History of Aurangzib, Based on Original Sources v5.c83.s3: § 3. Friction between the English traders and the Mughal officials in Bengal.
History of Aurangzib, Based on Original Sources v5.c83.s3
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§ 3. Friction between the English traders and the Mughal officials in Bengal.
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In 1681 the Hughli agency was made independent of Madras, and placed under a Governor and Council. William Hedges, the first governor and agent of Bengal, arrived at Hughli on 24th August, 1682. But the Directors changed their policy soon
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has been drawn by Talish in his Continuation. (Bodleian MS. 589.)
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afterwards, and in 1684 the Bengal establishments were again placed under Madras. In the meantime, the differences between the English traders and the local Mughal officers had come to a head. "When Hedges reached Hughli in 1682, he found that the general trade there was almost at a standstill...... 'The several affronts, insolences, and abuses daily put upon us by Balchand (the superintendent of customs at Hughli) being grown insufferable, the Agent and Council made use of divers expedients for redress of their grievances ; but all means proving ineffectual it was agreed in consultation that the only expedient now left was for the Agent to go himself in person to the Nawab and Diwan at Dacca,...to make some settled adjustment concerning the customs.' "
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Arriving at Dacca on 25th October, Hedges spent a month and a half in negotiations and returned with promises from Shaista Khan, the *subahdar*, that he would procure a *farman* from the Emperor in favour of the English, take off the claim to 5 p.c. duty on all the treasure imported since 1679, and remove the interdiction of English trade throughout Bengal. But nothing practically resulted from this mission. The local officials at Hughli continued to stop the Company's boats and seize their goods. In vain Hedges offered large sums of money in order to be excused the payment of customs.
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At last the English traders lost all patience with the Mughal Government. "Experience soon showed that treaties were of no avail against the lawlessness of the local officials. It was not that the Mughal Government would not protect the foreign merchants against oppression and wrong. It could not. Whatever control it had, it was gradually losing." The Company, therefore, decided to protect itself by force, break with the Indian rulers, and seize and fortify some convenient place on the Indian coast where their trade would be safe from molestation. This war actually broke out in 1686.
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§ 4. The grievances of the English traders examined.
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The complaints of the English traders against the local agents of the Mughal Government were three:—
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(i) The demand of an *ad valorem* duty on the actual merchandise imported, instead of the lump sum of Rs. 3,000 per annum into which it had been commuted during the viceroyalty of Prince Shuja, and also the enhancement of the rate of duty from time to time. The English also claimed that Aurangzib's *farman* of 15th March 1680 entitled them, on the payment of a consolidated duty of 3½ p. c. at Surat to import goods and to trade absolutely free of customs and other exactions at all other places in the Mughal empire, even though these goods had not been imported *via* Surat and therefore not taxed at all.
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(ii) Exactions by local officers under the name of *rahdari* (road patrol charge or internal transit duty), presents (*peshkash*), writer's fee, and *farmaish* (supplying manufactures to order of the governor for which it was not customary to take the price.)
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(iii) The practice of high officials (such as Shaista Khan and Prince Azim-ush-shan, subahdars of Bengal),—a practice sometimes resorted to by local faujdars also,—to open the packages of goods in transit and take away articles at prices capriciously fixed by them far below the fair market price, or what the English records call "opening and forcing goods." Even this unfairly low price could not always be realised from these great men. Some governors (notably Azim-ush-shan) tried to enrich themselves by seizing goods at low prices and then selling them in the market at normal prices,—a practice called *sauda-i-khas*.
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As for the first of the above grievances, the question will become clear to us if we bear in mind the principles of taxation followed by Aurangzib during his reign. The general rule was to levy a duty of 2½ p. c. on the value of all goods imported. But evidently different rates were followed at different places, and so on 10th April 1665 the Emperor issued an order that in all provinces there would be two uniform rates for customs in future, namely 2½ p. c. for Muslims and 5 p. c. for Hindus. A little later, the merchandise of Muslim importers was declared to be duty free from 9th May 1667 onwards.
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In addition to this import duty, a poll-tax called *jaziya* was imposed on non-Muslims from 2nd April 1679. The Christians, both European and Armenian, objected to this last impost, but the Quranic law does not exempt Christians and Jews from it, though they are *ahal-i-kitab* or believers in the Old Testament like the Muhammadans. The Mughal Government seems to have found it difficult to assess and levy the *jaziya* per head from the Europeans in the same manner as from the Hindus, and consequently it seems to have offered them a compromise by turning the *jaziya* into an addition to the import duty on their goods, raising the latter to 3½ p.c. [Farman of 15 March, 1680 in Stewart's *Bengal*].