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Mughal Land Revenue System

HISTORY (University of Delhi)

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Mughal Land Revenue System

Objective;

The objective of my term paper is to highlight the structure and important aspects of the land
revenue system under the Mughals.

Introduction;
The central feature of the agrarian system under the Mughals was the alienation
from the peasant of his surplus produce in the form of land revenue which was the
main source of state's income. Early British administrators regarded the land
revenue as rent of the soil because they had a notion that the king was the owner
of the land. Subsequent studies of Mughal India have shown that it was a tax on
the crop and was thus different from the land revenue as conceived by the British.
Abul Fazl in his Ain-i Akbari justifies the imposition of taxes by the state saying that
these are the remuneration of sovereignty, paid in return for protection and justice.

The Persian term for land revenue during the Mughal rule was mal and mal wajib.
Kharaj was not in regular use.

The process of land revenue collection has two stages:

(a)Assessment (tashkhis/jama)
(b) (b) Actual collection (hasil).

WHAT WAS THE LAND REVENUE SYSTEM UNDER THE MUGHALS?

During the period of disorders and confusion after the reigns of Sher Shah and Islam Shah the
prominent experiments of revenue system of Surs were nullified. However, Akbar, who had
inherited the old system of government and the time-tested customs and procedures, after
acquiring the throne, found that there were three types of land in the country namely the Khalsa
or crown-lands, the Jagir lands and the Sayurghat lands. Out of these lands the Jagir lands
were supervised by some nobles who obtained the local revenues out of which they provided a
portion of these collected revenues to the imperial exchequer and kept the rest for themselves.
Sayurghat lands were allotted on free tenure.

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Sher Shah paid great attention to the welfare of the peasants and therefore reduced or remitted
the revenue in times of calamities. He had issued specific instructions to the revenue officers to
be lenient at the time of the assessment but once the assessment had been made the tax was to be
collected with severity. Sher Shah gave severe punishments to the soldiers if they destroyed the
crops. Thus the revenue system established by Sher Shah was efficient and elastic.

Akbar, who succeeded Humayun paid attention to the revenue administration and made efforts
to improve on the revenue system set up by Sher Shah. In this he got the assistance from experts
like Muzaffar Khan, Itimad Khan and Raja Todar Mal.” He introduced Zabti System in eight
provinces of his empire. Akbar in 1575-76 abolished the old revenue areas and divided the whole
of the Empire, baring the provinces of Bengal, Gujarat and Bihar, into a large number of units.
Each unit yielded one Kror (crore) a year. For each unit an officer designated as Krori was
appointed who got the duty of not only of collecting the revenues but also encouraging
cultivation.

This experiment of Akbar proved disastrous as the Kroris soon engaged themselves in rampant
corruption and their cruelty resulted in great misery for peasants. Akbar was forced to abolish
the – offices of Kroris and the revenue divisions of the past were reinstated.

When Todar Mall was made the Diwan-i-Ashraf in 1582, some important reforms in the revenue
system under mughal came into existence. The main characteristics of this system were:

(a) Survey and measurement of land,

(b) Classification of land, and

(c) Fixation of rates.

Mansabdari System

The Mughal nobility or mansabdars looked after the administration of the state the central
authority of which lay with the Emperor, like the power of conferring, increasing, decreasing the
mansab. Mansab was the grant to enjoy a jagir given to every official. Jagir was the revenue
assignment as a substitute of a cash salary (not land) for services delivered. The mansabdar
could collect revenue from his jagir through the Zamindars collecting dues from cultivators. No
hereditary claim could be made and on the death of a Mansab his personal property taken by the
State, of which the balance owed to state was deducted and balance was returned to his heirs.

Jagirdari system

Under the reign of Akbar land was divided into two categories - Khalisa and Jagir. Land revenue
of Khalisa was directly for the royal treasury and Jagirs were allocated to the Jagirdars according
to their rank. The jagirs were the assignment of revenue given to the Mansabdars and the
assignees were Jagirdars. There were four types of Jagirs – Jagir Tankha (given in lieu of pay),

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Mashrut Jagirs (given on certain conditions), Inam Jagir (independent of any obligation) and
Watan Jagir (assigned in the homelands). The Revenue Department maintained a record Jama-
Dami that indicated the assessed income (jama) of various areas, indicated in dams, calculated as
40 dams to a rupee.

Dahsala System

Raja Todar Mal, as finance minister of Akbar, brought new system of revenue collection known
as zabti system and dahshala system which was a system of taxation. The Dahsala system as
instituted by by Akbar, the average produce of different crops as well as the average prices
prevailing over the last ten years was calculated and one-third share of the average produce was
apportioned to the state. The origin of this practice is traced in Sher Shah’s reign. As earlier
mentioned crop yields and prices cultivated for a period of 10 years was carefully and
comprehensively surveyed. On the basis of this comprehensive survey, tax was fixed on each
crop in cash. Each province was divided into revenue circles or dastur with their own rates of
revenue and a schedule of individual crops or dasture- amal.

The system of Ain-i-Dahsala, was developed by Raja Todarmal. For the clear measurement
of land, bigha -60 x 60 yards- was applied as standard unit of area. A new gaz or yard, gaz-i-
llahi was used as 41 digits (anguls) or 33 inches in length. In order to fix land revenue, both
regularity and productivity of cultivation were taken into consideration .

Measurement of land

Land was divided into four classes according to “the continuity or discontinuity of cultivation”:

(1) Polaj– under this category came the lands that could be cultivated annually,

(2) Paraudi – under this category fell the lands that were kept uncultivated for some time to get
their productive capacity back,

(3) Chachar – under this category came the lands that were kept uncultivated for three or four
years, and

(4) Banjar – under this category fell the lands that were kept uncultivated for five years or
longer.

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Rayotwari System

The revenue of the state was fixed at one- third of the actual produce, which the ryots were
permitted to pay either in cash or in kind. The cash rate fluctuated according to crops. This
system came to be known as Rayotwari System, and was applied to Northern India, Gujarat and,
to some extent, to the Deccan.

The Empire was separated, for the purpose of administration and revenue collection, into
Subahs; these Subhas were subdivided into Sarkars; each of the Sarkars consisted of a
number of Paragana. Each paragana was a cluster of several villages. The revenue collector, the
amalgujar, of a district got the assistance of a large subordinate staff.

The village headman, Muqaddam, and the village Patwari were servants of the village
community but they were not the servants of the State. Apart from these official there were the
Qanungo who had to keep records of revenue that the village had to pay; the Potdar (district
treasurer); and the Bitikchi (accountant).

These officers had got a clear instruction of collecting revenue with due care and caution and
“not to extend the hand of demand out of season”.

REVENUE ASSESSMENT;

Land revenue was the major source of the income.

Akbar had instituted a system of Dahsala/Bandobast Arazi/the Zabti system. Under which, the
average produce of different crops and the average prices from the last ten years were calculated.
One-third of the average was the share of the state that was mentioned in cash. Land revenue
was fixed considering both, continuity and productivity of cultivation. Polaj , parauti paid full
prices when under cultivation. After assessing land revenue in kind, value was converted into
cash using price list or dastur-ul-amal, prepared at regional level for various food crops. The
empire was divided into numerous regions-dastur, at pargana level, that had similar productivity.
It resorted to certain other taxes to supplement its income. These included toll tax, customs,
mints, presents which the king received from the Governors and Ministers as well as Jagirdars on
important occasions ; fines which the state levied on the criminals. Another source of income
was indemnity from vanquished or defeated ruler. This indemnity was paid either once or
regularly as a token of subordination to the emperor.

Most of the revenue collected by the state was spent on the wars and personal luxuries of the
rulers. For example Aurangzeb, who inherited an overflowing treasury from his father,
squandered huge amounts in his Deccan wars and ultimately left an almost depleted treasury for
his successors. He even resorted to the much hated Jaziya on the Hir us to find additional funds
for meeting the expenses of these wars.

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METHODS OF LAND REVENUE ASSESSMENT

Under the Mughals, assessment was separately made for kharif and rabi crops. After the
assessment was over a written document called patta, qaul or paul-e-qarar was issued in which
the amount or the rate of the revenue demand was mentioned.

1) Ghalla Bakhshi (Crop-sharing): In some areas it was called bhaoli and

batai. The Ain-i Akbri notes three types of crop-sharing:
a) Division of crop at the threshing floor after the grain was obtained.
b) Khet batai: The share was decided when the crop was still standing in
the fields, and a division of the field was marked.
c) Lang batai: The crop was cut and stacked in heaps without separating
grain and a division of crop in this form was made.
2) Kankut/Dambandi The word kankut is derived from the words kan and kat.
Kan denotes grain while kat means to estimate or appraisal. Similarly, dam
means grain while bandi is fixing or detemining anything. It was a system
where the grain yield (or productivity) was estimated. In kankut, at first, the
field was measured either by means of a rope or by pacing. After this, the
per bigha productivity from good, middling and bad Iands was estimated and
the revenue demand was fixed accordingly.
3) Zabti: In Mughal India, it was the most important method of assersment.
The origin of this practice is traced to Sher Shah. During Akbar'r reign, the
system was revised a number of times before it took the final shape.

Revenue Farming
Ijara system or revenue farming war another feature of the revenue system of that
time. Generally, these villages, when peasant did not have resources available for
undertaking cultivation or where owing to some calamity cultivation could not be
done, were farmed out on ijara. The revenue officials or their relatives were not
supposed to take land on ijara . It was expected that revenue farmers would not
extract more than the stipulatedl land revenue from the peasants. But this was
hardly the case in actual practice.

The practice of ijara, it seems, could not have been very common in the zabti
provin. In the khalisa lands also this practice was very rare. However, in the jagir
lands it became a common feature. Revenue assignees (jagirdars) farmed out their
assignments in lieu of a lump sum payment, generally to the highest bidders.

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During the 18th century ijara system became a common form of revenue
assessment and collection.

MODE OF PAYMENT
The practice of collecting land revenue in cash was in use in some regions even as
early as the 13th century. In the Mughal period, the peasant under zabti system
had to pay revenue in cash. No provision is on record for allowing a commutation
of cash into kind in any circumstances. However, under crop-sharing and hankut,
commutation into cash was permitted at market prices. Cash nexus was firmly
established in almost every part of the Empire.

COLLECTION OF LAND REVENUE

Under ghalla bakhshi, the state's share was seized directly from the field. In other
systems, the state collected its share at the time of harvest. Abul Fazl maintains
that "Collection should begin for rabi from holi and for kharif from Dashehra. The
officials should not delay it for another crop”

Usually, the revenue was deposited in the treasury through the 'amil' or revenue
collector. Akbar encouraged the peasants to pay directly, Todar Ma1 recommended
that the peasants of trusted villages, within the time limit, could deposit their
revenue in the treasury themselves and could obtain receipt. The village
accountant, patwari made endorsement in his register to establish the amount
paid. Irfan Habib considers there regulations as precautionary measures on the
part of administration to avoid fraud and embezzlement.

LAND REVENUE ADMINISTRATION

Since Jagirdars were transferred after every two or three years they had no
knowledge of revenue paying capacity of the people and local customs. So we find
three types of officials:

a) Officials and agents of jagirdars;

b) Permanent local officials many of whom were hereditary. They were
generally not affected by the frequent transfers of the Jagirdars, and
c) Imperial officials to help and control the Jagirdars

At the rural level, there were many revenue officials

i) karori: In 1574-75, the office of karori was created. Describing his
duties, Abul Fazl says that he was incharge of both assessment and
collection of the revenue.

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ii) Amin: The next important revenue official was amin. His main
function was to assess the revenue. He was appointed by the
diwan.He was responsible jointly with the karori and faujdar for the
safe transit of the collected revenue.

iii) Qanungo: He was the local revenue official of the pargana, and
generally belonged to one of the accountant castes.

iv) Chaudhari: He was also important revenue official like the qanungo.
He was the leading zamindar of the locality. He was mainly concerned
with the collection.

v) Shiqqdar: Abul Fazl mentions that in case of an emergency, the

shiqqdar could give the necessary sanction for disbursement which
was to be duly reported to the court. He was also responsible for
thefts that occurred in his jurisdiction.

vi) Muqaddam and Patwari: The muqaddam and patwari were village
level officials. The former was the village headman. In lieu of his
services; he was allowed 2.5 percent of.the total revenue collected by
him.,The patwari was to. . maintain records of the village land, the
holdings of the individual cultivators, variety of crops grown and
details about fallow land. The names of the cultivators were entered in
his bahi (ledger). On the basis of information contained in these bahis,
the bitikchi used to prepare necessary papers and records according
to which assessment and collection was carried out.

CONCLUSION
The land revenue was the main source of the state's income. The British
administrators regarded it as rent of the soil, and thought that the owner of the
land was the king, but subsequent studies have shown that it was a tax on the crop
rather than on land. The salient features of the Mughal land revenue system may
be summarised as follows :

a) The magnitute of land-revenue demand varied from region to region;

b) A number of methods were used to assess the land revenue demand.
c) A large number of officials were associated with the administration of land
revenue. Some of the important functionaries were karori, amin, qanungo.

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