Page:Mughal Land Revenue System.djvu/23

 The appearance of intermediaries is another feature to be noted. The services of middlemen are, to a great extent, required for the speedy and efficient collection of the revenue by an alien government from a people naturally reluctant to pay their dues, who have not yet come into an harmonious and beneficent relationship with the government. Akbar recognized the necessity of such men and when conditions required gave them a commission to the extent of per cent of the State revenues for their labours. This system seemed to be broadly congenial to the government as well as to the people inasmuch as the collection was speedy and effective. But the worst features of the agency of the intermediaries is to be seen when "an occasional Diwan inflated the revenue demand on paper and 'farmed' the revenue to the highest bidder." To this system of farming State revenues by the later Mughals must be ascribed the iniquities of the peasants and the luxurious insolence of the timariots which Bernier lays stress on in his Travels.

Another prominent feature to note is the State's sole proprietorship of the lands throughout the empire, a full discussion of which will be presented later on. Bernier's cognizance of and gloomy abhorrence at such a state of things is worth reading. But the State's right over property is a fact widely recognized throughout the other kingdoms of India and quite consonant with the then accumulated wisdom of statecraft which eventually made the peasants lose their respect for private property. Besides, there is no hereditary peerage in Islam. The property which was accumulated by the exertions of an