Life and Conditions of the People of Hindustan (1200–1550 A.D.) c8.9

c8.9

There is very meagre and uncertain information about the population of big cities. The population of ‘Gouro’ (Gaur) the principal city of Bengal is estimated at 2,00,000 persons.² If this be taken as a correct estimate, which is not unlikely, Delhi for so many obvious reasons had probably a bigger population that ‘Gouro’. We are in the dark about the population of other big cities of Hindustan like Cambay (Khambayat), Multan, Lahore, Agra, Patna, and other religious centres like Mathura, Benares, and Ujjain. Probably their population was much less than Delhi, though considerable. None of these two estimates of rural and urban population helps us in forming any correct idea for the whole of Hindustan. Mr. Moreland is of the opinion that the population of the Northern Indian plains from Multan to Monghyr must have been well over thirty millions and probably little less than forty millions, about the year 1605 A.D. He further estimates a total population of a hundred millions for the whole of India.³