Administrative System of the Marathas c2.4

c2.4

The Marathas were not mere robbers and plunderers. From their original documents I found that they had an excellent set of regulations for their own empire. Further investigation convinced me that these regulations and administrative institutions were not their own inventions, they had inherited them from their Hindu and Muhammadan predecessors. The administrative system of the Marathas is thus of surpassing interest. It explains the causes of the disruption and downfall of the last Hindu empire, it gives a history of the survival and development of the old Hindu administrative system, it supplies an important and interesting illustration of interaction of Hindu and Muslim principles on each other, and it helps us to understand the growth of the present British Indian administrative institutions, partly engrafted as they are on older Hindu and Muhammadan systems. This is indeed the justification for publishing this work which the toil of the last five years has produced.