The Cambridge History of India, Vol. IV: The Mughul Period v4.c20.113

v4.c20.113

Foreign trade occupied a negligible position in the economics of the Mughul empire on account of its small volume. The state gained from import duties probably less than three million rupees a year (out of which two-fifths came from Surat), so that customs yielded less than 1 per cent. of the total revenue of the state. The value of the Indian products exported by the English East India Company during the first sixty years of its trade (1612–72) did not average more than 800,000 rupees per annum; in 1681 it had risen to 1,840,000 rupees for Bengal alone. What little India imported from foreign countries was in the main paid for by her export of cotton goods, supplemented by a small variety of raw produce such as pepper, indigo and saltpetre; so that India was economically almost self-supporting (C. J. Hamilton).