The Cambridge History of India, Vol. IV: The Mughul Period v4.c22.12

v4.c22.12

The villages were grouped into larger units known as *parganas*, which were also recognised for administrative purposes. There was a headman (*chaudhrī*) in each *pargana*; his functions in the Muslim period are not described in the authorities, but he received orders from the administration, and exercised some sort of local jurisdiction. There was also a registrar or accountant (*qānūngo*) for the *pargana*; the post was ordinarily hereditary, and its holder was the repository of local agrarian knowledge, and, as the name implies, the interpreter of local customs on whom foreign administrators relied.