AGRARIAN POLICY OF MUGHAL INDIA

The economic activities of Mughal Empire derived from the basic urges which created
and sustained it as well as the structure of polity devised for their fulfillment. A recent
work has used the not -too- felicitous term 'conquest state' to characterize the empire.
the term has however the virtue of pin-pointing the fact that the state was created by,
and largely existed for, acts of conquest. There economism was simple state forward
and almost palpable. Over the years the empire had indeed acquired the excess fat of
incredible affluence. The Mughal state was insatiable Leviathan: it's impact on the
economy was defined ever all by its unlimited appetite for resources. In a
predominantly agrarian economy these resources were extracted primarily from the
agricultural sector, in the form of land revenue assessed as a fixed share of the
produce. the rate of assessment varied from one third to half or more of the output.
To these were added additional imposts and costs of collection, together adding up to
as much as 25% of the land revenue. In zamindari areas, there were further imposts
over and above all these. The great bulk of revenue yielding territories by the second
quarter of the 18th century were assigned as jagirs, were frequently transferred. By
the time of Farrukhsiyars reign the system of revenue farming or ijara - with bankers
and speculators investing in this highly profitable endeavour - had become
widespread. Both contemporary observers and modern historians have traced the
ruthlessness in revenue collection partly to the temporary nature of the jagirdars and
ijaradars interests. But the Hindu Rajas do not appear to have shown any awareness
of the fact . Their government has been described as 'the most tyrannic and
barbarous imaginable' they treated 'their subjects worse than if they were slaves'. The
peasants were first compelled to accept a certain level of assessment, and then
forced to pay a half or a third more than what they had contracted for. If the peasants
produce cash crop then he have to pay lesser.Yes it would be incorrect to represent
the Mughal state as a mere incubus sucking the lifeblood of the peasantry. Welfare of
peasantry,for reasons ideological as well as practical, was a basic norm of policy.
Aurangzeb recounted the tragic failure of his life not in terms of an Empire facing
imminent ruin, but his inability to protect the raiyats.

Mughal India's agrarian society suffered as badly as Bernier and other contemporary
observers would have us believe but the system benefited the sections of rural society
who had his share in the spoils. Not all that was extracted from the producer was
drained away from the countryside. probable extension of the area under cash crops
and the introduction of an important new product, tobacco, were positive features of
the Mughal agriculture scene. The affluent cultivatot must have benefited from the
development which probably further the impoverished the poor.Rural society in
Mughal India containing the powerful khuts or chiefs at one end and the menial
balahar at the other. Alternative and overlapping institutions for revenue extraction -
Khalisa, jagir, zamindari and raiyati villages etc. The development of zamindari rights
is the most important instance of such a casual link. The Mughals leant heavily on the
zamindars for the collection of revenue. When revenue farming became widespread,
powerful zamindars took advantage of the development. In Bengal, Murshid quli Khan
created six very large zamindaris which paid half the revenue of the Suba. Through
investments in revenue farming many speculative Bankers also emerged as absentee
landlords. The survival of the Empire and its ruling class depended on their power to
coerce, the largest part of the mansabdars income went into the maintenance of the
armed forces. The import of horses for army paid for with exports, also had the effect
of indirectly stimulating the economy. Mughal peace and a vast unified Empire had
very positive implications for the economy of the subcontinent.

Despite denying the growing importance of non-agricultural components in the Indian

economy, agriculture was said to be the mainstay of the Mughal economy. Because
agriculture was the livelihood of the majority of the people and the vast wealth of
surplus social labor came from agriculture.There is a debate about the ups and downs
of the Indian economy under British rule. Recently there is a lot of discussion in Indian
intellectual circles about Karl Marx's model of 'Asiatic mode of production'.Whether
there were any seeds of capitalism in the Mughal economy, how much its
development was disrupted by the British or whether there was any qualitative change
in British rule is also important.

Determining the character of the present Indian state is one of the tasks for social
change. In this effort some political parties often declared the Indian state as semi-
feudal.British rulers tried their best to understand what was the foundation of Indian
civilization and the study of the history of the economic structure of pre-colonial India
was developed at the insistence of imperialism.

According to the British rulers, the first sign of rural society was collective ownership
of land. The second characteristic is the isolation of rural society. According to
Charles Metcalfe, rural society is a small republic that provides almost all of its own
needs and is almost independent of any external relations. This society is the
stagnant,it remains the same.Monro, Mayne, Metcalfe etc. resorted to theory rather
than facts during the British period.

The urge was to uphold their philosophy of governance in India. By idealizing the rural
society, they described Britain as the protector of that society and declared that it was
their duty to sustain that society as far as possible. On the other hand, the 'paternal
attitude' of the British gave a historical explanation that the British rule was an
improved version of other empires in Indian history.

Karl Marx also acknowledged the existence of rural societies in pre-colonial India and
other parts of Asia. According to Marx, the main aim of the Asiatic mode was to unite
the agricultural and handicrafts of the rural society. That is, there is no social and
economic gap between agriculture and industry in the rural society. Labor power was
jointly employed for agriculture and industry in a village based on interdependence.
For this the rural society was fully self-sufficient.The third condition is the immobility
of this society. In Marx's words 'the Asiatic system naturally lasts the longest in the
most honorable condition.' Here the rate of change is very slow because each rural
society is mutually isolated, self-reliant and moving in its own orbit at its own
pace.Social labor division is absent here. As a result, taxonomy is underdeveloped and
class associations are stagnant here.

Marx envisioned two types of structure within Asiatic society, recognizing a superior
power or group in rural society as the owner of the means of production as a whole.
On the one hand there is a superior group. They enjoy a share of the surplus wealth of
the village in lieu of some social activities.Their hero is the emperor. On the other
hand, numerous rural societies accepted allegiance to the higher power group. Thus
in the Asiatic system of societies we see the co-existence of the two systems.Asiatic
society is a cross between classless early egalitarian societies, slave societies and
class-based feudal societies.

Foreign travelers all describe the king as the owner of the land in one word. But Abul
Fazl recognized the emperor's right to levy taxes as a claim of sovereignty only,
because the emperor maintained peace and order. Also in Waqa'i-i-Ajmir and Persian
texts it is seen that many subjects in the city had sold their private land to the king,
even quarreled with the king over its ownership.In fact the emperor received the
surplus share of social wealth as tax. He maintained peace and order for superior
military and political power. Ain-i-Akbari, Aurangzeb's Farmans, and Khafi Khan's
writings show that the cultivator personally had perpetual and hereditary tenure of
land.Then the ratio of cultivated land to population was relatively high.

Farmers' ownership rights were incomplete on the one hand. Farmers could not sell
their land to anyone at will. In this case, his rights were limited by various state and
group restrictions. There are also instances where a Muslim farmer could not buy land
in a Hindu area. So on the one hand, as the land was under the control of the farmer,
the farmer was also under the control of the land.The condition of the farmer was
almost equal to that of the serf. During the Mughal period, the monarchy tried hard to
prevent farmers from moving to other regions. The 'Dastur-i-Amal-Bekashe' from Delhi
mentions that the village officials were bonded to keep the peasants in their villages.
In 1641 some peasants from Ahmedabad took refuge in Navananagar and the king
was forced to apply military pressure to send them back.From this point of view, the
purpose of the ruling class was to tie the peasants to the land rather than to uproot
them from the land during the Mughal period. The government, zamindars, and raiyats
had various rights over land and produce, but none had exclusive or sole ownership.

Rural society during the Mughal period can be divided into two parts - Dehat-e-Taluk
and Dehat-e-Raiti. Dehat-i-taluks are villages which pay revenue to the state through
large zamindars. On the other hand, the peasants of Dehat-e-Raiti pay revenue directly
through the state bureaucrats or village headmen. The presence of powerful
zamindars in Dehat-e-Taluks has given these villages a somewhat distinct character.
Although various classes had different rights over land during the Mughal period,
there is generally no evidence of collective ownership by the rural community.

Rural society has nothing in common with pattadari and brotherly ownership systems.
Such land ownership means that some of the zamindari rights are jointly enjoyed by
several families and the responsibilities of the remaining revenue are shared equally.
Both 'Malba' and 'Kharach-i-De' were levied for the entertainment and customary
expenditure of the revenue-collecting bureaucrats.Pasture fields or forests and rural
communities were not included in the rights. It is true that a cultivator could cultivate
a forest and develop his tenure there, but for that he would have to pay a small
revenue to the state.

Now it is undeniable that rural society was not isolated at all. During the Mughal
period various crops were cultivated on a large scale which were sold in distant
markets. Cotton, sugar, tobacco etc. were produced in villages and shipped to distant
areas. The wide and rapid expansion of tobacco cultivation proves that the farmer
was individually producing in his own village to keep pace with external demand.On
the other hand, the rural society met the various needs of the city. The task of
meeting that demand was not only limited to providing raw materials but also
artists.There was to be extensive trade and collection of various goods from the
countryside by land
In the hands of a class of traders called 'Banjara'. Thus the isolation of Indian villages
during the Mughal period cannot be supported on factual basis.

Apart from isolation, self-sufficiency remains. From this point of view, the Indian
village was self dependent. We can know from the trade trend of agricultural products
that this trend was one-way. The city used to extract goods from the village and
nothing was returned to the village. The needs of the rural masses were met in the
villages as the purchasing power of the common people in the villages was very
limited.Grover's work suggests that a village may not have been singularly self-
sufficient.A few villages in a particular region catered to their mutual needs. That is,
even if a single village was not self-sufficient, a small area would meet their daily
needs. Apart from production, the existence of rural society in a few other special
fields can be seen in the Mughal period.

The identity of the village community meeting is widely found when leaving the
territory or building a collective storehouse in the village. The remaining revenue was
often paid from the collective treasury or minor irrigation was provided. An employee
called 'Patwari' was in charge of overseeing the interests of the farmers and the
collective treasury.In Western India and the Deccan, the bonds of rural society were
much stronger than in the villages of North India. If a newcomer to a village wanted to
live permanently with usufructuary rights on the land, he had to wait for the collective
consent of the village community. The control of rural society can also be said of rural
artisans in the villages of Maharashtra.

The concept of rural society as described by the British bureaucrats was very
unrealistic during the Mughal period. The absence of collective ownership, the
recognition of the individual rights of the peasantry and the widespread connection of
rural society with distant markets and cities changed the whole world. But Marx's
concept of rural society cannot be ruled out. The peasant has advanced so far in the
direction of personal rights that he cannot be called fully possessor of property.
Regarding the economy of rural life itself, Marx said that the Indian village was
complementary to the economy of urban and industrial and agricultural rural society.

So on the one hand some of the essential economic aspects of the rural empire of
the Mughal Empire were missing. On the other hand, a condition of rural society, the
unity of handicrafts and agro-industry and regional self-reliance was maintained in
terms of meeting the village's own needs. Hence the existence of rural society in the
Mughal period in the context of Asiatic mode of production is partially true, never fully
true.