Page:History of Aurangzib (based on original sources) Vol 1.djvu/209

CHAP. IX.] parison with the river-plains of Northern India, and the rainfall precarious and variable, bad harvests and scarcities were too frequent, and the standard revenue was never collected. In spite of an abatement of 12 lakhs of rupees on their first assessment made by the Imperial settlement officers in the hope that the collection in future would be more easy and certain, the land revenue still proved to have been pitched too high. For the four provinces which then constituted Mughal Deccan, it stood at three krores and 62 lakhs of rupees a year; but the actual collection in 1652 was only one krore, or less than one-third.

Out of the total territory, land estimated to yield 37½ lakhs a year was assigned as jagir to Aurangzib and his sons, and the rest to various officers, excluding the portion which was created Crownland (khalsa sharifa) and of which the revenue was collected directly by Imperial officers and spent at the discretion of the Emperor without being touched by the local governor. The financial condition of the jagirdars depended on the actual collection of land reve-