Social Structure of Mughal Empire - Essay Example

Social Structure of Mughal Empire The Mughals were the last influential successors of the Mongols; descended from Mongolians in Turkistan, in the early fifteen hundred’s they absorbed the final succession of conquests to stand the Mongols. They were, however, rather distant from their original predecessors. The Mughals had become Islamic, for the Middle-Eastern Mongol conquerors had embraced Islam long ago. They had also completely absorbed Middle-Eastern culture, particularly Persian culture (in Persian ‘Mongol’ is ‘Mughal’), and their conquests of invasion expanded Persian culture all over India. The size of population is a main indicator of economic development, but estimating it for the pre-census era is a daunting task. With complex estimations derived from statistics in the handbook of the Mughal Empire (Ain-i-Akbari), and an indication from Irfan Habib, the city population of Mughal India was estimated to be 14.7 millions or 15 percent of the entire 98.3 millions (Shireen 1987, pg. 395). Cultivated area is estimated at 50 percent of what it was in 1900 with the proposition that the wealth was not stagnant since both population and cultivation grown up slowly during the Mughal era. The monetarily prudent State faced the paradox of defending the small peasantry (“reza riaya”) from the control of rustic headmen (Zamindars1 and rural community’s headmen) who were revenue collectors for a percentage and also equivalents in the trade of exploitation. It includes (“inter alia”) a listing of the social groups from which revenue was obtained. The following table shows these interdependencies in a limited area in the central Ganga valley2 (Cohn 1969, pg. 56 ff). Table: Caste paying land revenue in accordance with the Ain-i-Akbari, ca. 1596 Caste Jaunpur Revenue % Ghazipur-Ballia Revenue % Banaras Revenue % All districts revenue % Rajput 4,45,000 64% 112000 39% 30,000 16% 5,87,000 50% Brahaman 43,000 6% 170,000 59% 151,000 79% 364,000 30% Mihar Brahaman-Rajput 122,000 18% 11,000 5% 133,000 11% Muslim 35000 5% 35,000 3% Muslim-Rajput 43,000 6% 43,000 4% Other 6,000 1% 6,000 1% Unknown 7,000 2% 7,000 1% (Source: Cohn 1969, pg. 56) The imperial system of revenue collection in the town was incorporated with the local system of supremacy, functioning through complex systam of alliances with local authority holders (such as merchants). The consolidation of power in the towns thus involved an increasing and more entrenched exclusion of the state’s resources. Additionally, Hasan (1969, pg. 17) pointed out: “The Zamindar class played a crucial role in the political, monetary, and social life of medieval India. During the Mughal’s era its significance enlarged [...] regardless of the invariable struggle between the Grand administration and the Zamindars for huge shares of the produce, the two became cohorts involved in monetary exploitation”. Although some minor social groups who also paid revenues were missing in the Ain-i-Akbari, it is a reality that the three higher-ranking Jatis – Brahmin, Bhumihar and Rajput – were accountable for the compensation of 90 per cent (in common with the Muslim’s Rajput even 94 percent) of the entire revenue demand. At least a reasonably good idea of their statistical strength, not specified in the Ain-i-Akbari, can be acquired from the Census 1931: “the share of these three Jatis to the whole population of the four areas at that period summed up to 20.3 per cent and 22.2 per cent of the Hindu population (Census of India 1931, Vol. XVIII). Mughal Indians resided mostly in rural communities that were self-sufficient but obliged to nourish towns and arteries of trade. Farmers had to trade half of their production to pay duties (90 percent of the state revenue) and a great deal of this wealth reached the Grand Ruling classes (Ruler and officials or Mansabdars of higher ranks) (Shireen 1987, pg. 398). The ruling class was town-based and used the taxable wealth to acquire armed forces, servants, followers and luxurious products. Towns thrived as industrialized and manufacturing centers with food grains, raw materials, and cash flow from the rural areas (Shireen 1987, pg. 401). Mughal India sent the choicest products overseas (i.e., they export textiles, indigo and sugar) to the Middle Eastern, European and East Asian countries for huge quantities of overseas coins. Favorable trade balance and the re-minting of imported wealth into Mughal funds oiled the wheels of exchange. In foreign assets Europe had found the way to finance the Industrial Revolution when Spanish silver (brutally extracted from American mines) increased costs and merchant earnings (Shireen 1987, pg. 405). Mughal India was the principal beneficiary of Spanish-American silver, but Moosvi believed its impact to be negligible. Business derived benefit from a self-effacing inflation as well as lower interest rates but industrialized structure of the wealth remained unaffected (Shireen 1987, pg. 406). Some history writers, such as Irfan Habib (2001, pg. 317-51), have illustrated the decline of the Mughal Empire in terms of class struggle. Habib suggested that excessive taxation and subjugation of peasants produced an unhappy class that either revolted it or supported revolts by other classes and states. As said by Habib: In as much as it was suitable for the revenue establishment to treat the rural community as a unit for tax compilation (and even assessment), it was normal for them to depend on the Zamindars or a small stratum of elite peasantry. This leading group, then, collected the tax at rates set by themselves from all peasants, putting a collection in a pool (Fota), with its accountants, the Patwari. From this pool the property revenue would be compensated, so also the charges and perquisites of certain officers and certain common operating expenses of the rural community. [...] Those who are in charge of the pool regularly evaded paying their due proportion of revenues. Lower tax rates were also charged upon some preferential elements, the Khwudkasht farmers in Northern India, Gharuhalas in Rajasthan, and Murasdars in Maharashtra. Such a favored group of peasants was established in almost every part of the State. The smaller peasants, Reza Ríaya (Maltis in Rajasthan, Kunbis in Maharashtra) forming the majority of the peasantry, were therefore called upon to compensate more than their due share of the income so as to make up the entire sum. It was widespread in Mughal administrative literature to grumble about such use of the smaller peasantry by the “dominant elements” in the rural community (Habib 2001, p. 248-49). Athar Ali suggested a theory of a "Jagirdari crisis." In accordance with his hypothesis, the arrival of several new Deccan upper class into the Mughal nobility during the sovereignty of Aurangzeb created a lack of agricultural crown land meant to be fixed, and ruined the crown lands overall (Ali 1997, pg. 11). The most observable impression is that of rising European power and spheres of control in the area. The powers of Europe were tough for themselves to the competitiveness of who could triumph over these foreign lands and make use of their resources and wealth for their own personal gains (pg. 11). The buyers and seller and the actions of approval and confirmation of the middle population, who stood as assertion to the property business, indicated a permanent control of society and public units of houses, i.e., the “Community-Muhallah Compact” (Hasan 1969, pg. 12). The complex power business in the course of property dealings and the combination of the household sphere with the larger system of dominion is illustrated by a study of how the office of the Qazi (an official appointee resolve disputes and punish offenders) worked in close participation with local provision of power (Hasan 1969, pg. 16). This office, which was based on local power relations, could be appropriated by societal players to protect their interests. An admiration of the Qazi’s job in property dealings leans-to further joy on the participatory, collective nature of the Mughal Empire. References: Cohn, B.S, 1969. “Structural Change in Indian Rural Society 1596-1885”. In: Frykenberg, R.E. (Ed.): Land Control and Social Structure in Indian History, Madison, pp. 53-121. Irfan Habib, 2001. The Agrarian System of Mughal India. Revised edition, Oxford University Press India, pg. 248-351. Census of India, 1931. United Provinces and Oudh, Vol. XVIII, Delhi 1935 S. Nurul Hasan, 1969. “Zamindars under the Mughals” in R.E. Frykenberg (ed.), Land Control and Social Structure in Indian History, Madison, pp. 1-24. Shireen Moosvi, 1987. People, Taxation, And Trade in Mughal India, Oxford University Press, pg. 395-406. M. Athar Ali. 1997. The Mughal nobility under Aurangzeb. Revised ed. Delhi: Oxford University Press, pg. 11. Read More