Growth of Muslim Population in Medieval India, A.D. 1000–1800 c5.s3: Modern Works
Growth of Muslim Population in Medieval India, A.D. 1000–1800 c5.s3
- Language
- English
Modern Works
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British administrators and officials in India were definitely interested in Indian demography, and from the nineteenth century many attempts were made to compute the numbers of inhabitants as well as to assess demographic trends in earlier centuries and estimate the population of ancient and medieval times. District officials sometimes held sorts of local censuses in cities, towns, and villages, and reported their findings to Government. So also was done in princely states. Colonel Sleeman's *Rambles and Recollections*⁴ and Reginald Heber's *Journal*⁵ fall under such category of works. Heber has also fixed the proportion of Hindus and Muslims with some amount of accuracy. These writings may be treated as almost contemporary material, for while political changes may be sudden or revolutionary, in the study of social, economic, and even population trends, the materials of 1820 or 1830 may, by and large, speak for 1780 or 1800. When Elphinstone wrote his history⁶ in the middle of the nineteenth century, he also made an attempt to assess the population of earlier times. But Edward Thornton's Gazetteer,⁷ written in pre-census times and published in 1854, is a mine of information for demographic study. It gives population figures of towns and cities gathered on the basis of actual censuses locally held between 1800 and 1851 as well as reports sent out by British officials from India to their home country. This Gazetteer contains total population of Presidencies, provinces and princely states, of districts, towns and sometimes even villages. Furthermore, besides giving the number of Hindu and Muslim inhabitants, it also provides figures of Hindu and Muslim agriculturists and those enganged in non-agricultural professions in rural and urban areas. It need hardly be stated that such pre-census attempts help a great deal in estimating the total population as also the Hindu-Muslim proportion in the India of 1800.
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⁴ Sleeman, Sir William H., *Journey through the Kingdom of Oudh in the years 1849-50*, 2 vols. (London, 1858).
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⁵ Heber, Reginald, *Narrative of a Journey through the Upper Provinces of India* second edition, 3 vols. (London, 1828).
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⁶ Elphinstone, Mountstuart, *The History of India*, 2 vols. (London 1841).
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⁷ Thornton Edward, *Gazetteer of the Territories under the Government of the East India Co. and of the Native States on the Continent of India*, Compiled by the authority of the Hon. Court of Directors and chiefly from the documents in their possession, 4 vols. (Wm. H. Allen & Co., 7, Leaden-hall Street, London, 1854).
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Indian Census Reports from 1872 onwards too are important. The first all-India census was held in 1872. But it was non-synchronous, the enumeration extended over two to three months, and it took place in different areas in different months. But after 1881 more scientific methods of enumeration were brought into use. Population figures of the late nineteenth and twentieth centuries by themselves are of no use to us, but Census Reports are not merely catalogues of figures. They trace historical background and deduce evidence for any particular or collective demographic behaviour. Information of social, religious, or economic nature collected by census officials, having a bearing on modern population patterns, could also be fruitfully used for the study of medieval Indian population trends.
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Among modern writers, W.H. Moreland must be given the credit of doing pioneering work in the field of medieval Indian demography. In the space of a few pages⁸ he scientifically sifted all the evidence within his reach to arrive at an estimate of Indian population in c. 1600. Some scholars have differed from him, some others have agreed with him, and many census Reports have cited his authority. Kingsley Davis wrote his monumental work⁹ thirty years after Moreland's when much more material was available. He has also attempted an estimate of the population of ancient and medieval times, thus helping in our study. The contribution of J.M. Datta to the study of medieval Indian demography too is laudable.¹⁰ Similarly, many historical monographs by modern scholars on medieval Indian history have been of great help. As an example only one such work may be mentioned. Professor Sri Ram Sharma's *Religious Policy of the Mughal Emperors* gives facts and figures about conversions of Hindus to Islam under the Mughals, in particular under Shahjahan and Aurangzeb, helping in the assessment of the growth of Muslim population. After all, our main task has been to collect figures, data, statistics and well-established facts having a bearing on medieval Indian demography. These are sometimes readily available in these research monographs, and are more reliable too, having been cross-checked from a number of sources.
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⁸ W.H. Moreland, *India at the Death of Akbar* (Macmillan & Co. London, 1920), pp. 9-22.
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⁹ Kingsley Davis, *The Population of India and Pakistan* (Princeton: New Jersey, 1951)
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¹⁰ Jatindra Mohan Datta, (i) "Proportion of Muhammadans in India Through Centuries", *The Modern Review*, Calcutta, January, 1948.
(ii) "A Reexamination of Moreland's Estimate of Population of India at the Death of Akbar" in *Indian Population Bulletin*, Published by the Registrar General, No. I, 1960.