Administrative System of the Marathas c7.s5.8

c7.s5.8

The Portuguese deliberately refrained from interfering with the ancient rights and privileges enjoyed by village communities of Goa and the Government often instituted enquiries about the customary rights and perquisites of the village officers. The results of one such enquiry are available in a Foral issued by Affonso Mexia, Veedor da Fazenda, as early as 1526. The text of this Foral is available not only in official publications like *Codigo das Communidades* but also in such popular works as *India Portuguesa* by Lopes Menedes. An abstract of this important document was published by R. S. Whiteway in his *Rise of the Portuguese Power in India* and B. H. Baden-Powell dealt with it more minutely in a learned paper contributed to the *Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society* in 1900 under the heading—*The Villages of Goa in the Early Sixteenth Century*. The Portuguese also decided to retain the old taxes and duties levied by their Muhammadan predecessors and as a result many of these old taxes survived in Portuguese India long after they had become obsolete in Maharashtra. A reference to taxes and duties in Portuguese India therefore sometimes enables us to ascertain the real nature and incidents of similar taxes mentioned in old Marathi records. In this respect, Saldanha's *History of Goa*, Moniz's work on Daman, Joao Baptista Amancio Gracias' *Subsidios para a Historia Economico. Financeira da India Portugueza* and Phillipe Nerry Xavier's works on village communities are of very great use.