The Cambridge History of India, Vol. IV: The Mughul Period v4.c22.42

v4.c22.42

The original record having thus become worthless, Akbar in the year 1566 ordered the preparation of a new valuation, which was duly effected, but it went the way of the first, being corruptly falsified; and by 1573 the dissatisfaction in the state service was such that the emperor decided, with the concurrence, or perhaps at the suggestion, of Rājā Todar Mal, to pay salaries in cash, and to bring practically the whole of northern India directly under the Revenue Ministry. For this purpose the country was divided into circles, each estimated to yield, when fully developed, a crore (*karor*) of *dām* (250,000 rupees), and a staff of officials was posted to each circle with instructions to press on agricultural development as quickly as possible; the officer in charge of the circle was officially designated '*Āmil*, or '*Amalguzār*, that is to say, Administrator, but popularly he became known as *Karorī*, a soubriquet derived from the nominal extent of his charge, and eventually this designation passed into the official language. These arrangements lasted for five years. In 1579–80 a new valuation was made, calculated on the precise data furnished by the ten years’ operation of Todar Mal’s assessment rates, and the practice of assignment again became general, though this fact is not formally recorded in the chronicles. The reasons for the change are matters for conjecture. The most probable view is that the introduction of cash salaries was intended from the first as a temporary measure, pending the time when data for a trustworthy valuation should become available; but in any case the reversion to the practice of assignment may have been hastened by the occurrence of grave scandals in the revenue administration.