Pramāṇa · Search · About · API

The History of Bengal (Vol. I: Hindu Period; Vol. II: Muslim Period 1200–1757) v2.c45: Chapter XXI. Bengal Under Murshid Quli Khan

The History of Bengal (Vol. I: Hindu Period; Vol. II: Muslim Period 1200–1757) v2.c45

Language
English

Contents

Chapter XXI. Bengal Under Murshid Quli Khan

I. Influence of Murshid Quli and Alivardi on the Life of Bengal

v2.c45.s1.1

Prince Muhammad ‘Azim-ud-din (later entitled ‘Azim-ush-shān) arrived at Bardwan and took charge of the government of Bengal in November 1697. For the next three years he had a free hand in Bengal, but thereafter a new force entered the Bengal administration which was destined to oust the Prince in less than three years and to leave an abiding mark on the history of our province. This was Murshid Quli Khan, the new provincial diwān, who came here in December 1700 and died in June 1727, as subahdār and the founder of an independent provincial dynasty.

v2.c45.s1.2

In the first half of the 18th century when disorder and revolution were desolating other provinces of the dying Mughal empire, it was the singular good fortune of Bengal that it passed into the hands of two rulers of exceptional ability, strength of character and long life. For over half a century Murshid Quli and Alivardi Khan between them maintained peace, increased the wealth and trade of the country, and above all else cast the administration into a new mould, which it retained long after the sceptre had passed into British hands. The land revenue system taken over by the English was in its main features the creation of Murshid Quli Khan, and it was continued in a more refined but more rigid form under Cornwallis’s Permanent settlement. For a century before the modernisation of Bengal society and administration by what we call the Indian Renaissance, our ancestors lived worked and suffered in many different lines as Murshid Quli Khan had taught them to do, and our British governors only added something to the superstructure, while the basis remained the same as before.

v2.c45.s1.3

Murshid Quli and Alivardi between them also gave this province a peace unknown in that age elsewhere in India. No repercussion of the dynastic revolutions at Delhi reached Bengal except in the change of the name on the coin. Marāthā incursion which convulsed and transformed the face of Mālwa and Gujrāt, Khāndesh and Berār, was felt in Bengal as merely a passing blast (1743-’52); it touched the fringe of the province and at the very end (1752) only tore away Orissa from Bengal.

v2.c45.s1.4

But though Murshid Quli and his successors greatly increased the volume of the State income and gave it permanence and ease of collection, though the foreign trade of the province expanded by leaps and bounds in their times, yet in the light of after events he must be pronounced a glorified civil servant only, a masterly collector and accountant, a brainy departmental head, but no statesmanlike leader possessed of vision. He did nothing to give permanence to his system, he created no efficient civil service, no council of notables to serve as a check on the caprice of tyrants and preserve the balance of the State in evil days to come. Above all, his one absorbing passion for filling the State coffers made him neglect the national defence and cut down the regular internal security force of Bengal to 2000 cavalry and 4000 infantry. The Buxar Rajputs and the Afghans of Bihar could have supplied him with hardly musketeers and sturdy heavy cavalry. But he did not tap this source of martial power. In the hour of foreign attack his successor was to learn that an army cannot be improvised in a day. The artillery (including the musketeers) was starved of the powder and shot required in training and had to rust without practice or improvement in the type of its guns.

v2.c45.s1.5

The gorgeous luxury of the Nawab's court at Murshidabad and the huge "surplus revenue" from Bengal which fed the imbecile pauper Court of Delhi should not blind our eyes to the utter weakness of the Bengal Government when confronted with the myriads of light horsemen from the Deccan or the steady musketry and accurate artillery of the handful of white troops and their Indian pupils, only a generation after Murshid Quli's death. The incredible contrast in numbers between the victors and the vanquished at Plassey is a matter of shame to us, no doubt; but still more humiliating is the political blindness and administrative corruption of the preceding years which made such a defeat of the Nawabi Government possible.

II. Murshid Quli's Life-Story and His Influence Over Aurangzib

v2.c45.s2.1

Murshid Quli Khan's service-career in Bengal can be traced step by step with exact details and dates from the Persian newsletters (*ākhbārāt*) of the imperial Court and Aurangzib's last Secretary's letters, which have been now discovered, and the prevailing errors—some of which occur even in such modern works as C. R. Wilson's *Early Annals of the English in Bengal*, (1895-1900) can be easily corrected.

v2.c45.s2.2

*1700*, 17th November. Kār Talb Khan, then the diwān of Haidarabad and faujdār of Yelkondal, is appointed by the Emperor Aurangzib as diwān of Bengal (*vice* Ghairat Khan) and also faujdār of Makhsusābād.

v2.c45.s2.3

*1701*, 23rd July. He is appointed, in addition, faujdār of Midnapur and Bardwan, and on 4th August diwān of Orissā also. 10th October, he is given the diwāni of Prince 'Azimuddin's estates in Bengal.

v2.c45.s2.4

*1702*, 23rd December. He is given the title of Murshid Quli Khan.

v2.c45.s2.5

*1703*, 21st January. He is appointed deputy-subahdār (and soon afterwards full subahdār) of Orissā, in addition to his Bengal posts. Visits Orissa, April-Dec. 1704.

v2.c45.s2.6

*1704*, 18th January. He is given the diwāni of Bihār also, but administers it through a deputy without visiting the province.

v2.c45.s2.7

*1707*, 15th July. He is appointed deputy subahdār of Bengal, in addition, but loses this post on 18th November when Prince Farrukh Siyar replaces him.

v2.c45.s2.8

8th October. M. Q. is removed from the diwāni of Bengal and the faujdāri of Makhsusābād, which are conferred on Ziāullah Khan, but he retains the subahdāri of Orissā.

v2.c45.s2.9

*1708*, 19th January. M. Q. is removed from the subahdāri of Orissā and appointed diwān of the Deccan. (*He was absent from Bengal throughout 1708 and 1709*).

v2.c45.s2.10

*1710*, c. 20th January, Diwān Ziāullah is killed by the naqdi soldiers in Murshidabad. On 20th February, Murshid Quli is appointed diwān of Bengal and also manager of Prince 'Azim-ush-shān's estates, with the rank of a three hazāri zāt (2,000 sawār), but not subahdār of Orissā.

v2.c45.s2.11

*1711*, 11th September. M. Q. is appointed faujdar of Midnāpur and of Hughli port *vice* Ziā-ud-din.

v2.c45.s2.12

*1713*, September. M. Q. made deputy subahdār of Bengal.

v2.c45.s2.13

*1714*, 6th May. M. Q. is also made subahdār of Orissā, with the title of Ja'far Khan.

v2.c45.s2.14

*1717*, 19th October. Emperor receives Ja'far Khan's nazarāna of one lakh rupees on appointment as full subahdār of Bengal, with the title of Mutaman-ul-mulk 'Ala-ud-daula Ja'far Khan Bahadur, Nasiri, Nāsir Jang.

v2.c45.s2.15

*1727*, 30th June. Ja'far Khan dies.

v2.c45.s2.16

Murshid Quli Khan was by birth a Brahman. As a boy, he was sold to Hāji Shafi' Isfahāni, who made him a Muslim with the name of Muhammad Hādi, brought him up like a son, and took him to Persia. He there grafted the refinement, orderliness and wisdom of the Persian race on the intelligence and industry of his Brahman stock. I am tempted to imagine that he was a South Indian Brahman, like another supremely exalted Hindu convert, Maqbul, whom Firuz Shāh Tughlaq cherished as the jewel of a minister, and to whom much of the success of that reign was due. This Shafi' Khan became *diwān-i-tan* of the empire of Delhi in 1668 and again in 1689, retiring in February 1690. In the interval he had been *diwān* of Bengal (in 1678 and 1680) and of the Deccan (1683-89). Thus Md. Hādi learnt the work of the *diwāni* department by practice under the best of masters. When Shafi' retired to Persia in 1690, his adopted son accompanied him, but returned to India after his patron's death (probably in 1696). Here he was employed for a short time by another Persian, Hāji 'Abdullah Khurāsāni the *diwān* of Berār. His extraordinary ability soon became known and the Emperor took Md. Hādi into his own service and appointed him *diwān* of Haidarabad and *faujdār* of Yelkondal (*c.* 1698). In this post, directly under the Emperor's eyes, he further heightened his reputation, and when a highly capable officer was needed for reforming the revenue administration of Bengal, Md. Hādi was selected by Aurangzib for the post (Nov. 1700).

v2.c45.s2.17

Thus Muhammad Hādi had forced himself up to the second highest place in the richest province of the Empire by sheer merit and in a very short time. Naturally he was regarded with envy, tinctured with contempt as for an upstart, by the old gang of lazy inefficient well-born hereditary official class. But the Emperor's unwavering trust stifled all opposition to Md. Hādi, and his power was increased year by year. The older officers and even princes of the blood learnt that to go against this *diwān* was to court their own disgrace at the hands of their supreme master.

v2.c45.s2.18

Although Murshid Quli Khan was not officially either *subahdār* or deputy *subahdār* of Bengal before 1713, his power was indisputable from the outset. As *diwān* he was the supreme head of the revenue administration in the province; in addition to which, as *faujdār* of Makhsusābād, Midnapur, Bardwān (1701) and later of Hughli, with his nominee in Sylhet, he exercised the executive functions of a district magistrate and criminal judge (excluding only crimes triable under the Muslim Canon Law and capital offences) over half the province.

v2.c45.s2.19

Murshid Quli being a *novum homo* was at first disobeyed and publicly slighted by the older class of officials, even of lower rank, especially the *Kokas* or sons of the wet-nurses of the Emperor's sons and grandsons. These men, on the strength of their personal influence in the royal harem, could always get letters of intercession from the princes and princesses to the Emperor against the diwān's decisions. But Murshid Quli was a strong man and knew his strength. The correspondence of Aurangzib presents us with an amusing picture of the Emperor forwarding these appeals to Murshid Quli but leaving him absolutely free to issue any orders he liked.

v2.c45.s2.20

Thus in Bengal, Murshid Quli Khan was left dominant. When he came to Bengal as diwān at the beginning of 1701, the far-flung and never-ending warfare in which Aurangzib had been engaged for the twenty years past had reduced the royal family, court and army to starvation. Salaries, both civil and military, had fallen into arrears for full three years, and the grain-dealers in the Deccan camp had refused further credit. On such a background the regular flow of one kror of rupees every year from Bengal which began in 1702 under Murshid Quli's management of the finances, made the new diwān appear as a life-saving angel in the eyes of the Emperor. His boundless confidence in this officer is reflected in his letters.

v2.c45.s2.21

Aurangzib to Murshid Quli.—"You have written, 'Partners in my work and other selfish people are openly boasting that (in their reports to the imperial Court) they would write whatever they thought proper; and the zamindars on the spreading of this news, are withholding the payment of their due revenue. If the Emperor does not remedy it, lakhs of rupees would again be lost (to the State) . . . . I have increased the cultivation of the country and gathered krors of rupees in revenue. But as selfish men are destroying my work, I pray some other servant may be appointed in my place.' (This threat of resignation had immediate effect; Aurangzib replied,—) "I do not see your point clearly. You are diwān and faujdār with full power, and nobody's allegation against you is acceptable to me. Why do you entertain doubts (about my trust in you) prompted by Satan? God guard us from such wickedness! Who are your 'partners' and what is their object? Keep in view my favour and instructions, give no place to apprehension in your heart, and exert yourself even more earnestly than before in collecting the revenue".¹

v2.c45.s2.22

¹ Ināyetullah's Ahkām, 218. The same assurance is repeated in another letter (Ibid, 220b), "Thank God! You are the object of the Emperor's favours and you should engage in doing your duties with perfect composure of mind. Protect the ryots and make them prosper."

v2.c45.s2.23

Aurangzib's admiration for Murshid Quli's ability and honesty was boundless. He wrote in 1704, "One and the same man is diwān of Bengal and Bihār, and nāzim and diwān of Orissa, with absolute authority. I myself have not the capacity for doing so much work; perhaps only "a man chosen by God" is gifted with the requisite ability. You ought to get reports (about M. Q's actual administration) from some impartial person by tactful persuasion. The nāzim of the subah cannot breathe (at ease) on observing (such accumulation of power in one hand.)” (‘Ināyet, Āhkām, 198.) Substantial proofs of the Emperor’s trust were received by Murshid Quli during Aurangzib’s reign. Owing to the extension of his functions, he received repeated promotions from his initial mansab of 900 zat (500 troopers.) His nominees were appointed to faujdāries setting aside the recommendations of the prince; e. g., Abdur Rahmān was appointed as dārogha of the nawwāra; two news-writers Salimullah and Md. Khalil were dismissed on his complaint; and a posting to Orissā was cancelled.

v2.c45.s2.24

In January 1704, fourteen relatives of Murshid Quli on migration from Irān reached Delhi, and at his request the Emperor granted mansabs to each of them according to his capacity, in Bengal. (‘Ināyet, Āhkām, 115a, 218b, 220a, 116.)

III. ‘Azim-ush-Shān and Murshid Quli at Variance

v2.c45.s3.1

Prince Muhammad ‘Azimuddin (generally known by his later title of ‘Azim-ush-shān, 1707) was the ablest of the sons of Bahādur Shāh I (the eldest surviving son of Aurangzib.) He had great intelligence and a strong will, but lacked diplomatic tact, the spirit of sustained work, and the power of managing a party. His governorship of Bengal extended from 1697 to 1712, but during the last nine years of this period he was an absentee and governed through agents only. Here he was known as lazy and covetous, his sole aim being to amass money from this rich province for supporting his own claim in the war of succession which, everybody knew, would break out in the near future, as the extremely aged Emperor Aurangzib could not last much longer. This motive of the prince was clearly detected by the French and English traders in Bengal.

v2.c45.s3.2

The easiest and longest-practised device for sucking the subject people was to conduct, on behalf of the governor, a trade monopoly in most necessaries of life and in many precious objects as well. It meant in effect the engrossing of merchandise at their places of origin or at the ports of unloading, and forcing them on the retail dealers at heightened prices. This evil practice had prevailed in Bengal from Shujā‘s time; Mir Jumla and Shāista Khan had indulged in it; and now ‘Azim’s officers plunged into it without moderation or shame. They called it sauda-i-khās or the personal trade of His Excellency. The report of it reached Aurangzib, and he sent the following letter to the prince :

v2.c45.s3.3

“My grandson ’Azim, like me forgetful of God the Karim (gracious)! It is not well to oppress the people who have been entrusted to us by the Creator, particularly it is a very wicked act on the part of the sons of kings. Ever bear in your mind the Prophet’s precepts on Truth—‘Death is an eternal verity (Haqq), so is Resurrection, so is the bridge across hell, so is the reckoning for your secret acts’. Consider yourself every hour as one destined to pass away, so that . . . the blossoms of your desires may not be withered by the sighs of the oppressed. Whence have you learnt this sauda-i-khās (private trade), which is only another name for pure insanity? Not certainly from your grand-father, nor from your father. Better turn your thoughts away from it.” (Sauda in Arabic means madness.)

v2.c45.s3.4

His private trade being thus stopped, ‘Azimuddin could make money only by laying his hands on the State revenue and squeezing the people. His underlings continued to make illegal exactions on the peasants and traders and thus reduced the legitimate income of the Exchequer at its source. The prince also overdrew his sanctioned pay and allowances. Murshid Quli Khan restored order to the finances of Bengal by at once stopping such irregular action. He had to save every rupee and create a surplus for remittance to the starving imperial Court and army in the Deccan. The prince, enraged by the strictness of the dīwān, inspired the rowdy cash-paid horsemen (naqdī) of the capital to set upon Murshid Quli on the pretext of demanding their arrears of pay and killing him in the confusion. It is a fact that the new dīwān was at first unable to pay the soldiers’ dues, because, as he explained to the Emperor, the collectors of the land set apart for this purpose had peculated the rent received by them, and Murshid Quli’s first care being to accumulate a treasure for despatch to the Emperor, he had been delayed in clearing the soldiers’ dues.

v2.c45.s3.5

One morning as Murshid Quli was riding out in the streets of Dacca to pay his daily respects to the governor, ’Abdul Wāhid, the naqdī captain with a party of his men (secretly instigated by ‘Azimuddin) crowded round him, clamouring for instant payment. The dīwān, who was ever on the alert and travelled with an armed escort, boldly faced the mob, broke through their line and riding up to ‘Azim-ud-din’s court, openly accused him of having inspired this plot against his life,¹ and defied him to do his worst then and there. Laying his hand on his belt-dagger, he cried out to the prince, "All this tumult is your doing. Abstain from such acts, or here is my life and here your life." The prince, confounded by the unexpected failure of his plot and trembling in fear of the Emperor's wrath, at once climbed down. He called up 'Abdul Wāhid, censured him, and tried to reassure the diwān. Murshid Quli immediately afterwards went to his office and calling for the accounts of this corps, issued orders for the payment of their full dues on the zamindārs and at once dismissed the whole force from service.

v2.c45.s3.6

¹ We find that on 1st July 1699, an order was issued by the Emperor reducing ‘Azimuddin’s rank from 10-hazārī zāt (6,000 tr.) to 9-hazārī zāt (5,000 tr.) But it could not have been in punishment for this plot, which occurred 3 years later. Evidently it was for the sauda-i-khās.

v2.c45.s3.7

He then caused a detailed report of the occurrence to be entered in the official newsletter (wāqia') and sent to the Emperor. In order to find safety in a place at a distance from the prince, Murshid Quli chose for his residence the town of Makhsusābād, in the centre of Bengal and more conveniently situated than Dacca for keeping in touch with all parts of the province. Here he transferred his office with the entire diwāni staff and the agents of the zamindārs in attendance on him. The name of the city was, many years later changed with the Emperor's permission to Murshid-ābād. The Emperor censured the prince and warned him that if a hair of Murshid Quli Khan's head were injured, retribution for it would be exacted from 'Azim-ud-din. An imperial rescript informed the diwān of Bengal, "The nāzim and other officers appointed to the subah will behave more gently (to you) than before, otherwise they would be reprimanded". ('Ināy, Āhkām, 155).

v2.c45.s3.8

At the end of the year 1702, news was received of the death of 'Askar Khan the subahdār of Orissā. The vacant post was conferred on prince 'Azim-uddin, but a fortnight later on the representation of Murshid Quli, the prince's appointment was cancelled and the Bengal diwān (who was also the Orissā diwān) was given charge of the executive administration of the latter province too, though his elevation was at first concealed by calling him nāib subahdār and faujdār (or hāris, i. e., defender) of Orissā (21 Jan. 1703). After some months the mask was thrown off, and he was declared subahdār. At the same time (21 January 1703), prince 'Azim was given in addition the subahdāri of Bihār vice Shamsher Khan. Six months later (29th July) the prince was ordered to leave his son Farrukh Siyar as his deputy in Bengal, with half his contingent, and himself remove to Bihār. At first he went to Rājmahal, but finding the royal quarters built there by Shujā' in ruin and the climate bad, he removed to Pātna and made it his official capital. This city he was permitted to name 'Azimābād after himself, 1704. ('Ināyet. Āhkām. 117b. 116b. 220a.)

v2.c45.s3.9

From Patna the Prince wrote to his grandfather in a tone of injured virtue, “As my subahs are situated far away from the Emperor’s presence, my calumniators get opportunities in various ways (for traducing me.) If I am given charge of subahs near the imperial camp, the truth or falsity of every man’s words (against me) would become manifest to His Majesty.”

v2.c45.s3.10

But no injustice was ever done to ’Azim-ud-din. He was commended in a *farmān* and his rank was increased by 2,000 troopers for his success against Sudhisht (the son of Dhir Ujjainia, a refractory zamindar of Shāhābād district) and other rebels of Bihār (in 1705). When at the end of the year 1706 he left Patna for the imperial camp, he carried away with himself about eight *krors* of rupees which he had succeeded in accumulating during his nine years’ rule over Bengal and Bihar.

IV. Career of Murshid Quli After Aurangzib's Death

v2.c45.s4.1

Murshid Quli Khan enjoyed supreme influence with the imperial Government while Aurangzib lived. He was then a commander of 1500 in nominal rank (*zāt mansab*), and neither subahdār nor deputy subahdār of Bengal; but though Farrukh Siyar lived at Dacca as the agent (*nāib*) of his father ’Azim-ud-din, the absentee subahdār of the province, that young prince was under orders of Aurangzib to obey the *diwān* as his guardian. After Aurangzib’s death and the battle of Jajau (8 June 1707), the new Emperor Bahādur Shah I, redistributed the offices of State. His son ’Azim-ud-din was created ’Azim-ush-shān, and again appointed subahdār of Bengal and Bihār; but he lived with his father for the rest of his life and governed these two provinces through his sons Farrukh Siyar and Karim-ud-din respectively as *nāib* subahdārs. At the beginning of the new reign, as a temporary arrangement, Murshid Quli had been made deputy governor of Bengal (15 July to 18 Nov. 1707). But ’Azim-ush-shān soon began to dominate the will of his soft and aged father, and paid his hated rival in Bengal fully back for all that he had suffered silently in the days of his stern grandfather. Murshid Quli was replaced as *nāib* *nāzim* of Bengal by Farrukh Siyar (18 Nov.), as *diwān* of Bengal by Ziāullah Khan (18 Oct.), and as subahdār of Orissa by Farrukh Siyar (19 Jan. next year, 1708). He was transferred as *diwān* to the Deccan and thus kept out of Bengal for full two years, 1708 and 1709.

v2.c45.s4.2

About 20th January 1710, Ziāullah the *diwān* of Bengal was killed in the streets of Murshidābād by the mutinous *naqdi* troopers and the *diwānship* was conferred on Murshid Quli (20. Feb.) with the high rank of a 3-hazāri zāt (2,000 troopers) and the honour of kettledrums (April).

v2.c45.s4.3

Throughout Bahādur Shāh's reign (which ended on 17 Feb. 1712) 'Azim-ush-shān remained officially subahdār of Bengal, and when he was killed (7th March 1712) and Jahāndār Shāh gained the throne no new subahdār reached this province, but Farrukh Siyar continued as deputy governor. After Murshid Quli's dismissal from Bengal, Sarbuland Khan had been sent by the imperial Government to manage Bengal on behalf of the prince, (appointed January, 1709, arrived May, dismissed November, the same year.) Farrukh Siyar was reappointed nāib nāzim in Nov. 1709. Next came Sipahdār Khan (surnamed Khan-i-'Ālam II, Khan-i-Jahān II, Dilir Jang, 'Izzudaulah), appointed nāib Nāzim in January 1711. During Jahāndār Shāh's short reign (1712) Khan-i-Jahān continued to act as subahdār of Bengal, but was removed from that office on the accession of Farrukh Siyar (at Delhi, 9 January, 1713) and the viceroyalty of Bengal was granted on paper to the new Emperor's infant son, Farkhunda Siyar, with Murshid Quli Khan as his deputy. The infant died in a few months (2 May 1713), and then the Bengal subahdāri was conferred on Mir Jumla (U'bāidullah Muzaffar Jang, Khān-i-Khānān, Mu'tamid-ul-mulk), in absentia, with Murshid Quli as his deputy. Mir Jumla continued to stay at Delhi Court and was given congé for his charge on Dec. 1714, but after reaching Patna en route (18 June 1715) did not proceed further, and finally sneaked back to Delhi (10 January 1716). Murshid Quli Khan (now officially known as 'Alaulmulk Ja'far Khan, Nasiri, Nāsir Jang, Mutaman-ul-mulk) was formally appointed subahdār of Bengal shortly before August 1717, and continued at the post till his death on 30th June 1727.

v2.c45.s4.4

Bahādur Shāh's death (Feb. 1712) was followed by a war of succession among his four sons in Lahore, which left the throne to Jahāndār Shāh, the sole survivor among them (entered Delhi March 1712). But Farrukh Siyar, the son of 'Azim-ush-shān, then at Patna, made a claim to the throne and sent an officer to Murshid Quli to demand the government treasure in Bengal. The diwān very properly refused, on the ground that as a servant he owed his obedience to that Timurid prince who was then sitting on the Delhi throne, and Farrukh Siyar was a mere competitor. Money was urgently needed by Farrukh Siyar for his supreme adventure, and Bengal was the only mine of silver left in the Mughal Empire. So, the prince sent a small detachment from his contingent in Patna, under Timur Beg, to march against Murshid Quli and bring back either his treasure or his head. This detachment received additions on the way (under Mirzā Ja‘far, Mirzā Rizā and Gāndāra Singh) making it 2,000 horse and 1000 foot. Their chief commander was Rashid Khan (a brother of Mirzā Ajmeri Afrāsiyāb Khan, the Kokah of Prince Md. Akbar). In a long drawn and changeful battle fought on the Karimābād plain outside Murshidābād, about the middle of May 1712, Rashid Khan was killed and his army routed by Mir Bangāli (the diwān’s general), though the latter’s colleague Sayyid Ānwār fell on the field. To avenge this reverse, Farrukh Siyar detached another force (intended to be 5,000 strong) from Patna under Ibrāhim Husain. But that general was halted at the western frontier of Bengal by reason of the Sikrigali pass having been blocked by Khān-i-Jahān. Meantime the threat to Farrukh Siyar’s partisans near Agra by Jahāndār Shāh’s army under his son, forced the former prince to recall Ibrāhim Husain and proceed to the western front with all his men, (left Patna on 12th September, 1712).

v2.c45.s4.5

When Farrukh Siyar gained the throne (at Delhi, Feb. 1713) Murshid Quli loyally sent the provincial tribute to the new Emperor. He was confirmed in the diwāni of Bengal, and also (in September 1713) made deputy subahdār of Bengal, while next year (6 May 1714) the subahdāri of Orissā was again conferred on him, with the title of Ja‘far Khan. But the full subahdāri of Bengal came to him only in September 1717, as his thanks-offering for the post (one lakh of rupees) was received at the imperial Court on the 19th October of that year.¹ Early in the third year of Farrukh Siyar’s reign (Jan 1715) we learn that Murshid Quli had already remitted to the new Emperor Rs 2,40,68,000 in all, including the land revenue due to the crown, the yield of the jāgir of Mir Jumla (a Court favourite and nominal subahdār of Bengal), the reserve in the provincial treasury, and the tributes received from zamindārs. (Akhbārāt).

v2.c45.s4.6

¹ A popular error must be corrected here. Murshid Quli was never subahdār or deputy subahdār of Bihār, but only diwān of that province, and that too under Aurangzib, with whose death his connection with Bihar ceased. So long as ‘Azim-ud-din was in Bihār (i. e., to the end of 1706), M. Q. did not personally visit Bihār even once. Ināy, Ahk. 222a.

v2.c45.s4.7

We shall now turn to Murshid Quli Khan’s work in the province. After his reappointment as diwān in February 1710, he moved the imperial Court and secured (on 11th Sept. 1711) an order placing the collectorship of customs at Hughli port and the faujdāri of the Midnapur district, then held by Ziā-ud-din Khan, again under the provincial diwān’s control, from which they had been removed and placed directly under the Central Government two years before.

v2.c45.s4.8

This Ziā-ud-din was a nephew of Fāzil Khan (Mullā 'Ala-ul-mulk Tuni, a most learned Persian scholar and one of the highest ministers of Shah Jahān, who died as Aurangzib's grand wazir in June 1663) and a son-in-law of Burhān-ud-din (Fāzil Khan II,) the Lord High Steward of Aurangzib. In pride of his high connections, Ziāuddin publicly defied and slighted the upstart diwān of Bengal. In this foolish game his henchman was a Bengali named Kinkar Sen (his head clerk). When Murshid Quli's agent Wali Beg approached Hugli, Ziāuddin refused to give up his charge or to render accounts of the custom collections during his tenure, but entrenched himself with his followers. Wali Beg established his own camp near the tank of Devidās, a mile and a half in front of his rival's position, outside Chandernagar. Here the two parties remained quarrelling for over a year, but only light skirmishes were fought by a few men. Ziā-ud-din secretly bought arms and hired mercenaries from the French and Dutch traders of the neighbourhood. The English of Calcutta wisely stood neutral, and repeatedly tried to effect a friendly compromise between the two parties, but without success. On 10th November 1712, Mir Ābu Turāb arrived near Hugli at the head of reinforcements sent by Murshid Quli, but could not dislodge Ziāuddin from Hugli. At last on 22nd April 1713, the dismissed officer received news that the Emperor had appointed him diwān of the western Karnātak, and he left Hugli at the end of June when Murshid Quli's representative got possession of the port. When Murshid Quli was firmly in the saddle, he crushed Kinkar Sen, like a gravel (*kankar*) under his shoe,—to use his own simile.¹

v2.c45.s4.9

¹ "Ja'far Khan apparently forgave Kinkar Sen, but bore a grudge in his heart. He appointed him 'Uhdadār of the chākla of Hugli, and at the end of the year when he came to Murshidābād, confined him on pretence of malversation. He ordered him to be fed with nothing but buffaloes' milk and salt, which occasioning a disorder in the bowels, he died soon after his return to Hugli". (Salimullah)

V. Murshid Quli's Revenue System and Its Effect

v2.c45.s5.1

When Murshid Quli Khan first came to Bengal he found that the Government itself received no income from the land revenue of the province, and all the country was allotted to the officers as jāgir in lieu of their pay. Thus the only money that came into the State treasury was the custom duty; hence, the pressure exercised by the subahdārs and diwāns of Bengal on the European traders, who were the biggest dealers in the province and bought and sold goods worth millions of rupees every year.

v2.c45.s5.2

Murshid Quli adopted a twofold plan for increasing the revenue, —First, to turn all the officers' jāgirs in Bengal into khālsa, directly under the Crown collectors, and give the dispossessed officers in exchange jāgirs in the poor, wild and unsubdued province of Orissā. Secondly, to give contracts for the collection of the land revenue (the ijāra system.) Before this the State used to get its dues from the land in the lump, from the old landed proprietors of Bengal, called zamindārs. Some of them were decayed scions of old Hindu ruling houses, but most were the descendants of the hereditary local officials and barons of the old Hindu and Muslim dynasties of the days before the coming of Mughal sovereignty. Like all aristocracies, these men had now fallen into indolence, negligence, and improvidence, and the State could have no certainty of collection or regularity of income from the land if the old zamindārs continued in charge of it. The direct collection of land-rent from the actual cultivators by State officials, which prevailed in Upper India under Todar Mal's zabti system, was impossible in Bengal. Hence, Murshid Quli began to collect the land revenue through ijāra-dārs or contractors, like the fermiers généraux of France, by taking security bonds from them. This was his māl zāmini system. Many of the older zamindārs remained, but under the thumbs of these new ijāra-dārs, and in time they were crushed out of existence. In the second or third generation, these contractors came to be called zamindārs and many of them were dignified with the title of Rajas and Mahārajas, though not of princely birth, but merely glorified civil servants paid by a percentage on their collections. Indeed, under Murshid Quli and the Permanent Settlement of Cornwallis, our hereditary landed families of historical origin (except a few small fry) were extinguished and their places were taken by new men of the official and capitalist classes. In choosing his contractors, Murshid Quli always gave preference to Hindus and to new men of that sect, as most of the Muslim collectors before his time were found to have embezzled their collections and it was impossible to recover the money from them.¹ He thus created a new landed

v2.c45.s5.3

¹ Salimullah writes,—"Murshid Quli Khan employed none but Bengali Hindus in the collection of the revenues, because they were most easily compelled by punishment to discover their malpractices; and nothing was to be apprehended from their pusillanimity."

v2.c45.s5.4

In the letters of Aurangzib drafted by Ināyetullah we find the names of some of the Muslim collectors who had embezzled Government revenue, viz., (119b) Md. Khalil and Md. Raza (the sons of Husain Khan) ex-faujdārs of Ghorāghāt and Hughli respectively (also 218b), (222b). Mukarramat Khan (late diwān). Murshid Quli wrote to the Emperor (220a), "The mahals which I had entrusted to certain officers for meeting the pay of the troops. . . have been unsurped (i. e., misappropriated) by them . . . The local officials of Bengal wish to peculate the money assigned for the payment of those whose salary is due from the State".

v2.c45.s5.5

aristocracy in Bengal, whose position was confirmed and made hereditary by Lord Cornwallis.

v2.c45.s5.6

Yet another change in the Hindu society of Bengal began with Murshid Quli Khan’s coming as permanent dīwān, in 1710. Hitherto all the higher offices in the Mughal administration, not only in the army and law, but also in the revenue and accounts departments and even in the supply and secretariat branches of the army and navy in this province, had been filled by men imported from Agra and the Panjab, who did not settle in Bengal, but came and went away with the changing subahdārs. (see, ch. 12, sec. 3, p. 223.) This flow of talent from the west was interrupted and finally stopped when after Shah ‘Ālam’s death (1712) the central power in Delhi disintegrated through palace-revolutions and an independent provincial dynasty grew up in Bengal, like those of Hyderabad and Lucknow. Under Murshid Quli Khan and the succeeding Nawabs, Bengali Hindus, by the force of their talents and mastery of Persian, came to occupy the highest civil posts under the subahdār and many of the military posts also under the faujdārs. There had been Bengali Hindu dīwāns and qānungoes, well versed in the Persian language and in Muslim Court etiquette, as early as the days of Husain Shah (c. 1510). Under Murshid Quli such men grew prosperous enough to found new zamindāri houses. Such ennobled civil servants came from the Brāhman, Vaidya, Kāyastha, and even the confectioner castes—whose progeny are now called Rajas, Under the later Nawabs, more than one Bengali Hindu held the rank of Rāy-i-Rāyān (the sanskrit equivalent of Khān-i-Khānān) with the function of the Chancellor of Exchequer. So many Bengalis, of all the above three castes, claim descent from Rāy-i-Rāyāns that these ancestors must have been “chancellors” only to district magistrates, like the local Nawabs of Dacca and Purneā. Kāyasth Ghoshes of Gāvā (Barisal) are called Dastidārs, from having once held charge of the lights of the Bengal fleet under the Nawābi. Old official titles like Bakhshi, (pay-master), Sarkār, Qānungo, Shāhna (police prefect), Chākladār, Tarafdār, Munshi, Lashkar, and Khan (!) are still borne by Bengali Hindu families, reminding us of their ancestors’ careers in the age of the Nawābs.

v2.c45.s5.7

Apart from his industrious attention to details and honest control of the finances, Murshid Quli Khan owed his success in enhancing the revenue collection to his practice of draconic severity and bestial torture on the defaulters. Salimullah, only one generation after this Nawāb’s death, thus describes his methods:

v2.c45.s5.8

“On the last day of the month he exacted from the Khālsa, jāgir and other departments, the amount due, to uttermost dām.

v2.c45.s5.9

He put strict muhasils (bailiffs) over the mutasaddis, ’āmils, qānungoes and other officers, confining them in the kachari or in the diwān khānah of the Chihil Situn (Hall of Forty Pillars) in Murshidabad, where they were refused food and drink, and not suffered to perform the other necessary calls of nature. To these severities were added the cruelties of Nāzir Ahmad (his major domo); this man used to suspend the zamindars by the heels and bastinado them with a switch . . . And he also used to have them flogged till they consented to pay the money . . . When Murshid Quli Khan discovered that an ’āmil or zamindār had dissipated the revenue and was unable to make good the deficiency, he compelled the offenders, his wife and children to turn Muhammadans.

v2.c45.s5.10

“Sayyid Razi Khan (the husband of Murshid Quli’s granddaughter) was appointed deputy diwān of Bengal. This man exercised several new species of severity on the zamindārs and ’āmils who fell in arrears. He ordered a pit to be dug, about the height of a man, which was filled with human excrement in a state of putrefaction . . . The zamindārs or ’āmils who failed in their payments . . . were ducked in this pit . . . Because in the Hindavi language Vaikunth signifies Paradise, Sayyid Razi Khan called this infernal pit by that name”.

v2.c45.s5.11

This radical change in the revenue system of Bengal was not effected without opposition. Complaints were made by the dismissed collectors to the Emperor. In one “letter by order” from the imperial Government to the Bengal diwān we read, “The Emperor has learnt from an outside source that you are distributing the parganas of crownland etc. in ijāra,—which in the language of that province means farming the revenue to contractors (māl-zāmini) and that these contractors are practising all kinds of oppression on the weak and the peasantry, so that the cultivation of the parganas has almost reached the point of desolation, and that if this continues for one year more the peasants would be ruined”. (Ināy, Ahkām, 217b). The diwān in reply explained his system of revenue settlement, how “after reaching Dacca he took security-bonds from the contractors of the revenue-collection and fixed the periodical instalments payable by them at the prayer of the cultivators and following the practice of the late diwān Kifāyet Khan”. The Emperor gave full authority to the man on the spot, and assured Murshid Quli, “You are diwān with full power for the three provinces and also for the estates of the prince. Act to the satisfaction of the governor and with his advice, in any way that you know to be most advisable, proper, and conducive to economy . . . I have heard that you have administered Orissa better than your predecessors and succeeded in collecting tribute from the zamindārs. You are highly praised for it". ('Ināy, Aḥkām, 220a).

v2.c45.s5.12

Salimullah in his *Tārīkh-i-Bangāla* (written about 1763) fully describes how the new system worked:— "In order to make a full investigation of the value of the lands, he placed the principal zamindārs in close confinement, and gave the collection into the hands of expert *'āmils* or collectors . . . He also ordered the whole of the lands to be remeasured; and having ascertained the quantity of fallow and waste ground belonging to every village, he caused a considerable quantity of it to be brought into cultivation; the collectors were authorized to make money advances (*taqavi*) to the poorer husbandmen for purchasing stock and seed-grain. When he had thus entirely dispossessed the zamindārs of all interference in the collection, he assigned to them a subsistence allowance called *nānkar* land, to which was added the privilege of hunting, cutting wood in the forests (*bankar*), and of fishing in the lakes and rivers (*jal-kar*.) After some years, his agents, in order to enhance the collection, resumed to the State the subsistence-lands of the zamindārs and by other kinds of exaction raised the surplus revenue of the province from one kror and thirty lakhs¹ of rupees to one kror and fifty lakhs. On his assumption of the diwāni he had made a careful cadastral survey, by which he gained accurate information about the total areas under the heads cultivated, fallow, and barren, and also prepared a comparative estimate of the past and present (*hast-o-bud*) revenue yield of every rural unit."

v2.c45.s5.13

¹ This was the theoretical or standard total of the revenue (*jama' kāmil*) of Bengal as we find in the official manuals of the empire, called *Dastur-ul-aml*. But in January 1715 Murshid Quli was informed by his head assistant (*peshkār*) that the revenue of the subah was one kror and two lakhs of rupees; out of which 74 lakhs came from the Crownlands, 18 lakhs from the *jāgir* of Mir Jumla (the nominal subahdār), and the balance was the income of the *jāgirs* of the mansabdārs and the fleet or *nawwāra*. (*Akhbārāt*.) In the above is two lakhs (*du*) a copyist's error for thirty lakhs (*si*) ? [J. S.]

v2.c45.s5.14

Another cause of the revenue increase was his administrative economy, the collection-charges were cut down to the bone (which meant in actual effect the still greater squeezing of the peasantry) and the force that preserved internal peace over this vast province was reduced to 2,000 horsemen and 4000 infantry only. This sufficed for the purpose, while he lived and his name held a fretful realm in awe, but brought in chaos when the country's sleep was broken by rebellion or invasion.

v2.c45.s5.15

The year 1717 marks a turning point not only in the career of Murshid Quli Khan, but also in the history of Bengal. He was now at last firmly in the saddle as the supreme and *sole* authority in Bengal. The fainéant Emperors in far-off Delhi were too much entangled in palace intrigues and revolutions to have the power, even if they had the wish, to actively interfere in the administration of Bengal; they left everything to the subahdār so long as the annual surplus revenue of the province (one kror and some lakhs of rupees) was regularly paid to them.

v2.c45.s5.16

Hence, Bengal was at last freed from the double set of leeches who had been "sucking the people",¹ one the temporary governor bent solely upon making his own pile before being transferred from Bengal, and the other the diwān loyally trying to collect the revenue to the last pice. The gross fiscal tyranny and illegal exaction of which the French merchants at Chandernagar complain so often in their letters during 'Ainuddin's governorship (1700-1706) and which "made the province depopulated, silver scarce, and trade difficult (as they wrote), were now placed under check, because there was only one master to be satisfied. Murshid Quli as subahdār demanded only the standard revenue. In realising the State demand under this head, he was severe and even barbarous in his methods of cruelty, but he collected only the regular or legitimate amount of revenue but tormented only those contractors who had defaulted,—not every "farmer of the revenue". And he forbade all the illegal cesses or extra-revenue exactions and trade monopolies practised by his predecessors for three generations before. His own annual surplus accumulations were modest sums; not comparable to Shāista Khan's nine krores in 18 years, Khan Jahān Bahādur Khan's two krores in one year, or Prince 'Azim's eight krores in 9 years. Moreover, this saving was effected by Murshid Quli's economy in administrative expenditure, his personal abstention from every kind of luxury and pomp, and not by squeezing the rich by illegal exaction. Thus, under his rule as well as Alivardi's (1716-1756), the Bengal people gained a breathing time and a chance of prosperity.

v2.c45.s5.17

¹ French merchants at Hugli to the Compagnie in Paris, 18 Dec. 1701.—"Le Sultan Azim-ud-din et le divan.—ne reculant devant aucun moyen pour 'sucer les peuples'". Kaep. 524.

v2.c45.s5.18

It must also be borne in mind in mitigation of our censure of Murshid Quli's severity that the internal peace which he sternly enforced on the country increased the people's tax-paying power and therefore a larger revenue in his last ten years did not necessarily mean any increased extortion.

VI. Zamindārs of Bengal

v2.c45.s6.1

In his final revenue settlement, Murshid Quli divided the entire land of Bengal into 13 circles (chāklas) which were subdivided into thirteen tracts under collection by jāgirdārs and twenty-five areas reserved as Khālsa (Crownland) farmed out to contractors. We have seen how Islām Khan Chishti and his immediate successors had made the Rajshahi and Pabna districts (covering north and central Bengal) into regular fiscal units of the Mughal administration; so, too, in Murshid Quli Khan’s time, Mymensingh and Alapsingh in the northeast and Jessore-Khulna in the extreme south became regularly revenue-paying areas under the Crown.

v2.c45.s6.2

Among the new zamindārs created by Murshid Quli the most fortunate was Raghunandan, a Brahman of the Vārendra section, who had been brought up in the house of another Vārendra Brahman the Raja of Puthiā (in the Rajshahi district), but after coming to Murshidabad to seek his fortune got a small post in the revenue department. Here he showed such intelligence, industry, suppleness and skill in intrigue that he rose with phenomenal rapidity, till at last he became Murshid Quli’s most trusted counsellor in revenue matters. He used this position to get many landed estates transferred to his brother Rāmjivan, especially the Bhushnā pargana after the fall of Sitārām (1714). Thus was founded the Nātor rāj, which rivalled the Bardwān rāj for the premier position among the Bengal zamindārs in the last days of the Nawābi, but has been woefully shorn of most of its limbs since then through folly and sloth. The ablest servant of Raghunandan was Dayārām Rāy (of the tili caste), who acted for his chief in the overthrow of Sitārām, and enriched himself in the sack of that Raja’s capital. He was the founder of the Dighāpatiyā rāj (Rajshahi district). Another officer of Nātor got the pickings when the Nātor zamindāri broke up under the incompetent successor of Rāni Bhawāni, and he founded the Narāil rāj (Dakhin Rārhi Kāyasth caste).

v2.c45.s6.3

Two zamindār houses of older origin than Nātor still remain in Rajshahi, but now in a very shrunken condition. They are both of the same Vārendra Brāhman caste, and hold (1) Tāhirpur, which once claimed to be among the Twelve Bhuiyās, and (2) Puthiā. Two more Vārendra Brāhman families owe their elevation to aristocratic rank to Murshid Quli Khan. Srikrishna (title Hāldār, short for Hāvladār) whose ancestor had gained the zamindāri of Karoi (in Taraf, Rājshāhi, now included in Bogra district), and took lease of the Selbarsh pargana (c. 1710-15). As a qānungo he gained notable success in suppressing refractory zamindārs and collecting the Government revenue in full, and was rewarded with the title of Talāpātra and made Chaudhuri of Mymensingh (c. 1718), pargana Mominshāhi. That district was then in a primitive wild condition, with no roads, no civilised population, no industry except a rude form of husbandry and cattle-raising. The people were mostly half savage Mongoloid tribesmen. But Srikrishna proved an improving landlord; he developed his estate by settling on it many Brāhman and Kāyastha families from western Bengal by grants of land and thus supplied teachers, priests and civilised administrators to that wilderness. He cleared the jungle, dug canals, raised embankments, planted agricultural colonies in the vast untilled areas, and set up local marts for the produce. Thus the yield of the pargana greatly increased. Srikrishna’s eldest son Chānd Rāy was placed by Alivardi Khan at the head of his Khālsa department; and he secured for his father the Zafar Shāhi pargana, west of the Brahmaputra (in the Ghorāghāt chākla),—which was similarly developed by the same active and enlightened owner. His endowments of land to Muslim saints and mosques, as well as to Hindu temples and priests, were wisely designed to elevate the intellectual and religious life of the people. (Died c. 1758.) The founder of the Muktāgāchā family (now known as the Maharajas of Mymensingh) was Srikrishna Āchārya Chaudhury, another revenue-official of the Nawāb and of the same Vārendra Brāhman caste, He secured the Ālapsingh pargana.

v2.c45.s6.4

Of the great or old historical zamindāris that survived up to Murshid Quli’s time, two were preserved by him, namely Birbhum (under Asadullah Khan, who was universally respected for his high character and acts of piety) and Bishnupur (under the Malla Hāmbir Rājas, whose country was too full of hills and jungles and too poor in natural resources to be a profitable conquest). But Uday Nārāyan, the last descendant of the ancient lords of greater Rajshahi (about three times the area of the present Rajshahi district) died in this Nawāb’s time and his estates were parcelled out to new men.

v2.c45.s6.5

As distinct from zamindārs, three ruling houses were made to pay regular tribute to the Bengal subahdār:

v2.c45.s6.6

(1) Kuch Bihār, which by the treaty of 1711 ceded the three chāklas of Fathpur, Qāzirhāt and Kānkinā, besides Bodā Pātgrām and Purbabhāg, while tribute was promised for some former Kuch areas in the modern Rangpur district.

v2.c45.s6.7

(2) Tipperah, whose Raja used formerly to menace Mughal Sylhet, now became submissive. And so also (3) the hill Raja of Jaintiā. Early in his career in Bengal, Murshid Quli had suppressed rebels in Chandrakonā (evidently the remnant of Rahim Afghan’s partisans) and in Morang (through Purnia).

v2.c45.s6.8

But one among the zamindārs crushed by Murshid Quli Khan deserves our notice because his meteoric rise and fall has placed him by the side of Pratāpāditya as the foremost tragic figures in the history and popular tradition of this province. Sitārām Rāy of Bhushnā, an Uttar Rārhi Kāyastha, and the son of the Hindu collector under the Muslim faujdār of Bhushnā (16 miles east of Māgurā in the Khulnā district), took a lease of the Naldi pargana (modern Narāil) from the Bengal subahdār, promising to pay the revenue regularly and to suppress the rebel Afghans and bandit gangs of that tract (c. 1686.) His strong and able rule greatly increased his wealth and power and he formed the nucleus of a kingdom, which grew up as he added more parganas by farming their revenue from the Bengal governor. Many adventurers were attracted by his fame as a successful leader and good paymaster and he formed a fairly strong army under some very devoted and heroic lieutenants. At the same time he kept the governor at Dacca satisfied through his tactful Court-agent, occasionally paying some money and reporting his suppression of robbers and rebels. He is even said to have secured an imperial farman and the title of Raja by paying tribute to the Emperor of Delhi. To keep up his new dignity he founded a capital at the village of Bāgjāni (10 miles from Bhushnā) and named it Muhammadpur (in honour of a Muslim saint.) This place he fortified by means of long earthen embankments and a fosse, while vast marshes kept invasion out on two sides, and the river Madhumati formed a natural barrier on the east side. Here he built many temples, palaces, offices and store-rooms and stables and dug tanks of fresh water. In pride of power, he humbled and robbed the smaller zamindārs of the country round and stopped sending any revenue to the subahdārs. His success was made easier by the supine rule of Ibrāhim Khan (1689-1697) and the friction between Murshid Quli and ‘Azim-ush-shān, which lasted till 1710. At last in 1713 when he killed Sayyid Abu Turāb, the faujdār of Hugli, Murshid Quli could no longer overlook his audacity. A strong force was detached under Murshid Quli’s relative Bakhsh ‘Ali Khan (newly appointed faujdār of Bhushnā); and with the help of all the neighbouring zamindārs’ levies, Sitārām was overwhelmed and captured with his family, and his capital was sacked (Feb-March 1714). Thus fell the last Hindu kingdom in Bengal.

First 74 of 107 passages. Read on