The Rashtrakutas and their Times c17.s3.41

c17.s3.41

The powers and functions of the village assembly and their executives were substantially the same in Gujarat, Maharashtra and Karnatak, but they differed considerably from those of the corresponding bodies in Tamil country. In the latter province the village executive was responsible to the central government for its revenues; but how and when these were to be collected, whether and to what extent remission in taxation was to be given were matters in which the village had full powers. Nay, the government had even delegated to the village assemblies its power of selling the land of the defaulters of land-revenue. The village committees there were also the owners of the village lands and could sell or assign them for village purposes.⁶⁶ Under the Rāṣṭrakūṭa administration all these powers were reserved to itself by the central government and were exercised through its representatives, as shown in the last chapter. Our records supply not a single case of the Mahājanas or Mahattarādhikārins remitting any taxes or making any lands tax-free. The Kalas inscription⁶⁷ no doubt refers to the Agrahāra of Kadiyur assigning the tax on pedlars for a local temple, but the case is beside the point; for the village was an alienated one and so the rights of the central government had devolved upon the Mahājanas who were the alienees. In a record from Kattageri⁶⁸ from Bijapur district, dated 1092 A.D., we no doubt find the honourable 500 making over an impost due to them to a local temple; but the honourable 500 obviously did not represent the Mahājanas of the place, for in that case they would have been so designated, as is the invariable practice of the Karnatak records. Besides, if "honourable 500" had represented the Mahājanas of the place having sole control over the village taxation and its disposal, they need not have drawn up any document for assigning one of their imposts for the purpose of their tank. We can understand the record only if we take the honourable 500 as the members of some outside guild who assigned an impost due to them for the tank of the village. There is only one case, that of the Mahājanas of Soratur, assigning away a tax in kind to a local temple, but the record shows that they could do so only when the headman and the Governor of the place had graciously acceded to their request in that matter.(69)