crop if it is a commercial crop the rate is higher; if there is no crop, there is no revenue. So the two systems are different.
History of India Page 6 of 14 The British rulers considered the Zamindars as owners of the land (malik). Therefore the land revenue was imposed irrespective of the utilization of the land. The onus of collecting the revenue was on the Zamindars. Mughal Revenue System There are documents of the early and late Mughal Period. In the mid 17 th century, the last diwan of Gujarat named Ali Muhammad Khan wrote a book called Mirat-i- Ahmandi. He stated that the Mughal revenue was divided into two i) Banth (taken by the zamindar) and ii) Talpad (taken by the state or Central government). Another document of the early days says the same. The subedar of Gujarat, Khan-i-Azam, in the late 16 th century gave certain orders regarding the collection of revenue.
History of India Page 7 of 14 There are three main points in the order of Khan-i- Azam, the subedar of Gujarat: i) One-fourth of the land should be reserved for the aboriginal people and no revenue should be taken from them. ii) Zamindar should not collect more than 50% of the total harvest as revenue. iii) There is no restriction on the Zamindars for the sale or purchase of land. In other words it means that if the revenue is paid then the Zamindar can do almost anything. The document of Khan-i-Azam giving far more latitude to the Zamindars was perhaps prevalent all over the Mughal Empire. But we do not have any corroborative evidences from other provinces.
History of India Page 8 of 14 Types of Zamindars There were three types of Zamindars: Big zamindars called the Rajas and in Persian called Zamindaran-i-umda Middle level Zamindars who were neither big nor very small Primary Zamindar There is a problem of abstraction here. The problem is that these types are not exclusive to each other. In other words, in a big zamindari there maybe small zamindars and primary zamindars. But the big zamindar is himself a primary zamindar in a certain area. So therefore these types although classified separately overlap each other. All the Zamindars are not the same kind. Abul Fazl while talking about the big zamindars said that there were two types of big Zamindars: i) Zamindar of the territory e.g. the raja of Jammu and Kangra and ii) Zamindar of the tribe e.g. raja of Baluch. He calls the Zamindar of the Tribe as Alus.
History of India Page 9 of 14 The difference between the two is very small. The Zamindar of the Tribe has his strength mainly based on the strength of the tribe. But the Zamindar of the Territory is also the leader of his tribe, which is perhaps the dominant tribe but there were other racial groups involved. So the internal politics of these two are different. In case of a tribal one it was a simple matter; in case of the territory is a difficult mater. Peshkash The big Zamindars were asked by the Central government to send tribute, which is called Peshkash. There are two types of Peshkash: a) to pay tribute or Peshkash and also give military help and b) to pay only Peshkash and no military help. So they are called Peshkash-i-Zamindar.
History of India Page 10 of 14 Both types of Zamindars paid tribute. But we do not know the basis on which tribute was paid by those zamindars that provided military help. We get some information from Ain-i-Akbari about the payment made by the second type of Zamindars. The second type of Peshkash-i-Zamindar i.e. those who pay tribute only perhaps paid on the basis of their own revenue because we find that Abul Fazl had given a list of their revenue in his Ain-i-Akbari. The big Zamindars are very powerful. That has been acknowledged by the Central government. Babur in his Babur-namah stated that these big Zamindars are very powerful controlling one-sixth of the entire land. They had plenty of elephants (the number is given), guns, and soldiers. He said that the only advantage for them is that they are not united. So it is easy to defeat them. The Peshkash-i-Zamindar like all other Zamindars tried to remain independent while the Mughal government tried to convert them as revenue-paying Zamindars (Persian mal guzari zamindar). So there is always a tussle going on.
History of India Page 11 of 14 How frequently the tribute is paid is not known. Generally whenever the Emperor is near the zamindari or his representative is near that place the zamindars then personally come and pay their respects and revenues as well, which is called Peshkash or tribute. There had been problems on this. In case of Bengal in 1610 Pratapaditya of Jessore, a very big zamindar (perhaps the leading zamindar of Bengal at that time) was called Jor Talab Zamindar i.e. rebel zamindar because he did not personally come to see the subedar. Therefore there are all sorts of rules and regulations, etiquettes concerning the Mughals and the Zamindars. Mal guzari Zamindars There were certain other areas where the Zamindar pays the revenue. These are called the Mal guzari Zamindars. Akbar in 1592-93 issued a farmaan stating that all zamindars under the Mughals should either attend the court or send his son or representative of his tribe as a sort of zamin (security). Abul Fazl said in 1595-96 that there were 27 such zamins from Lahore alone. To control
History of India Page 12 of 14 these zamindars this was one of the measures. This led to trouble between the Zamindars and the Mughals. Rana Pratap of Chittor did not want to attend; neither did he want his son to attend. Akbar invaded Chittor, Pratap left for the hills. But during the time of Jahangir he exempted the Chittor raja from sending the zamin and the problem was solved. This kind of attendance created a problem at one point of time. It is generally believed that in the later years this rule was not strictly followed. Controlling the Zamindars Another way to control the big zamindars (which was taken by Akbar) was marriage between the Emperor and the daughter of the big Hindu Zamindar. The first such marriage was in 1563, when Akbar married the daughter of Raja Behari Mal of Ambar i.e. Jaipur. It is stated by later historians that the rise of the Amber family was due to this marriage. In Abul Fazl s list in 1595-96, there were 61 Zamindar/ Mansabdars. Out of these 61, 40 came from Jaipur / Ajmer area. Out of these 40, 27 came from the Kachoa family of Ambar.
History of India Page 13 of 14 Therefore it is claimed that the rise of the Ambar family in the Mughal administrative system, was due to this factor. But now the recent researches it has been seen that this statement is not correct. There were certain other Rajputs who had given their daughters and had gone up. But there were also certain other Rajput zamindars or rajas that had not given their daughters in marriage had also gone up in the Mughal administrative system. So this statement by the later historians particularly late 19 th and early 20 th century cannot be accepted. Jodhabai In 1873 in the journal of the Asiatic Society Calcutta, Beverage wrote that the daughter of Behari Mal was called Jodhabai. She was considered to be the mother of Jahangir. Since then the controversy had snow-balled into great discussions. But the recent view of the historians is that the name of the daughter of Raja Behari Mal is not known. Jahangir never mentioned the name of his mother. Also any Hindu daughter coming into the Mughal family was given a royal title and the daughter of
History of India Page 14 of 14 Raja Brhari Mal was also given one. She has issued some farmaans which they normally do. These farmaans have been found but no name was there. Actually it appears that Jahangir had married the daughter of the Raja of Jodhpur who was called Jodhabai. Therefore this connection between the daughter of raja Behari Mal of Ambar, Akbar and Salim is very tenuous. The big zamindars always tried to increase their powers and their lands. In the late 18 th century Raja Jai Singh of Amber could enlarge the territory of his zamindari by grabbing the lands of others. This was resented in the Mughal court by other Mansabdars and pressure was given to the Emperor to stop it, which he tried to do with the Marathas.