Mughal Land Revenue System.
CHAPTER 1.
Introduction.
ONE of the most interesting topics that engages the attention of the student of Indian history and economics is the nature of relationship between the sovereign and the actual tiller of the land in mediaeval India. Being at once a subject thoroughly historical and antiquarian, a study of Mughal land revenue system entails the necessary culling of statistics and information from State archives and official returns of the Mughal sovereigns of India, a comprehensive mastery over fact and a laborious assimilation of divergent statements and variant readings. Fortunately for us, Abul-Fazl, the famous vizier of Akbar, bequeathed an invaluable legacy to the student of history in his Ain-i-Akbari[1] But the task of a careful student of this book is not smooth, since he has often to draw a line between sober fact and courtly adulation, interspersed throughout the text.
- ↑ The book is mainly concerned with the reign of Akbar. For the later Mughals we have to sound the Dasturs-ul Amal or the administrative manuals of Aurangzib which were written in 'the exact antithesis of the style of the Ain'. But since the translations of them by Prof. Jadunath Sarkar were not available for me, I was obliged to content myself with the material contained in the admirable article by Mr. Moreland in The Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society for January 1922. I have freely made use of Bernier's Travels in the Mughal Empire, between the years 1656-88, that is, partly in the reign of Shah Jahan and partly in that of Aurangzib. The translation of Ain is the one of Francia Gladwin, as that of Blochmann and Jarret is not accessible to me.
