1839.] Report on the District of Azimgurh. 103 



does, that the proprietor is not a cultivator, but has acquired the share 

 by purchase, public or private, from a cultivating proprietor. Where 

 the profits of the estate are divided according to ancestral shares, the 

 Seer of a Zemindar is that which he has under his own cultivation, 

 i. e. which he has cultivated at his own cost, and by his own capital. 

 In tenures however of the kind which we are now considering, the 

 word Seer acquires as it were an artificial meaning. It is that por- 

 tion of the land in the possession of a sharer on which he pays the 

 bachyh, and which when compared with the total amount of Seer 

 in the village, represents his interest in the estate. It depends upon 

 the custom of the estate whether this be all or any part in his actual 

 cultivation, or whether he have any other cultivation in the village 

 than this. Instances are not very common where the sharer cultivates 

 no part of his Seer, and they generally arise, as above stated, out of 

 forced, or voluntary transfers from cultivating proprietors. It is com- 

 mon however for the proprietor to under- let a part of his Seer, 

 obtaining from the tenant the full Ryottee rates, and paying himself 

 only according to the bach,h. Instances are not common where the 

 proprietors cultivate more than their Seer. One singular case deserves 

 special notice. In Mowzah Oomahpoor, Pergunnah Mhownat Bhunjun, 

 thirty-six beegahs were set apart in the village, and each sharer's 

 right was determined by the portion of this thirty-six beegahs which 

 he cultivated. It was his Seer, but besides this he might cultivate 

 as much more of the village as he liked at the common Ryottee rates, 

 and so all the sharers did to a considerable extent. Other instances 

 probably might be found where sharers cultivated the land of other 

 sharers, or the common lands of the villages, at the usual Ryottee rates, 

 but they do not come permanently into notice. 



58th. It is evident that the Seer land may in such case bear any 

 proportion to the Ryottee. It may be very small, and the great bulk 

 of the estate may be cultivated by persons claiming no proprietary 

 rights in the estate, or it may absorb the whole of the estate, which in 

 that case is parcelled out amongst the several co-parceners as their 

 Seer. The latter is commonly the case in the old Rajpoot communities, 

 which have been strong enough to resist all the changes which 

 violence or fraud so often effect. In Tuppahs Chowree and Koobah, 

 in Pergunnah Deogaon, and in a great part of Pergunnah Belhabans 

 this prevails. The members of the Rajpoot communities are very nu- 

 merous and strong. They will not admit that there are any cultivators 

 but themselves, and record the land as their Seer, each man paying 

 a proportionate share of the Jumma according to the bachji. There 

 is strong reason to believe that this is by no means so generally the 



