Administrative System of the Marathas c11.s4.20

c11.s4.20

But Chauth and Sardeshmukhi were quite different from spoils of war. They were more or less permanent demands. Shivaji's claim to Sardeshmukhi was based on a legal fiction. He claimed to be the hereditary Sardeshmukh of his country and had put forth his claim early in his career. If his claim had been acknowledged, or if he had succeeded in obtaining a farman in its support, there would have been no legal flaw whatever in his demand. This imperial sanction, however, could not be obtained before Shahu's accession to his grandfather's throne, and in Shivaji's time at least, Sardeshmukhi was not recognised as his watan. Chauth was nothing but a tribute exacted from the weak by the strong. The Raja of Bednore and the Chief of Soonda agreed to pay Chauth in 1676, because they had no option in the matter. Shivaji had invaded their principalities with a strong army and any refusal would have been sternly punished. The Marathas obtained a legal right to levy Chauth, when the diplomacy of Balaji Vishwanath secured for Shahu an imperial recognition of that oft-repeated claim. This legal sanction would have been of little avail, if it had not been backed by the lance of the Maratha horseman. Nothing short of an expedition would make any chief or king, either Hindu or Muhammadan, admit Shivaji's claim to a quarter of his revenue and nothing but a strong army could enforce punctual payment. It was, therefore, a military contribution levied by a power without being in formal occupation of the country, and without observing the formalities specified by modern International Law. But the late Mr. Ranade does not admit that Chauth was a mere military contribution without any moral or legal obligation on the part of the Marathas to protect the Chauth-paying chiefs from the invasion of a third power or to restore peace and order in their country. He was of opinion that the policy underlying the exaction of Chauth was the same as that which impelled Lord Wellesley to enforce a subsidiary alliance on his weaker neighbours. "The demand for *chouth* was subsequently added with the consent of the powers whose protection was undertaken against foreign aggression, on payment of fixed sums for the support of the troops maintained for such service. This was the original idea as worked out by Shivaji, and it was this same idea which in the Marquis of Wellesley's hand bore such fruit a hundred and twenty five years later." Such is Ranade's interpretation of the Chauth policy.¹