History of Aurangzib, Based on Original Sources v5.c85.s2: § 3. Economic drain of Aurangzib's ceaseless warfare.
History of Aurangzib, Based on Original Sources v5.c85.s2
- Language
- English
§ 3. Economic drain of Aurangzib's ceaseless warfare.
v5.c85.s2.1
The economic drain caused by Aurangzib's quarter century of warfare in the Deccan was appalling in its character and most far-reaching and durable in its effects. The operations of the imperial armies, especially their numerous sieges, led to a total destruction of forests and grass. The huge Mughal forces, totalling 1,70,000 troops according to the official records, with perhaps ten times that number of non-combatants, soon ate up everything green wherever they moved. In addition, the Maratha raiders destroyed whatever they could not carry off, feeding their horses on the standing crops, and burning the houses and property too heavy to be removed. At the siege of Satara, the Marathas had prepared for defence by burning the grass for twenty miles round the fort; while the Mughals in their turn, in building a raised battery opposite the fort tower "had left not a single tree standing within a range of 60 or 80 miles from the place." [M.A. 414.] The mischief was multiplied by the immense number of sieges in which the Mughals engaged in that land of the mountain and the flood. Hence, it is no wonder that when at last in 1705 Aurangzib retired after his last campaign, the country presented a scene of utter desolation. "He left behind him the fields of these provinces devoid of trees and bare of crops, their places being taken by the bones of men and beasts." [*Storia*, iv. 252.]
v5.c85.s2.2
This total and extensive deforestation had a most injurious effect on agriculture. At the same time, herds of cattle became extinct through robbery and lack of fodder. The pastoral tribes were ruined, and meat and milk supply ceased over much of Maharashtra.
v5.c85.s2.3
The financial exhaustion of the empire in these endless wars left Government and private owners alike too poor to repair buildings and roads worn out by the lapse of time. Indeed, in Aurangzib's last years, we read of urgent appeals from his officers for funds to make the most necessary repairs in important fortifications, which the Emperor has to reject owing to lack of money! Civil buildings, water-works, *sarais* and roads could not expect any better treatment in such a state of things.
v5.c85.s2.4
The labouring population suffered not only from violent capture, forced labour, and starvation, but also from epidemics which were very frequent during these campaigns. Even in the imperial camp, where greater comfort, security and civilisation might have been expected, the annual wastage of the Deccan wars was one lakh of men, and three lakhs of horses, oxen, camels and elephants. [*Storia*, iv. 96.] At the siege of Golkonda (1687) a famine broke out. In Haidarabad city the houses river and plain were filled with the dead.
v5.c85.s2.5
The same was the condition of the imperial camp... Kos after kos the eye fell only on mounds of corpses. The incessant rain melted away the flesh and skin... After some months when the rains ceased, the white ridges of bones looked from a distance like hills of snow." [M.A. 292.] The same desolation overtook tracts which had hitherto enjoyed peace and prosperity. The acute observer Bhimsen writes about the Eastern Karnatak, "During the rule of the Bijapur Golkonda and Telinga [dynasties] the country was extensively cultivated. But now many places have been turned into wildernesses on account of the passage of the imperial armies, which has inflicted hardship and oppression on the people." [Dil. ii. 114a, also 136b about Berar.] The depopulation and impoverishment of the Madras Coast in the closing decade of the 17th century is repeatedly noticed in the Madras Factory Diary and M. Martin's memoirs.