OR CTJTTACK. 211 



The accounts remaining to us of the most important operation in modern Revenues. 

 Indian finance, Raja Toral Mall's settlement called the Taksim Jamma 

 and Tankhah Raqmi, are as imperfect and deficient in Orissa as in eve- 

 ry other part of India with which I am acquainted. There can be no 

 doubt but that a jar id or measurement of the lands of the three sircars 

 Jelasir, Badrak and Cuttack, was made, under the orders and superintend- 

 ence of that distinguished minister, with what is termed the Bareh Dasti 

 Padika or rod of twelve spans, and all the Ruqbeh accounts in the offices 

 of the Sudder Canungos and their Gomashtehs, are stated to be founded 

 on that measurement. The subsequent corrections and alterations that 



have taken place, are said to have been made only by Nezer Anddzi or guess 

 work. What is curious, the standard of the bigah, which was originally 

 uniform, is now found to be different in every part of the district, to such an 

 extent indeed, that in some Pergunnahs the bigah is four times the size of 

 that nominal measure in other divisions, and all the intermediate variations 

 frequently occur. By what rule the other great step in the settlement was 

 adjusted, viz. the determ nation of the rates of rent to be paid by the hus- 

 bandmen for a bigah of each description, I can find no evidence Or informa- 

 tion whatever. Ahulfazl in describing the Emperor's settlement for Hin- 

 dustan generally, says, that an average of ten years' collection was struck.* 

 But whether in this province which had then only recently been con- 

 quered from its Hindu sovereigns, and rescued from the destructive anar- 

 chy of the Bengal Afghans, the ancient rates were maintained, or heavier 

 ones imposed, I cannot venture to offer any assertion. My general im- 



pression is that the fixed and regular assessment of the Moguls was hea- 

 vier than that of the Hindu Rajas, but the indigenous princes of Orissa 

 seem to have had so many methods of extorting a large revenue from their 

 subjects, by extra demands, occasional requisitions, and irregular claims 



* Vide A j in Ached, part 3. " For that purpose having- formed an aggregate of the rates of col- 

 lection from the commencement of the 15th year of the reign to the 24th inclusive, they took a tenth 

 part of that total as the annual rate for ten years to come." 



A a2 



