History of the Qaraunah Turks in India c11.155

c11.155

arrears for several years past, and the Sultan now found time to appoint efficient tax-collectors to realise it with the utmost severity. But disobedience was in his eyes a greater crime than default in the payment of revenue, and he proceeded with his usual energy to punish the miscreants and their associates. The royal forces were left free to engage themselves in plunder, and under royal connivance they levied a heavy blackmail upon the people of Surat and Cambay. Those who had attacked Malik Maqbūl together with the amirs, who had openly or secretly countenanced their misbehaviour, were punished and as a result of these proceedings many people innocent as well as guilty lost their lives.