A History of Agriculture in India v2.c86.s3: Chauth as Source of Revenue
A History of Agriculture in India v2.c86.s3
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Chauth as Source of Revenue
v2.c86.s3.1
The Marathas derived their finances from *chauth*, a tribute of twenty-five per cent of the revenue of a province. How the *chauth* was collected is thus described by Khafi Khan (1718 A.D.). 'With large armies the Marathas invaded the *subas* of the Dakhin, and Ahmadabad, and Malwa, for the purpose of collecting the *chauth*, and they plundered and ravaged wherever they went. To cities and large towns they sent messengers and letters, demanding payment of the *chauth* from the governor or *zamindar*. Or the *mukkaddams* and *zamindars* of the towns and villages hastened out to meet the Maratha army, undertaking to pay the *chauth*, and begged for protection. Taking back with them a messenger (*harkara*) and a horseman, to protect the village and the cultivation, instead of showing their total rent to be one or two thousand rupees, they made it out to be four or five hundred. But whatever sum was settled, they promised payment, and gave sureties, called *ol* in the language of India. They thus saved themselves from violence and plunder.
v2.c86.s3.2
'When the *faujdars* or *zamindars* of a place refused to pay the *chauth*, and made no propositions, the Marathas attacked the place and thoroughly ravaged it.
v2.c86.s3.3
'The Marathas treated carvans just in the same way, and many were plundered. The commanders of their bands did their best to settle the amount of *chauth* to be paid, and were not willing to pillage. Their men, on the contrary, strove to prevent any arrangment of the *chauth*, so that they might be free to plunder. For, if an agreement was arrived at, and the chauth was settled without plundering, it belonged to the chiefs, and the men got nothing. But, if it came to plundering, each man kept what he could lay hands upon, and the chiefs did not gain so much.
v2.c86.s3.4
'Through Balaji Bishwanath and Jamnaji, Brahmans, and most intelligent generals of Raja Sahu, a proposal of peace was made on these terms. There was to be paid to the officers of Faja Sahu a fourth part of what the amins, kroris, and shikkdars collected as land revenue, and as sair from the government lands and from the jagirdars. It was also settled that, in addition to the fourth share which they were to get from the receipts of the jagirdars, they were to receive from the raiyats ten per cent as sar-deshmukhi. Altogether they were to receive thirty-five per cent, upon the total collections, and also upon the cesses (abwabs) called faujdari, shikkdari, ziyafat, and other charges, as shown in the gross account of the collections. According to this account they were to receive nearly half the total revenue recorded in the Government rent-roll, and the collections were thus shared by the domineering collectors of Raja Sahu. This arrangement, by which they were to collect all taxes, fell very hard upon the raiyats, and the government officers and jagirdars; for in every district there were two collectors: one called the kamaishdar, the other the gumashta of the sar-deshmukhi. On the roll of the collections the signature of the sarrishtadar of the sar-deshmukhi was first placed, and what was required by the rules on that account was to be taken separately. The position and life of the officers of Government and of the jagirdars became irksome.
v2.c86.s3.5
'Besides these, there were two separate collectors of the rahdari (road duties) in each district. In consequence of the negligence of the faujdars and the dominance of the enemy, these had for some time taken their positions in different places, and exacted half a rupee, or one rupee, for each bullock and cart from merchants, and whatever they pleased from other persons. They exacted twice or three times more than the most tyrannical faujdars. Now also, since the days of the peace, the former grievance remained, but it was aggravated by more taking part in it. In the present state of things there were in each district three regular collectors of Raja Sahu, with parties of horsemen and footmen stationed at the office, the guard-house where the land-revenue, the sair and the tolls were collected.
v2.c86.s3.6
'Besides this there were in many places villages which had been laid waste by the Marathas, and which had been again brought into cultivation under special agreements, such as the districts about Nandurbar, in Khandesh, in Berar, and in other places. They paid no heed to the special contracts made by Husain 'Ali Khan; but, conceding the third share belonging to the jagirdar, they made the following arrangement. They recognized three shares; one was for the jagirdar, one they took themselves, and the third they left to the raiyats. In revenue and civil matters the orders and the action of the enemy prevailed over the authority of the *faujdars* and *jagirdars*. At the time of the peace Husain 'Ali Khan determined and issued strict injunctions that the *rahdari* should not be exacted, as in the days before the peace, from merchants and travellers at the rate of three rupees or four upon each bullock and cart, as if *faujdars* and harsh officials were acting. But it was not good. In several districts there was no longer any plundering of villages and caravans; but, as in former days, travellers and wanderers paid the *rahdari*, and went on in peace without interruption. Villages which had been ravaged by plunderers, or made completely desolate by the tyranny of rapacious managers, were now restored to cultivation.
v2.c86.s3.7
'Husain 'Ali delivered a *sanad* containing the conditions of peace, under his seal, to the *vakils* of Raja Sahu, and made no delay in writing for a royal *farman* confirmatory of this document. He introduced the agents of Raja Sahu everywhere, and he settled that Balaji Bishwanath and Jamnaji, two of the highest officers of Raja Sahu, should stay with a suitable escort in Aurangabad as deputy and *vakil* of the Raja, so that all civil and revenue matters might be settled through them.⁶
v2.c86.s3.8
⁶ Khafi Khan. *Muntakhabu-l Lubab*, in Elliot and Dowson, *The History of India*..., Vol. VII, pp. 465-468