10-17-2007, 11:29 PM
Anglospheric view on the pre-Anglospheric native political system of India:
When the British East India Company became the dominant power in India about the middle of the eighteenth century, the Mogul Empire was in the last stages of disintegration. Provincial rulers had only nominal titles, sufficient to bring them immense treasure in taxes and rents, but they generally lacked either the will or the strength to maintain order. The more vigorous tried to expand their domains at the expense of the more feeble, oppressing the peace-loving peasantry in the process, while all legal power was challenged by roaming upstart bands and plundering tribes. Of these willful tribes, the most important were the Marathas. These systematically devastated much of south-central India in the last half of the eighteenth century, forcing each village to buy temporary immunity from destruction, but steadily reducing the capacity of the countryside to meet their demands because of the trail of death and economic disorganization they left in their wake. By 1900 only one-fifth of the land in some areas was cultivated.
When the British East India Company became the dominant power in India about the middle of the eighteenth century, the Mogul Empire was in the last stages of disintegration. Provincial rulers had only nominal titles, sufficient to bring them immense treasure in taxes and rents, but they generally lacked either the will or the strength to maintain order. The more vigorous tried to expand their domains at the expense of the more feeble, oppressing the peace-loving peasantry in the process, while all legal power was challenged by roaming upstart bands and plundering tribes. Of these willful tribes, the most important were the Marathas. These systematically devastated much of south-central India in the last half of the eighteenth century, forcing each village to buy temporary immunity from destruction, but steadily reducing the capacity of the countryside to meet their demands because of the trail of death and economic disorganization they left in their wake. By 1900 only one-fifth of the land in some areas was cultivated.