14 



among the Mussalmans, it follows that taking half their in- 

 comes is lawful a fortiori.'''' The hint given as to the lawful- 

 ness of taking the whole of the property of the infidels was of 

 course not likely to be lofet on the ever necessitous Muham- 

 madan sovereigns. Emperor Akbar abolished many vexa^- 

 tious taxes and fixed the land tax at about one- third of the 

 gross produce, but his successors re-imposed all the abolished 

 taxes. The devices resorted to for enhancing taxation were 

 innumerable. In the provinces of Agra and Delhi the money 

 assessment had been fixed by Todar Mull at so much per beigah 

 of 3,600 'square ells (each ell between 38J to 41 inches) or 

 nearly an acre ; the tax was enhanced by the simple expedient ^ 

 of reducing the heigah to one-third of its original dimensions. 



10. It is the enormous revenue which former rulers derived 

 Temples, palaces, &c., ^^^^ ^^ud, couplcd with Unlimited command 

 erected by means of of forccd labour, that enabled them to exe- 

 force about. ^^^^ ^j^^ stupcudous works, whether palaces, 



temples, anicuts or tanks, which strike us with astonishment. 

 The celebrated temple at Tanjore built by the Cholas in the 

 11th century is stated to have taken 12 years to complete. 

 The architect, who designed the building and supervised its 

 execution, was one Soma Varman of Conjeeveram. A village, 

 called Sdrapallam (literally the hollow at the base of the scaf- 



^ Vide Grant's Political Survey of the Northern Circars. Appendix to the "Fifth 

 Report" of the Parliamentary Committeo on Indian affairs published by Messrs. Higgin- 

 botham & Co,, page 233. Colonel Wilks in his History of Mysore mentions 20 additional 

 taxes imposed by Chick Deo Raj, the able ruler of Mysore in 1672-1704. Four of 

 the taxes may be mentioned here as the reasons given in justification of them are very 

 characteristic : — 



(1) Hid Hanna, a tax upon straw produced on land which had already paid kandaya 

 or the regular land tax, on the pretence that a share of the straw as well as of the graiji 

 belonged to Goverument. 



(2) Leo Rai Wutta is literally loss or difference of exchange on defective coins. 

 Deo Raj exacted this tax as a reimbursement. This was soon after permanently added 

 to the ryot's payments. It averaged 2 per -cent, of the regular assessment. 



(3) Beargee. — A potail, for example, farmed his village or engaged for the payment 

 of a fixed sum to Government. When his actual receipts fell short of the amount, he 

 compelled or induced the ryots to make good the loss by a proportional contribution. This 

 contribution was called Beargee, and the largest amount that was ever contributed was 

 collected under that name in addition to the kandaya of each ryot. 



(4) Ycare Suncn. — Sunca is properly a duty on transit of goods or grain. Yeare is 

 a plough. The ryot instead of carrying grain to where a transit duty is payable often 

 sold it or consumed it in his own village. A tax of one to two gold fanams *on each 

 plough was imposed as an equivalent for the transit duty that would have been payable 

 on the produce if it had been carried outside the village.' This was called Yeare Sunca. 



There is of course something to be said for these artifices resorted to with a view to 

 enhance taxation. Where law is professedly based on customary usages and there is no 

 direct legislation, if the revenue levied at customary rates becomes, owing to the fall in 

 the value of the precious metals or otherwise, inadequate, the only way in which custom 

 could be circumvented and a re-adjustment of taxation brought about would be the 

 adoption of legal ficticms of some sort or ot'her. 



For a list (a long one) of taxes levied by Native sovereigns in former centuries see 

 appen(iices D and E, section I, to this memorandum. A grant in the reign of Rajaraja- 

 deva Chola, A.D. 1373, mentions revenue in paddy, tolls, small tax for the village police, 

 including three handfuls of paddy, the money from water and land, the tax on Jooms, the 

 tax on shops, the tax on goldsmiths, the tax on Ajivakas (Jains), the tax on oilmills, the 

 money from the sale of fish in tanks, the money from documents, &c. " 



