236 ON ORISSA PROPER 



was that of translating all the uncouth and harsh sounding Uria designati- 

 ons of things and offices, into more familiar Persian terms of corresponding 

 import. 



m 



The Khands and Bissees now became Pergunnahs ; the Police and Re- 

 venue Officers, Chowdris* ,and Vilaity (Mofussil or Provincial) Canungos, 

 or generally Talukdars, the heads of villages Mokaddams ; and the villages 

 themselves Mouzas. The larger territorial division of Sircar was perhaps 

 arbitrary, suggested by considerations of financial convenience, or may 

 have been copied from the Uria Dandpat. The term Mehal, or plural Me- 

 halat, by which the Revenue lands were designated in contradistinction 

 to Killajat or the Military ditto, comprized in Akber's time, each, several 

 Pergunnahs, and answered nearly to the modern Chakleh, though it is now 

 applied to every petty estate or interest separately engaged for with the 

 Collector. • 



The Revenue Officers of the khaliseh lands, called Chowdris and Vi- 

 laity Canungos, or generally Talukdars, certainly acquired no new rights 

 under the Mogul Government. We find them on all occasions acting 

 with the Mokaddams as the fixed hereditary local Officers of the state, 

 discharging some of their functions in relation to their Pergunnahs jointly, 

 others separately and independently, — exercising in short the same privi- 

 leges, and enjoying the same percentage and profits, under the new as 

 under the old system of things. Amongst the chief of their duties were 

 the collection of the Government Revenue assessed on their several divi- 

 sions, the Control of Police, the adjustment of disputes relating to the 

 Pergunnah generally, and the enforcement of all the government orders 

 and instructions relative to the assignment and appropriation of lands. 

 Their acknowledged profits were five per cent, on the collections, certain 



* The author of the Ayin Arfceri ypys, sperkfr<r of tie Subeb of Bera, — " Tn this country they call 

 the Chowdri, Desmookhee ; the Canunyoe, Despoudiah ; the Mvkaddam, Putayl and the Putwaree, Keol- 

 hurnee." 



