Author Description

The present essays on land revenue system were read and discussed in a local seminar held in the Department of History, Patna University, in 1965. They cover a large span of Indian history and have also something to say on the tribal land system. The first two essays analyze and explain the ground taxes from about B.C. 200 to A.D. 1200, and a comparison between the two shows that several additional taxes appeared in early medieval north India. The third essay deals with the mode of assessment, medium of payment and the method of collection in Mughal times. The discussion on assignment initiated by it is continued in the fourth, which examines the ideas and circumstances leading to the introduction of Permanent Settlement. The peculiarities of the tribal land system in South Bihar are brought out in two essays. They show how the large-scale introduction of ideas of private property in land by non-tribal practices and gave rise to social tensions, political unrest and peasant revolts, which could not be successfully tackled by piecemeal agrarian legislation introduced by the British.