University of Michigan Press

University of Michigan Center for South Asia Studies

Chapter Title: APPENDIX D: Mughal Land Revenue Administration: An Overview

Book Title: The Mertiyo Rathors of Merto, Rajasthan

Book Subtitle: Select Translations Bearing on the History of a Rajput Family, 1462–1660,
Volumes 1–2
Published by: University of Michigan Press, University of Michigan Center for South Asia
Studies. (2001)
Stable URL: https://www.jstor.org/stable/10.3998/mpub.19305.19

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 243

APPENDIX D

Mughal Land Revenue Administration: An Overview

Land revenue administration in Mughal India was concerned with two

primary activities: the assessment of revenue on lands and the collection of this
revenue. The revenue system was based on a variety of methods inherited from
previous rulers of north India during the early years of Emperor Akbar's reign
(1556-1605). These included varying methods of assessing production for both
the autumn (khanf) and the spring (rabP) crops, and fixing revenue demands.
One method called hast-o-biid involved a rough estimate of the area of all
cultivated land in a village without any kind of measurement of the area under
crops, an estimate of production, and finally a fixing of the revenue demand in
cash and kind. Alongside this very crude method was another called kankut.
Kankut involved a stricter assessment based upon actual field measurement
using a rope (jarib) or walking off distances, then estimating crop yields by unit
through first-hand observation. Demands under this method were fixed
primarily in kind through various methods of share-cropping, referred to locally
as batdi or bhdoli (or by the Persian term ghalla-bakhshi). Several methods of
share-cropping were in evidence, including division of a field of standing crop,
division of the crop after it had been cut and stacked in readiness for threshing,
and finally batdi proper or division of the crop on the threshing floor. Revenue
farming with grants of land to locals at fixed prices was also current in some
areas.
These methods of fixing demand and collecting revenue, while
workable, posed inherent difficulties. Share-cropping divided the risks between
the peasants and the state, and provided a relatively simple and easy method of
fixing demand. However, it was expensive and cumbersome to operate because
it required an army of officials to administer. These officials had to watch local
village lands and crops and do the actual collection, in itself a major task.
Additional problems were present because of the necessity of transport and
storage of goods over large areas of the Empire.
The methods of assessment were also crude, there being no standardized
measures, and were equally hard to administer. The assessments generally did
not distinguish adequately between lands of differing quality, nor did they have a
means of adjusting demand in relation to yearly fluctuations in crops, yields and
prices at local levels. The fixing of demand was, in addition, open to serious
abuses. Reliance was placed entirely on the fairness of the assessor who
estimated land area and production. Corruption and inefficiency compounded
difficulties present in the systems of assessment and collection.
By the thirteenth year of Akbar's reign (1569-70), a situation had
emerged in the Empire which rendered the functioning of the land revenue
system, particularly as this affected assignments of revenue on land (jdgirs),
virtually impossible. Land revenue assignments (jama6) no longer bore any
relation to the amounts of revenue actually collected (hdsil). Emperor Akbar
had, in essence, an inflated paper valuation of his empire which bore little

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 244

relation to land areas under production and the revenues derived from these
lands.
Akbar had attempted to correct some of the shortcoming in his land
revenue administration in his eleventh regnal year. He had placed his Imperial
divan, Muzaffar Khan, and then Muzaffar Khan's successor, Raja Todar Mai, in
charge of all revenue affairs for the Empire. They began a more consistent
gathering of information about lands and crop production from the local
hereditary officials concerned with village revenue accounts (qdnungos) and
other knowledgeable men. The new assessment (jama() which emerged was an
improvement, but it still remained far from actual collection figures (hdsil).
Akbar finally initiated a series of reforms beginning in his nineteenth
regnal year (1575-76) which fundamentally altered the Imperial revenue system.
He first resumed all jdgirs throughout the Empire with the exception of those
assigned in Bengal, Bihar, and Orissa. He then ordered the establishment of a
system for fixing permanent local cash rates for different crops and assessing
values on land. The latter was finally accomplished in his twenty-fourth regnal
year, based on a ten-year schedule (jama (4 dahsdla) determined through actual
field measurement using bamboo rods linked with iron loops (an innovation of
Akbar's to ensure uniform measurement), yields by year and crop prices. Actual
field measurement did not extend to all parts of the Empire, but included only
the Punjab, Uttar Pradesh, Malwa, and portions of Ajmer and Gujarat.
The new jama6 based upon the ten-year schedule allowed the
development of a system called gabf, a payment of land revenue in cash based
upon actual measurement of land and assessment of production. The gabt
system involved the preparation and use of cash rates (dastur-al 'amah or
dasturs) derived from information the local qdnungos had provided about lands,
crops and revenues. New valuations were determined yearly, and cash rates
eventually became fixed for particular areas. Revenue assessment and the fixing
of the revenue demand became a matter of establishing a proportion of average
production multiplied by averaged cash rates for an area.
Akbar reorganized the machinery of revenue administration in order to
facilitate the compilation of a new and more accurate jama(. He first had all
crown lands (khalisa) divided into administrative districts (pargands, mahak).
These small administrative unites were grouped, in turn, into larger divisions
(sarkdrs) and finally unified into provinces (subds). There were one hundred
and eighty-five pargands designated, each of which was expected to yield one
kror of fankas, or 250,000 rupees.
An 'amil (also called 'amalguzdr) was appointed over each
administrative district (pargand). This 'amil was initially responsible for both
revenue assessment and revenue collection. It is this official, the 'am% who
became known as the kiron (the official associated with/responsible for a kror of
taiikas). Kiroris were placed over one or more pargands and had wide powers
to settle the boundaries of lands under their jurisdiction, assess production on the
land, set revenue demands based on local prices, and administer the collection of
the revenue itself. Subordinate to the kiron/'amil were officials known as amins
who were in charge of the revenue parties sent to local villages to carry out the

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 245

actual measurement and assessment of lands. The anting reported back to the
kirons, who in turn conveyed local information to the Imperial divans posted at
each of the provincial headquarters, where all revenue accounts were audited.
This system of land revenue administration functioned in all crown lands
(khdlisa) during the latter years of Akbar's reign and during the reign of his
successor, Jahanglr (1605-27). Then, when Shah Jahan (1628-58) succeeded to
the Mughal throne, there was a reversal of roles among local revenue officials.
Shah Jahan had his divan, Islam Khan, make several changes in the land revenue
system in order to curb abuses which had grown up (indeed the system as a
whole had been fraught with abuse since its inception, due in large measure to
the heavy-handedness of the kirofisl'amUs). Islam Khan transferred the work of
the leirons/'amTh to the amlns, whose duty it became to assess the revenue.
Actual collection became a separate function under the kirons.
Islam Khan's successor, Sa'adullah Khan, later reduced the powers of the
kirons even further. This change was made in order to counter the local practice
which had emerged of combining the functions of the kironand the faujddr, the
local official charged with the maintenance of law and order. The practice of
combining these two functions in one person had led to a great increase in local
abuse of the land revenue system.

It seems evident from the material about Merto that not only were
qdniingos involved in the development and administration of the local land
revenue system, but that a gabt system based on dasturs evolved which extended
both to Merto Pargano and to other nearby areas of Marvar (see Vigat, 2:83-84,
2:88, 2:96 for mention of qdniingos, labtl, and the 'amal dastur for Merto).
Man Habib has written of the extension of the Mughal revenue system
into Rajasthan that

Some of the Rajput states seem to have been influenced considerably by

the general pattern of Mughal administration. In the kingdom of
Jodhpur, for example, a kind of jagirdari system existed. The Raja held
a few villages in each pargana for his own treasury, while he assigned
the rest in pattas, equivalent to jagirs, to his officers in lieu of their
pay.... It even appears from the Ain that in some Rajput states,
especially Ambir and Jodhpur, an attempt was made to copy the Zabt
method of revenue assessment established in the imperial territories. But
if these states copied the Mughal system, they did so of their own
volition. Nor was the copying ever one hundred per cent. Jodhpur, for
example, did not have qdniingos, officials whose functions were vital
for the working of the jagirdari system. Nor did it enforce the Zabt, for
though it had established cash revenue rates it did not apparently come
round to measuring the land, and the Ain fails to provide areas statistics
for its territory. Finally, these states were, after all, exceptions, and there

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 246

is no reasons to believe that the chiefs in general ever followed their

example.1

Based on material in the Vigat, a reassessment of Habib's observations

appears to be in order.

1
Man Habib, The Agrarian System of the Mughal Empire, 1556-1707 (New York:
Asia Publishing House, 1963), p. 186. For a complete discussion of the Mughal land
revenue system and its operation over time, see also the following sources: I. H.
Qureshi, The Administration of the Mughal Empire (Patna: N. V. Publications, 1966),
pp. 227-238; P. Saran, The Provincial Government of the Mughals, 1526-1658
(Allahabad: Kitabistan, 1941), pp. 63-82, 125-138, 165-212; S. R. Sharma, Mughal
Government and Administration (Bombay: Hind Kitab Ltd., 1951), pp. 69-94; A. L.
Srivastava, Akhar the Great, vol. 1, Political History (2nd ed., Agra: Shiva Lala
Agarwala & Co., 1972), pp. 95-96, 142, 162-165, 228-229.

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