(Done)Decline of the Mughal Empire Peasant Revolts Devika Bahadur

Devika Bahadur History III Mughal India Q. The peasant revolts contributed significantly to the decline of the Mughal Empire. Comment The eighteenth century in India saw far reaching changes in political organization, social institutions and economic life. The Mughal Empire which had given a sense of virtual unity to the subcontinent for a century and a half, disintegrated rapidly. The Maratha bid to establish hegemony over the country failed and the British merchant adventurers succeeded in laying the foundations of an empire of a new type. Traditionally, Aurangzeb’s policies have been blamed for accelerating the decline of the Mughal Empire. The rebellions of the Jats, Sikhs, Satnamis etc. were all viewed in this context. Focus is now shifting towards an analysis of the institutional and structural factors that contributed to the decline of the Empire. Peasant resistance to the process of centralization of authority, often at the expense of clan/tribal leaders or institutions such as the village community was a continuous feature under Mughal rule, and was often put down by ruthless severity. However repression had gone on all the time along with attempts at conciliation and assimilation simultaneously. The new feature we find in Aurangzeb's time is greater spirit of defiance and resistance, and better organization, either by local landed elements or charismatic leaders. There has been a tendency to put all these movements under a common heading, such as Hindu reaction to the narrow, bigoted policies of Aurangzeb, or the result of increased economic exploitation. However we need to understand the specific features of each of these movements. It should also be remembered that in medieval times, most anti-establishment movements had to draw upon religion as a binding force. During the reign of Aurangzeb, the Mughal Empire was faced with numerous rebellions and revolts from the Jats, Satnamis, Sikhs and Marathas. While Irfan Habib has viewed these as peasant uprisings, we need to review this characterization and analyse their effect on the decline of the Mughal Empire. In the following essay, I shall firstly give a brief account of the various uprisings during Aurangzeb’s reign, followed by a discussion on their impact on the decline of the Empire as well as alternative theories that explain this decline. The Jat rebellion was a serious rebellion which confronted the Mughal state. It was centered primarily in the Agra region which had been a centre of resistance from the time of Akbar. Resistance in this area had intensified by the time of Aurangzeb. From the accounts of Manucci we also hear of the Jats having attacked and plundered the tomb of Akbar at Sikandra. This has not been corroborated but it is indicative of the kind of problems that the Jats were posing to the Mughals. The Jat rebellion led by Gokul was suppressed in 1669. Later the resistance was continued by Raja Ram and Churaman, largely in the form of plundering raids. By the 1680s, the character of the struggle now changed subtly, primacy being accorded to ousting non-Jat zamindars of the region, and moving towards a Jat dominated state. This led to a conflict between the Jats and the Rajputs over zamindari rights,

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most of the primary zamindars, that is the cultivating peasants who owned the land being Jats, and the intermediary zamindars, that is those who collected the land-revenue being Rajputs. The Jats put up stiff resistance, but by 1691, Rajaram and his successor, Churaman, were compelled to submit. Later on, in the eighteenth century, taking advantage of Mughal civil wars and weakness in the central government, Churaman was able to carve out a separate Jat principality in the area and to oust the Rajput zamindars. Thus, what apparently started as a peasant uprising, was diverted from its character, and culminated in a state in which Jat chiefs formed the ruling class. The origins of the Jat resistance can be traced to the 15th and 16th centuries during which the Jats, from being nomadic pastoralists began to adopt settled agriculture and through technological innovations and extension of agriculture began to rise economically. The Jats had begun to cultivate cash crops like sugarcane, indigo, cotton, etc and in spite of the economic benefits they were still accorded a low social status. The Jat aspiration for a higher social status is apparent when we see the kind of titles they were adopting, such as Singh, which had largely been seen as a Rajput prerogative. In this context we can see that they were a receptive audience to Nanak’s ideology. The Sikhs were another important centre of resistance to the Mughals. The Sikhs had been resisting Mughal rule since the time of Jahangir’s reign. By the mid 17th century, under the leadership of Guru Hargobind Singh the Sikhs organized themselves in a more disciplined and well-knit manner, acquiring a more militant character in the form of the Khalsa. The Khalsa became a symbol of armed resistance against the Mughals. In this region the Sikh movement led by Banda Bahadur can also be seen as a reflection of the weakening imperial control and increasing agrarian unrest. In the Punjab region, Jat and Sikh resistance was largely concentrated against the dominant landed elements, the Rajputs. The Rajputs were the visible appropriators of revenue and as agents of the Mughal state they were also perceived as perpetuators of tyranny. By 1710, we see that the resistance under Banda Bahadur extended over Sirhind, Sutlej and Yamuna region. Banda Bahadur began to issue coins in his own name without reference to the Mughal state and even started to issue farmans and hukumnamas. He also took on the title of Saccha Padshah. Banda Bahadur was able to carve out his independent sphere of influence, but he was unable to consolidate his hold over the region since his main support base among the Jats and Khatris was soon alienated. While this could have allowed the Mughal state to regain a hold over the region, many factors restrained the Mughals. The Mughal governor in Punjab, Zakaria Khan did try to forge an alliance with the landed magnates, the Rajputs, but since they were a largely unpopular group lacking a support base, the effects of such an alliance were nullified. Unlike provinces like Awadh where the Mughals faced a challenge from the zamindars, in this region, the challenge came from the peasantry as well indicating a deep rooted agrarian crisis, one that could not be solved simply by a strong provincial governor from above. Any solution would have to take into account the Jats and Banda Bahadur. Eventually, the economic prosperity in this region began to wane with the military activities of Banda Bahadur, the campaigns of Nadir Shah and Ahmed Shah Abdali and Maratha incursions.

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The Satnami rebellion of 1672 was another important rebellion. The Satnamis belonged to the Vairagi sect. Like Kabir, they believed in monotheism, and condemned rituals and superstition. They had an attitude of sympathy with the poor, and hostility towards authority and wealth. Hence, their appeal lay mainly with the lower classes. They were mostly peasants, artisans and low caste people. They did not observe distinctions of caste and rank or between Hindus and Muslims, and followed a strict code of conduct. The rebellion started when a Satnami was murdered by a soldier in the Mathura region. The Satnamis plundered many villages, and after defeating the local faujdar, seized the towns of Narnaul and Bairat. Irfan Habib sees the Satnami rebellion as essentially peasant in character and camouflaged by religious motives. The Marathas in the Maharashtra region also rose as an important centre of resistance. Following Shivaji, Maratha resistance in the region was highly dispersed and spread over various centres like Kolhapur and Poona. Maratha resistance eventually gathered momentum with the rise of the Peshwas. Under Balaji Vishwanath, the Peshwa under Sahu, the Marathas were reorganized. Under the Peshwas, the Maratha state extended up to Malwa and Gujarat as well. Irfan Habib has viewed Maratha resistance as a rebellion of zamindars. When we look at the historiography regarding the decline of the Mughal Empire, the earliest writings were those of colonial writers like James Mill and Elphinstone, and British administrators such as Vincent Smith. In their largely colonial conception of Indian history, especially that of the preceding Mughal period, such uprisings were viewed in a religious light. These scholars viewed the Mughal state as a large monarchical structure, which was authoritarian in structure. Their focus was largely politico-religious and the decline of the empire was seen in terms of the moral, administrative and military decadence of the Mughals. The lavish and ostentatious Mughal lifestyle was also blamed for the decline. In this view, the Mughals were also viewed as ‘foreigners’ and the Mughal state seen as a ‘Muslim state’. In this context, decline and resistance to Mughal rule was seen in terms of a ‘Hindu’ reaction to orthodox Muslim rule. The inability of the ‘Muslim’ Mughal state to garner support among non-Muslims was perceived as its weakness. This view of course stemmed from an essentially colonial outlook which sought to paint a picture of decadence in the preceding period in order to highlight and justify the benevolent colonial rule in contrast. As regards their argument there is enough evidence that the Mughals enjoyed popular support, acceptance and legitimacy and were not perceived as foreigners. Nationalist historians like Sir Jadunath Sarkar and AL Srivastava viewed resistance to Mughal rule in terms of popular reaction against Aurangzeb’s decadent and orthodox rule. In their view the responsibility for the decline of the Mughal Empire was Aurangzeb’s. Akbar has been traditionally viewed as the consolidator of Mughal rule with his liberal religious policy, creation of a composite nobility, and forging of Rajput alliances. Aurangzeb, on the other hand, is seen as the last great Mughal ruler and the harbinger of decline through his orthodox and unwise policies. Aurangzeb has been attacked for his orthodox religious policy, his wasteful and expensive Deccan campaigns, and decadent nobility. Popular resistance from the Sikhs, Jats and Satnamis was therefore viewed as a result of the prevailing discontent and lawlessness under Aurangzeb. This view has also highlighted the intellectual and

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technological stagnation in this period. Scholars like Ishwari Prasad also subscribed to this view. These scholars have relied heavily on Bernier, who described the Maratha raids and Manucci who gave an account of the 18th century as a dark and gloomy period. This view of Mughal decline prevailed for a very long time. However, it needs to be understood that state formation or decline is a process and cannot be attributed to one person. The decline of the Mughal Empire was in fact a cumulative process which had begun under the reigns of Jahangir and Shah Jahan. Recent writings have shifted their focus in understanding decline towards an analysis of institutional failings as opposed to political or religious factors. Primary among these is Professor Irfan Habib who did pioneering work in studying the agrarian structures in the Mughal state. He has understood the decline of the Mughal state as well as the various rebellions faced by the state in this framework. Irfan Habib’s essential argument was that the high rate of land revenue demanded by Delhi caused large-scale rural exploitation, leading to peasant migration and rebellion. This created an agrarian crisis that resulted in the weakening of the empire’s political edifice. The gap between the jama (gross estimate) and haasil (gross revenue) is seen as reflective of this crisis. Habib relies heavily for his information of the period on the works of Bernier, St. Xavier and Bhimsen. Habib maintains that the principal obligation of the mansabdars was the maintenance of cavalry contingents with horses of standard breeds. There was therefore an intimate connection between the military power of the Mughals and the jagirdari system. Imperial revenue policy had to balance between two important considerations. Firstly, the revenue had to be enough to pay for the maintenance of such contingents. Secondly, it could not be so high as to leave the peasant with pittance. Habib refers to the regressive land revenue structure of the Mughal state, which put increased pressure on the small and middle peasants. According to him the land revenue demand was so high that the smaller peasants were often left with barely subsistence level produce after paying taxes. Also, insistence of payment in cash, made the peasants subject to the vagaries of market forces. Irfan Habib points to a structural flaw in the system, whereby there was a basic contradiction between short term and long term interests of the jagirdars. According to him, the practice of reckless and frequent transfers put pressure on the jagirdars to extract as much as they could from their jagirs in as short a period of time as possible. As a result there was no investment in agriculture which could yield long-term benefits and the peasantry was exploited further as the burden of land revenue demand was passed on to them. Based on contemporary writings, Habib further illustrates how the oppressed peasantry burst into rebellion. Habib analyses the two social forces which helped in the extension of these peasant revolts. The first was the larger community of caste, which was an important binding force for peasants. The Jat revolt is perhaps the clearest instance of how a peasant revolt proceeded along caste lines. He also writes that the Jat power near Agra and Mathura arose out of the rebellion of peasants under zamindar leadership attaining the apex of power under Suraj Mal (d. 1673). The second was the organization along sect lines formed as a result of the great religious revival of the 15th century. These forces helped to forge a sense of unity among

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disparate discontented groups. It is also interesting to note that in many cases the zamindars also cooperated with the peasantry. While Habib made a valid point with regard to exploitation and can be credited with shifting the academic focus to institutional factors, it would be simplistic to view the above movements as mere peasant uprisings and the decline of the Mughal Empire in just these terms. The short tenure of the zamindars might have led them to rack-renting, but this was too complex a phenomenon to be explained by just one cause. Moreover the 19 th century saw a laxity in the transfer of jagirdars and the exploitation of the peasantry may also have been due to the zamindars. Other factors in these uprisings also need to be looked at. Many alternative explanations have been offered. Some people view the decline of the Mughal state in terms of the crises in the Mansabdari and Jagirdari system. A prominent view is that of Satish Chandra who spoke of the decline of the Mughal Empire in terms of a jagirdari crisis or a situation of what he calls bejagiri. Athar Ali has also substantiated Satish Chandra’s views with statistical details. The above scholars have drawn heavily from the accounts of Mamsuri and Khafi Khan, who have highlighted the shortage of jagirs. The jagirdari crisis was essentially a situation in which there was a serious gap between the number of jagir holding mansabdars and number of available jagirs. Satish Chandra points to the conquests of Bijapur, Golconda and the Maratha kingdom as precipitating the jagirdari crisis. He points out that in the eagerness to annex these kingdoms, Aurangzeb lavishly awarded high positions in imperial services to nobles. The resulting increased demand for jagirs exhausted the reserve of paibaqi lands which meant that many long-established families (khanzadas) who had served the empire faithfully lost heavily. Not only was there a paucity of jagirs but those who did get jagirs often received them after a delay of many years. This kind of a crisis in the jagirdari system undermined the loyalty of the mansabdars and encouraged factionalism in the nobility. Another implication of this shortage of jagir lands was that often jagirs had to be given from the khalisa lands so that the income of the state was further reduced. To add to the crisis competition increased among the jagirdars to grab more lucrative jagirs since many of the new jagirs were in difficult and unproductive terrain, and many jagirdars also began to turn their jagirs into hereditary possessions. Widespread conflict among the Mughal nobility was thus an unanticipated effect of the Deccan conquests. In his path-breaking article presented at the Chicago Symposium on “Decline of the Mughals” JF Richards has questioned the proposition of the two above scholars. He concedes that a shortage in jagirs did contribute to a loss of morale among the Mughal nobility. However he points to a note of inevitability in Chandra’s thesis i.e. as soon as the Deccan was conquered the jagir shortage began to be followed inevitably by the imperial crisis. It also implies that the ties between the Emperor and the nobility were essentially economic in nature. Richards points out that the annexation of Bijapur and Golconda could also have given new resources in the form of salary assignments to a mansabdar, sufficient to offset the influx of new Deccani nobles into the Mughal nobility. However in the view of Richards, Aurangzeb chose instead to restrict access to the greater part of the most productive and fertile tracts to meet his strategic objectives in the south. Most productive tracts were kept under khalisa, slightly poor

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lands were given off as jagirs and the rest were kept as paibaqi. Thus Richards sees the shortage of jagirs in the 1690s as partly artificial rather than one caused by an absolute shortage of territory. Richards also wrote that Aurangzeb was unable to forge alliances successfully with local groups. Aurangzeb never gained the active loyalty of the chiefs of the south to the extent that he could trust them to perform discretionary missions of great importance sat long distances from the court. This was unlike the fully assimilated mansabdars such as the khanzadas and the Rajputs who seemingly responded emotively to the emperor in the way the Marathas and other Deccani groups did not. Richards stressed the unique nature of the Emperor-noble relationship built on dynamic personal interaction and commonality of values and attitudes, which was the strength of the Mughal Empire. However as the empire came under stress for having stretched its frontiers too far, mansabdars in the Deccan were forced to reconsider the realities of power. Some moved into open rebellion. An interesting case is that of the Bedars who refused to accept Aurangzeb’s offer due to their rejection of the Indo-Persian court culture and the increasing emphasis put by Aurangzeb on conversion to Islam. Hence rather than a failure of resources for jagirs, incomplete administrative and political consolidation of Bijapur and Golconda after 1686-87 and commitment of the best administrative and military resources of the empire to continued expansion in the south brought about a crisis of public order. By 1711-12, the mansabdars of the region were demoralized. The failure also lay in the inability of Aurangzeb to continue the process of assimilation of the rural Deccan aristocracies. Richards’ critique led Satish Chandra to revise his views on ‘shortage of jagirs’. He now said that it was a delay in the transfer of jagirs that accelerated the jagirdari crisis. It was in fact the non-working of the jagirdari system which led to a crisis as opposed to regular transfers and efficient working of the system. Laxity in transfer of jagirdars led them to tighten their control over their jagirs. They tried to extract the maximum from the zamindars who in turn put pressure on the peasantry. This disturbed the delicate balance of the tripolar relationship between the jagirdar, zamindar and the peasantry that led to the decline of the Mughal Empire. The Mughal state could function properly only as long as this balance was maintained. The state had to assure the zamindars and jagirdars that it was beneficial to them to ally with the Mughal state. As soon as the Mughal state itself became a primary exploiter, this balance was disrupted. Satish Chandra points out that the rebellions in Aurangzeb’s period were not simply peasant revolts and were far more complex. He does not deny the agrarian element but emphasizes that these movements were not simply peasant movements. Satish Chandra suggested that these rebellions need to be understood as social movements, an idea further articulated and developed by Chetan Singh in the context of the Punjab. Chetan Singh suggests that the political unrest in provinces such as the Punjab was linked to tensions generated between the agrarian economy of the Mughal state, on the one hand, and fringe tribal societies as they moved towards a sedentary existence, on the other. The latter process altered the structure of tribal societies and increased pressure on the agrarian

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economy, which was already under stress. Thus the events of the eighteenth-century were rooted in the economic processes that shaped the functioning of empire from its very inception. Satish Chandra noted in the context of the Punjab that the struggles in that region cannot be generalized as peasants versus the oppressive Mughal land revenue system. The rebellion was not just reaction to Mughal agrarian policy but also to the dominance of Rajput zamindars. The Sikh movement too had agrarian and peasant base and was essentially a reaction to Mughal policy. Yet it is important to note that that leadership was provided by the khatris, an upwardly mobile group of small traders who had benefited from the favourable strategic location of the Punjab. Both Satish Chandra and Chetan Singh therefore analyze these revolts in order to understand their socio-economic basis. Similar studies with a regional focus were carried on by Muzaffar Alam with special reference to Awadh. Alam has tried to show that early eighteenth-century Awadh provides evidence of the remarkable economic growth and prosperity which resulted in zamindari unrest in the region. Economic prosperity was a consequence of increased commercialization and the monetization of the economy that was initiated in the heyday of the Mughals. As they rose in rebellion, the Mughal subedar (governor) in the region enhanced his power by using the unrest as his bargaining chip with the emperor. It is under his aegis that regional assertion ultimately buoyed the suba to political autonomy. Alam tried to show that the eighteenthcentury ‘crisis’ is a far more complex issue than the Delhi-centered administrative and fiscal studies of empire have so far projected. An alternative view of the decline of the Mughal Empire has been offered by MN Pearson. According to Pearson, the apparent aggressive policy of the Mughals was in fact a defensive policy that they had been forced to follow due to various compulsions. He contends that the move south was itself a symptom of central weakness of the Mughal Empire. Due to the centrality of the military concerns in the state, there was no alternative but to respond aggressively to the military challenge of Maratha resistance. The move was thus not expansionist but entirely defensive. Pearson also analysed the unique relationship between the Mughal state and the nobility. He perceived Mughal rule as very indirect, and the only people directly connected to the emperor were the mansabdars. They were bound by patronage and continuity of these ties depended upon military success and not religious or ethnic background. Pearson shows how Shivaji’s increasing threats through his attack on Surat, attack on Shaista Khan, the failure of the Mughal Emperor to strike an alliance with him as well as his eventual escape from Agra were all humiliating and demoralizing for the Mughal state. With the consequent move to the Deccan, by the 1670s onwards there was a sense of despair in Mughal nobility. They began to think in terms of whether or not support to Mughal state was still beneficial. Pearson maintains that the empire declined because it failed to evolve to a more impersonal level where criteria other than military might could be allowed to have more influence. Peter Hardy critiqued Pearson’s thesis and pointed out that it is unreasonable to expect anything more than a military ethic based relationship between the Emperor and the nobility

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because for ages preceding Mughal rule, Indian society had been organized into large political units through military warfare and was very accustomed to it. He also points out that apart from the military ethos, other ties of loyalty and patronage also bound both sides. Hardy has tried to show that the relationship between the state and the mansabdars was not only based on military success but also had political and administrative dimensions and at various levels there were attempts to integrate nobility with local chiefs and zamindars and bring them into Mughal framework. The concept of watan jagir is an example which took into account political interests of groups like Rajputs and zamindars. Heestermann has tried to explain the decline of the Mughal Empire in terms of trade. According to him the Mughal state was unable to establish its control properly over trade routes. Internal trade routes had become vulnerable due to increasing plundering raids and the sea routes were becoming monopolized by the Europeans. However recent scholars like Satish Chandra, Muzaffar Alam and Stephen Dale have shown that if trade routes were affected, external trade was carried on through land routes of Central Asia. Moreover the Mughals were a land-oriented state. Hence their trade was also carried usually on land and not seas. They also point out that if certain trade centres had declined, others had emerged. According to Heesterman, the Mughal Empire did not fall; rather it was simply swallowed by a larger political organism: a cyclical realignment rather than a collapse characterized the change in the eighteenth century. Athar Ali in his article ‘Passing of the Empire’ tried to find a similarity between the collapse of the Mughal Empire that coincided with the collapse of the Safavids, Uzbeks and Ottomans. He saw the emergence of Europe as the principle market for luxuries and crafts manufacturing of the world as the major event between 1500 and 1700. This caused a serious disturbance in the economics of the Eastern countries because as prices of luxuries rose, the ruling class found it difficult to obtain them from their limited income. Hence, they resorted to reckless agricultural exploitation and when that failed, to factional activities for individual gains that led to civil wars and spelled the end of the empire. Ali also maintains that India remained stagnant in the growth of science and technology whereas Europe forged ahead. Therefore Athar Ali has tried to explain the Mughal decline in terms of a cultural failure shared with the entire Islamic world that tilted the economic balance in favour of Europe and reduced their capacity to grapple with the agrarian crisis. This argument has been challenged by Chris Bayly, Satish Chandra, Muzaffar Alam and AJ Kaiser who hold that the Indians did not lag behind the Europeans in technical terms. Kaiser points out that in some areas Mughal technology was far superior to European technology but was not used on a large scale and needed more time to produce. These scholars place Ali’s contention in the context of the larger tendency to term the 18th century as a period of decline and instability. Another interesting view is that of Karen Leonard. Moving from trade to the potential of merchant capital, Leonard emphasized the movement of mercantile from Delhi to the regional centers as being critical to the buoyancy of the latter’s political economy and the relative decline of the former. The shift of credit and trade of the great banking firms to the regional centers was accompanied by the emergence of a mobile service class with multiple functions: trade, accounting, as well as revenue collection. This theory however might explain one

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aspect of the decline but one cannot explain the phenomenon of decline in its totality from just this perspective. After an analysis of the various points of view on the nature of resistance in the latter part of the 17th and early 18th centuries and the decline of the Mughal Empire, we can conclude that to use the term peasant revolts to describe these movements is a simplistic generalization. Not only were there other factors like exploitation by the zamindars, but we also need to understand these movements in their regional context. Also, when understanding the decline of the Mughal Empire we need to look at institutional problems which developed over time and not just look at politico-religious explanations that focus on the personality of one individual – Aurangzeb. Recent revisionist writings like those of Alam and Bayly have emphasized that we need to question the very notion of a general decline since there is evidence that from a regional perspective there was economic prosperity in the subcontinent. There is only a reorientation of interests from the centre to the provinces. The emergence of various successor states such as Awadh, Bengal, Hyderabad, Mysore, Punjab and Jat states, in which Mughal traditions continued at a regional level are testimony to this decentralization and reorientation of authority. Weakening of central authority also needs to be seen in the context of weak successors of Aurangzeb. BIBLIOGRAPHY  Irfan Habib – The Agrarian System of Mughal India  Seema Alavi (ed.) – The Eighteenth Century in India (Introduction)  M. Athar Ali – The Passing of Empire: The Mughal Case  M. Athar Ali – The Nobility under Aurangzeb  Satish Chandra – Medieval India  JF Richards – The Imperial Crisis in the Deccan  MN Pearson – Shivaji and the Decline of the Mughal Empire  Muzaffar Alam – The Crisis of the Mughal Empire  R.P.Tripathi - Rise and Fall of the Mughal Empire  Jadunath Sarkar – History of Aurangzeb, Volume IV  Articles a.) Irfan Habib – The Eighteenth Century in Indian Economic History in P. J. Marshall (ed.) – The Eighteenth Century in Indian History: Evolution or Revolution? b.) Muzaffar Alam - Aspects of Agrarian Uprisings in North India in the Early Eighteenth Century in Seema Alavi (ed.) – The Eighteenth Century In India

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