Peasants, Zamindars and the State — Agrarian Society and the Mughal Empire

In the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries about 85 per cent of the people of India lived in villages, and the Mughal state drew most of its revenue from what they grew. This chapter looks at that world from the bottom up and the top down: the peasants and how they worked the land, the village community and its panchayat, women, forest dwellers, the zamindars who stood between village and state, and the revenue system that connected them all to the imperial treasury. The main source is the Ain-i Akbari, and the paper expects candidates to know both what it says and why a historian treats an official chronicle with care.

The Sources — the Ain-i Akbari and Beyond

The cornerstone source is the Ain-i Akbari, authored by Akbar's court historian Abu'l Fazl. It was completed in 1598, the forty-second regnal year, after having gone through five revisions, and it is the third volume of the Akbarnama, a larger project of history writing commissioned by Akbar. The Ain was concerned with recording the arrangements of the empire — the household, the army, revenue and the geography of the empire — and the traditions and culture of the people. It is made up of five books (daftars), of which the first three describe the administration: the manzil-abadi concerns the imperial household; the sipah-abadi covers the military and civil administration; and the mulk-abadi deals with the fiscal side of the empire and provides detailed revenue rates and statistics. The fourth and fifth books deal with the religious, literary and cultural traditions of the people, and with a collection of Akbar's "auspicious sayings".

🎯 Why historians read the Ain with care
The Ain is an official document written from the point of view of the court. Its numerical data contain errors of totalling, and the data were not collected uniformly — for many provinces the details of zamindars' castes were tabulated, for Bengal and Orissa they were not. Prices and wages are given chiefly for the area around Agra. So historians supplement it with revenue records from the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries from Gujarat, Maharashtra and Rajasthan, and with the extensive records of the East India Company.

Peasants and Agricultural Production

Indo-Persian sources of the Mughal period most frequently used the term raiyat (plural riaya) or muzarian to denote a peasant, as well as kisan or asami. Seventeenth-century sources refer to two kinds of peasants: the khud-kashta, who were residents of the village in which they held their lands, and the pahi-kashta, non-resident cultivators who belonged to some other village but cultivated lands elsewhere on a contractual basis — sometimes because of more favourable terms, sometimes out of economic distress after a famine. Few peasants in north India owned more than a pair of bullocks and two ploughs; in Gujarat a peasant with about six acres was considered affluent.

  • Two seasons: agriculture was organised around two major seasonal cycles — the kharif (autumn) and the rabi (spring). Most places produced a minimum of two crops a year; where rainfall or irrigation assured a continuous supply of water, some gave three.
  • Cash crops: Mughal sources often referred to jins-i kamil, literally "perfect crops", such as cotton and sugarcane, which brought in more revenue; the state encouraged their cultivation. Oilseeds and lentils were also cash crops.
  • New crops: in the seventeenth century several new crops reached the subcontinent from different parts of the world. Maize was introduced into India via Africa and Spain and by the seventeenth century was listed among the major crops of western India; vegetables like tomatoes, potatoes and chillies were introduced from the New World, as were fruits like the pineapple and the papaya.

The Village Community, Women and Forest Dwellers

The village was a community of cultivators, with the panchayat, the headman and artisans. The village panchayat was an assembly of elders, usually important people of the village with hereditary rights over their property; in mixed-caste villages it was usually a heterogeneous body. It was headed by a headman known as the muqaddam or mandal, chosen through the consensus of the village elders, and ratified by the zamindar. The panchayat's funds came from contributions by individuals to a common financial pool; it ensured that caste boundaries were maintained, could levy fines and inflict punishments such as expulsion from the community. Separate jati panchayats wielded considerable power. Village artisans — potters, blacksmiths, carpenters, barbers — were often compensated with a share of the harvest or a piece of land, an arrangement later described as the jajmani system in Bengal and elsewhere.

⚠️ The "little republic" — a nineteenth-century image with limits
Some British officials in the nineteenth century saw the Indian village as a "little republic", where fraternal sharing of resources and labour went on. The book cautions that this was not a sign of social equality: there was individual ownership of assets, deep inequalities based on caste and gender, and a powerful group decided the village's affairs. Nor was the village cut off — cash transactions and trade linked it to towns.
  • Women worked shoulder to shoulder with men in the fields — men tilled and ploughed, women sowed, weeded, threshed and winnowed the harvest — and in crafts such as spinning yarn and kneading clay for pottery. Because women were seen as an important resource in an agrarian society, high mortality rates among women owing to malnutrition and frequent pregnancies led to marriages in which a bride-price rather than dowry was paid in many rural communities. Amongst the landed gentry women had the right to inherit property; in Bengal there were women zamindars, and in the eighteenth century the Rajshahi zamindari, one of the biggest and most famous, had a woman at its helm.
  • Forests: beyond the cultivated villages lay huge swathes of forest — dense forest or scrubland — in eastern India, central India, northern India (including the Terai on the border with Nepal), Jharkhand and the Western Ghats and Deccan plateau. Contemporary texts describe forest dwellers as jangli, which did not mean an absence of civilisation but people whose livelihood came from gathering forest produce, hunting and shifting agriculture. For the state the forest was a subversive place, but also a source of elephants, which were demanded as part of peshkash (a form of tribute), and of commercial products such as honey, beeswax and gum lac.

Zamindars, Land Revenue and the Flow of Silver

The zamindars were a class of people who lived off agriculture but did not participate directly in agricultural production. They held extensive personal lands termed milkiyat (property), cultivated for their private use by hired or servile labour, and they could sell, bequeath or mortgage these lands at will. Their power came from collecting revenue on behalf of the state, and from control over military resources — most had fortresses and armed contingents of cavalry, artillery and infantry. The Ain notes that the zamindars belonged to upper castes. Their relationship with the peasantry had an element of reciprocity and patronage as well as exploitation, and in peasant revolts against the state zamindars often had peasant support.

Akbar's classification of land (Ain-i Akbari)
ClassMeaning
PolajLand annually cultivated for each crop in succession and never allowed to lie fallow
ParautiLand left out of cultivation for a time to recover its strength
ChacharLand that has lain fallow for three or four years
BanjarLand uncultivated for five years and more

Revenue from the land was the economic mainstay of the Mughal empire. The revenue had two stages: first, assessment — the jama, the amount assessed — and then actual collection, the hasil, the amount collected. In listing the duties of the amil-guzar, or revenue collector, Akbar decreed that he should strive to make cultivators pay in cash, while the option of payment in kind was also to be kept open. Each province was divided into revenue circles with its own schedule of revenue rates for individual crops. The importance of silver to this system came from outside: in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries voyages of discovery and the opening up of the New World expanded Asia's trade with Europe, and a huge amount of silver bullion flowed into Asia to pay for goods procured in India. This was good for the Mughal state, which issued a silver rupee, and ensured an unprecedented expansion of minting of coins and of the circulation of money.

🧠 Jama before hasil
J comes before H in the process, even though H comes before J in the alphabet: the jama is what the state expected, the hasil what it actually got. In land classes, the time out of cultivation grows down the list — polaj never, parauti for a while, chachar three or four years, banjar five or more.

Key takeaways

  • The Ain-i Akbari, by Abu'l Fazl, is the third volume of the Akbarnama, completed in 1598 after five revisions, in five daftars.
  • Manzil-abadi (household), sipah-abadi (military and civil administration) and mulk-abadi (fiscal) are the Ain's three administrative books.
  • Khud-kashta peasants were residents of their village; pahi-kashta cultivated elsewhere on contract.
  • Jins-i kamil ("perfect crops") were cash crops like cotton and sugarcane; maize, tomatoes, potatoes and chillies came from abroad.
  • The panchayat was headed by the muqaddam or mandal; the "little republic" image ignores caste and gender inequality.
  • Zamindars held milkiyat lands and armed contingents; Akbar's land classes were polaj, parauti, chachar and banjar.
  • Jama was the revenue assessed and hasil the revenue collected; New World silver expanded the Mughal silver currency.

Practice questions (8)

Attempt each one before opening the answer. Every explanation names the tempting wrong option as well as the right one, because that is where marks are lost.

  1. The Ain-i Akbari, completed in 1598 after five revisions, is:

    1. Akbar's own autobiography
    2. The third volume of the Akbarnama, by Abu'l Fazl
    3. A collection of revenue records compiled by the East India Company
    4. A Persian translation of the Mahabharata
    Show answer

    Answer: B — The third volume of the Akbarnama, by Abu'l Fazl

    The Ain is the third volume of the Akbarnama, the history Akbar commissioned from his court historian Abu'l Fazl. Akbar wrote no autobiography — the Mughal emperor known for that is Babur — and the Company's records are a separate, later source historians use to supplement the Ain.

  2. Seventeenth-century sources distinguish khud-kashta from pahi-kashta peasants. A pahi-kashta was a peasant who:

    1. Lived in the village where he held his land
    2. Collected revenue on behalf of the zamindar
    3. Was a non-resident cultivating land in another village on a contractual basis
    4. Grew only jins-i kamil crops for the state
    Show answer

    Answer: C — Was a non-resident cultivating land in another village on a contractual basis

    Pahi-kashta peasants belonged to some other village but cultivated land elsewhere on contract — for better terms, or out of distress after a famine. The option about living in the village defines khud-kashta, the resident cultivator, which is why it is the most tempting wrong answer: the two terms are taught as a pair and are easily reversed.

  3. Match the class of land in Akbar's classification with its description. A. Polaj B. Parauti C. Chachar D. Banjar — 1. Uncultivated for five years or more 2. Never allowed to lie fallow 3. Fallow for three or four years 4. Left fallow for a time to recover its strength

    1. A-2, B-4, C-3, D-1
    2. A-4, B-2, C-3, D-1
    3. A-2, B-3, C-4, D-1
    4. A-1, B-4, C-3, D-2
    Show answer

    Answer: A — A-2, B-4, C-3, D-1

    Polaj was cultivated every year and never left fallow; parauti was rested for a time; chachar had lain fallow three or four years; banjar had been uncultivated for five years or more. The time out of cultivation grows as the list goes down, which is the quickest way to rule out the options that swap parauti and chachar.

  4. In the Mughal revenue system, the terms jama and hasil referred respectively to:

    1. The revenue collected and the revenue assessed
    2. The kharif and the rabi harvests
    3. Land owned by zamindars and land owned by peasants
    4. The revenue assessed and the revenue actually collected
    Show answer

    Answer: D — The revenue assessed and the revenue actually collected

    Revenue had two stages: assessment, the jama, and actual collection, the hasil. The reversed pairing is the trap, since both terms concern the same sum of revenue and differ only in whether it was expected or received. The harvests and the categories of land have their own terms — kharif and rabi, milkiyat and the like.

  5. Mughal sources often refer to jins-i kamil, or "perfect crops". Which pair of crops is the standard example?

    1. Cotton and sugarcane
    2. Wheat and barley
    3. Maize and potatoes
    4. Rice and millets
    Show answer

    Answer: A — Cotton and sugarcane

    Jins-i kamil were cash crops such as cotton and sugarcane, which yielded more revenue, so the state encouraged them. Wheat and barley are staple food grains, not the "perfect crops" of the revenue sources. Maize and potatoes are a trap of a different kind — they are crops that came from abroad in this period, not ones the sources classed as perfect.

  6. Assertion (A): Nineteenth-century British officials who described the Indian village as a "little republic" gave an accurate picture of social equality. Reason (R): Village society was marked by individual ownership of assets and deep inequalities of caste and gender.

    1. Both A and R are true, and R is the correct explanation of A
    2. Both A and R are true, but R is not the correct explanation of A
    3. A is true, but R is false
    4. A is false, but R is true
    Show answer

    Answer: D — A is false, but R is true

    The book cautions that the "little republic" image was not a sign of social equality: assets were individually owned, caste and gender divided the village, and a powerful group decided its affairs. So R is true and is precisely what makes A false. Accepting A takes the colonial description at face value, which is the reading the chapter warns against.

  7. Which of the following crops reached the Indian subcontinent from the New World, directly or through other regions, by the seventeenth century?

    1. Rice
    2. Sugarcane
    3. Cotton
    4. Chillies
    Show answer

    Answer: D — Chillies

    Chillies, like tomatoes, potatoes, pineapples and papayas, came from the New World, and maize arrived through Africa and Spain. Rice, sugarcane and cotton had been grown in the subcontinent for a very long time — cotton and sugarcane were in fact the jins-i kamil of Mughal revenue sources, which is why they may feel like candidates.

  8. Which of the following statements about zamindars in the Mughal period is correct?

    1. They tilled their own fields and took no part in revenue collection
    2. They held milkiyat lands they could sell or mortgage, collected revenue for the state, and maintained armed contingents
    3. They were salaried officials appointed by the emperor, transferred every three years and forbidden to hold any land of their own
    4. They were always drawn from the peasant castes of the village
    Show answer

    Answer: B — They held milkiyat lands they could sell or mortgage, collected revenue for the state, and maintained armed contingents

    Zamindars held personal lands called milkiyat that they could sell, bequeath or mortgage, collected revenue on the state's behalf, and most had fortresses and armed contingents. They lived off agriculture without tilling the land themselves, and the Ain records them as of upper castes. Regular transfer was a feature of the Mughal officials who held assignments of revenue, not of hereditary zamindars.