History 7th NCERT chapter 10 key points

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Day # 7 (March 30, 2017)           

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Topics of the Day: History 7th NCERT chapter 10 key points

Emperor Arungazeb had depleted the military and financial resources of his empire by fighting a long war in the Deccan.

 Under his successors, the efficiency of the imperial administration broke down.

 Nobles appointed as governors (subadars) often controlled the offices of revenue and military administration (diwani and faujdari) as well. This gave them extraordinary political, economic

and military powers over vast regions of the Mughal Empire.

 As the governors consolidated their control over the provinces, the periodic remission of revenue to the capital declined.

 Peasant and zamindari rebellions in many parts of northern and western India added to these problems.

 The Mughal emperors after Aurangzeb were unable to arrest the gradual shifting of political and economic authority into the hands of provincial governors, local chieftains and other groups.

 In the midst of this economic and political crisis, the ruler of Iran, Nadir Shah, sacked and plundered the city of Delhi in 1739 and took away immense amounts of wealth. This invasion

was followed by a series of plundering raids by the Afghan ruler Ahmad

 Shah Abdali, who invaded north India five times between 1748 and 1761.

 Two Mughal emperors, Farrukh Siyar (1713-1719) and Alamgir II (1754-1759) were assassinated, and two others Ahmad Shah (1748-1754) and Shah Alam II (1759-1816) were blinded by their

nobles. Hyderabad

 Nizam-ul-Mulk Asaf Jah, the founder of Hyderabad state, was one of the most powerful members at the court of the Mughal Emperor Farrukh Siyar.

 He was entrusted first with the governorship of Awadh, and later given charge of the Deccan.

 As the Mughal governor of the Deccan provinces, Asaf Jah already had full control over its political and financial administration.

 Taking advantage of the turmoil in the Deccan and the competition amongst the court nobility, he gathered power in his hands and became the actual ruler of that region.

 Asaf Jah brought skilled soldiers and administrators from northern India who welcomed the new opportunities in the south.

 He appointed mansabdars and granted jagirs.

 Although he was still a servant of the Mughal emperor, he ruled quite independently without seeking any direction from Delhi or facing any interference.

 The Mughal emperor merely confirmed the decisions already taken by the Nizam.

 The state of Hyderabad was constantly engaged in a struggle against the Marathas to the west and with independent Telugu warrior chiefs (nayakas) of the plateau.

 The ambitions of the Nizam to control the rich textile-producing areas of the Coromandel coast in the east were checked by the British who were becoming increasingly powerful in that region.

Awadh

 Burhan-ul-Mulk Sa‘adat Khan was appointed subadar of Awadh in 1722 and founded a state which was one of the most important to emerge out of the break-up of the Mughal Empire.

Awadh was a prosperous region, controlling the rich alluvial Ganga plain and the main trade route between north India and Bengal. Burhan-ul-Mulk also held the combined offices of

subadari, diwani and faujdari.

 In other words, he was responsible for managing the political, financial and military affairs of the province of Awadh.

 Burhan-ul-Mulk tried to decrease Mughal influence in the Awadh region by reducing the number of office holders (jagirdars) appointed by the Mughals.

 He also reduced the size of jagirs, and appointed his own loyal servants to vacant positions.

 The accounts of jagirdars were checked to prevent cheating and the revenues of all districts were reassessed by officials appointed by the Nawab’s court.

 He seized a number of Rajput zamindaris and the agriculturally fertile lands of the Afghans of Rohilkhand.

 The state depended on local bankers and mahajans for loans. It sold the right to collect tax to the highest bidders.

 These “revenue farmers” (ijaradars) agreed to pay the state a fixed sum of money.

 Local bankers guaranteed the payment of this contracted amount to the state.

 In turn, the revenue-farmers were given considerable freedom in the assessment and collection of taxes.

 These developments allowed new social groups, like moneylenders and bankers, to influence the management of the state’s revenue system, something which had not

occurred in the past.

Bengal

 Bengal gradually broke away from Mughal control under Murshid Quli Khan who was appointed as the naib, deputy to the governor of the province.

 Although never a formal subadar, Murshid Quli Khan very quickly seized all the power that went with that office.

 Like the rulers of Hyderabad and Awadh he also commanded the revenue administration of the state.

 In an effort to reduce Mughal influence in Bengal he transferred all Mughal jagirdars to Orissa and ordered a major reassessment of the revenues of Bengal.

 Revenue was collected in cash with great strictness from all zamindars. As a result, many zamindars had to borrow money from bankers and moneylenders.

 Those unable to pay were forced to sell their lands to larger zamindars.

The Watan Jagirs of Rajput:

 Many Rajput kings particularly those belonging to Amber and Jodhpur, had served under the Mughals with distinction. In exchange, they were permitted to enjoy considerable autonomy

in their watan jagirs.

 In the eighteenth century, these rulers now attempted to extend their control over adjacent regions.

 Ajit Singh, the ruler of Jodhpur, was also involved in the factional politics at the Mughal court.

 These influential Rajput families claimed the subadari of the rich provinces of Gujarat and Malwa.

 Raja Ajit Singh of Jodhpur held the governorship of Gujarat and Sawai Raja Jai Singh of Amber was governor of Malwa. These offices were renewed by Emperor Jahandar Shah in 1713.

 They also tried to extend their territories by seizing portions of imperial territories neighbouring their watans.

 Nagaur was conquered and annexed to the house of Jodhpur, while Amber seized large portions of Bundi.

 Sawai Raja Jai Singh founded his new capital at Jaipur and was given the subadari of Agra in 1722.

 Maratha campaigns into Rajasthan from the 1740s put severe pressure on these principalities and checked their further expansion.

The Sikhs

 The organisation of the Sikhs into a political community during the seventeenth century helped in regional state-building in the Punjab.

 Several battles were fought by Guru Gobind Singh against the Rajput and Mughal rulers, both before and after the institution of the Khalsa in 1699.

 After his death in 1708, the Khalsa rose in revolt against the Mughal authority under Banda Bahadur’s leadership, declared their sovereign rule by striking coins in the name of Guru Nanak

and Guru Gobind Singh, and established their own administration between the Sutlej and the Jamuna.

 Banda Bahadur was captured in 1715 and executed in 1716.

 Under a number of able leaders in the eighteenth century, the Sikhs organized themselves into a number of bands called jathas, and later on misls.

 Their combined forces were known as the grand army (dal khalsa).

 The entire body used to meet at Amritsar at the time of Baisakhi and Diwali to take collective decisions known as “resolutions of the Guru (gurmatas)”.

 A system called rakhi was introduced, offering protection to cultivators on the payment of a tax of 20 per cent of the produce.

 Guru Gobind Singh had inspired the Khalsa with the belief that their destiny was to rule (raj karega khalsa). Their well-knit organization enabled them to put up a successful resistance to

the Mughal governors first and then to Ahmad Shah Abdali who had seized the rich province of the Punjab and the Sarkar of Sirhind from the Mughals.

 The Khalsa declared their sovereign rule by striking their own coin again in 1765.

 Significantly, this coin bore the same inscription as the one on the orders issued by the Khalsa in the time of Banda Bahadur.

 The Sikh territories in the late eighteenth century extended from the Indus to the Jamuna but they were divided under different rulers. One of them, Maharaja Ranjit Singh, reunited these groups and established his capital at Lahore in 1799.

The Marathas

 The Maratha kingdom was another powerful regional kingdom to arise out of a sustained opposition to Mughal rule.

 Shivaji (1627-1680) carved out a stable kingdom with the support of powerful warrior families (deshmukhs).

 Groups of highly mobile, peasantpastoralists (kunbis) provided the backbone of the Maratha army.

 Shivaji used these forces to challenge the Mughals in the peninsula.

 After Shivaji’s death, effective power in the Maratha state was wielded by a family of Chitpavan Brahmanas who served Shivaji’s successors as Peshwa (or principal minister).

 Poona became the capital of the Maratha kingdom.

 Under the Peshwas, the Marathas developed a very successful military organisation. Their success lay in bypassing the fortified areas of the Mughals, by raiding cities and by engaging

Mughal armies in areas where their supply lines and reinforcements could be easily disturbed.

 Between 1720 and 1761, the Maratha empire expanded.

 By the 1730s, the Maratha king was recognised as the overlord of the entire Deccan peninsula. He possessed the right to levy chauth and sardeshmukhi in the entire region.

 After raiding Delhi in 1737 the frontiers of Maratha domination expanded rapidly: into Rajasthan and the Punjab in the north; into Bengal and Orissa in the east; and into Karnataka

and the Tamil and Telugu countries in the south.

 These were not formally included in the Maratha empire, but were made to pay tribute as a way of accepting Maratha sovereignty.

 Expansion brought enormous resources, but it came at a price.

 These military campaigns also made other rulers hostile towards the Marathas.

 As a result, they were not inclined to support the Marathas during the third battle of Panipat in 1761.

 Once conquest had been completed and Maratha rule was secure, revenue demands were gradually introduced taking local conditions into account.

 Agriculture was encouraged and trade revived. This allowed Maratha chiefs (sardars) like Sindhia of Gwalior, Gaekwad of Baroda and Bhonsle of Nagpur the resources to raise powerful armies.

 Maratha campaigns into Malwa in the 1720s did not challenge the growth and prosperity of the cities in the region.

 Ujjain expanded under Sindhia’s patronage and Indore under Holkar’s. By all accounts these

cities were large and prosperous and functioned as important commercial and cultural centres. New trade routes emerged within the areas controlled by the Marathas.

 The silk produced in the Chanderi region now found a new outlet in Poona, the Maratha capital. Burhanpur which had earlier participated in the trade between Agra and Surat now

expanded its hinterland to include Poona and Nagpur in the south and Lucknow and Allahabad in the east.

The Jats

 Like the other states the Jats consolidated their power during the late seventeenth and eighteenth-centuries.

 Under their leader, Churaman, they acquired control over territories situated to the west of the city of Delhi, and by the 1680s they had begun dominating the region between the two

imperial cities of Delhi and Agra.

 The Jats were prosperous agriculturists, and towns like Panipat and Ballabhgarh became important trading centres in the areas dominated by them.

 Under Suraj Mal the kingdom of Bharatpur emerged as a strong state.

 When Nadir Shah sacked Delhi in 1739, many of the city’s notables took refuge there.

 His son Jawahir Shah had 30,000 troops of his own and hired another 20,000 Maratha and 15,000 Sikh troops to fight the Mughals.