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and advanced the amount of the revenue for payment in money. The headman also settled the allowance to be made for injury to the crops near the pathways. He set the village watchmen to look after the crops, and to see that the cultivation was so conducted that the revenue might not suffer. He settled the share to be paid by each ryot towards the deh khurcha (or village expenses), and each ryot's share of the cost of watching the crops; and, in Mahomedan times, the amount of abwab or extra assessment that fell to each cultivator's share. He was bound to see that the putwaree or village accountant made the proper entries in his books. He was besides the village magistrate, and superintended the village police or chowkeedars.2

LECTURE

ments.

I.

The headman's duties were numerous and responsible; His emoluand his emoluments were in consequence considerable. He had a few beegahs of land, free of revenue, for a garden; and paid a lower rate for the rest of his lands than ordinary ryots.3 He was allowed the services of one or more of the servile labourers of the village, and of their families; and 4th or th of his grain crop was set apart for their maintenance before his crop was assessed. Or if he did not require their labour, he was sometimes allowed the deduction instead. He got fees and dues (called huks in the Deccan) from the non-agricultural villagers; such as money for a dress and turban; oil and tobacco daily from the shops; a present on the marriage of

Mr. Newnham's evidence before the Select Committee of the House of Commons (1832), 2765.

2 Land Tenure by a Civilian, 32, 77. Harington's Analysis Vol. II, 67, 68. Fifth Report, Vol. II, 13, 352, 353. Robinson's Land Revenue, 55, 69. Orissa, Vol. II, 242. Directions for Revenue Officers, 4.

3 Orissa, Vol. I, 60, 61; Vol. II, 253, 254.

LECTURE

I.

In Orissa villages.

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any of the tenants-at-will (oopurees or pyekashts); fees from travellers, &c. These were called mohturfa. His money dues amounted to about a penny in the acre in Orissa. He had a right, prior to that the rest of the village, to water from the common wells or dams. He was entitled to any surplus of the deh khurcha (village fund) or watching fund. He was paid his expenses for food and travelling when employed on the village affairs. He was entitled to have his water and wood brought to him by the village servants, and even to the services of a shampooer. These emoluments were in the Deccan included under the generic term wuttun. I have mentioned that he paid less than the other cultivators for his own holding; this appears to have been his remuneration as a servant of the State; while his other emoluments were derived from the village, and were the payment of his services to the village. He paid from th to 4th of his grain crop (nujkaree) as revenue, while the other villagers paid higher rates; and he was charged from th to 3rd less than ordinary ryots for his other crops of a superior kind (zubtee).5

The Kandh villages in Orissa were in like manner presided over by headmen, but owing to the loose organisation of those villages, their headmen had none of the power or privileges of the Hindoo village headman. In the ancient German villages, which had an organisation something like 1 Steele's Deccan Castes, 204, 205.

2 Orissa, Vol. I, 60, 61; Vol. II, 253, 254.

Land Tenure by a Civilian, 78, 80. Orissa, Vol. I, 60, 61. Fifth Report, Vol. II, 13, 76. Steele's Deccan Castes, 204, 205. See Menu, ch. VII, sl. 119.

Robinson's Land Revenue, 69. Steele's Deccan Castes, 204.

5 Land Tenure by a Civilian 80.

6 Orissa, Vol. II, 209, 210.

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I.

that of the Hindoo villages, the chief had a larger or better LECTURE allotment of land as his remuneration.'

Although the headman had the strength of hereditary Dismissal, claims to support him, his office was not a freehold. He could be dismissed by the State; and then his services to the village being rendered useless, his emoluments ceased: but of course he retained his own lands, paying the ordinary revenue for them. He could not however be dismissed by the State except for failure to make good the revenue assessed upon the village, and for the due payment of which he was responsible. In fact, he was in something like the same position as the zemindars subsequently, except that he was in some sort elected by the village subject to the sanction of the State, and not appointed by the State. He might however have advanced claims to be considered the absolute proprietor upon almost as good grounds as have been advanced by or rather for the zemindars; but in truth he was a mere official originally; having nevertheless land which he cultivated himself within the limits of his jurisdiction, just as the zemindars afterwards had. The position and emoluments of the zemindars seem to have been an extension of those of the headman: many of the headmen became zemindars, and their rights as headmen were combined with and merged in their claims as zemindars.3

assessment

We have seen that the assessment of revenue was upon Mode of the individual cultivator; but the headman and the entire of revenue. village were responsible for its payment. The cultivator was dealt with individually, but as a member of the village

M. de Laveleye in the Revue des Deux Mondes, tome 100, p. 511.

2 Land Tenure by a Civilian, 33, 79.

Land Tenure by a Civilian, 33, 76. Thomason's Selections, 18.

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I.

Mode of payment.

2

LECTURE and through the headman: and so strong was the custom of having the assessment settled with reference to the village usages, and to the position of the individual as a member of the village, that in the Madras presidency some villages were found where the individual cultivators had been assessed direct by the Government for half a century, but had always redistributed the assessment amongst themselves according to their own usages. The same thing also happened in Java, where, as I have mentioned, the village system is derived from India. The headman made over the revenue either direct to the superior representative of the Government, or indirectly through a talookdar or zemindar; the latter chiefly in Mahomedan times. When he paid the revenue direct he was called in Mahomedan times an huzooree or kharij malgoozar; but if he paid through a talookdar or zemindar, he was called a muzkooree (dependent), shikmi, mofussil or shamili malgoozar. word muzkooree is now however sometimes applied in the opposite sense to direct paying malgoozars in the Surbarakari and Mocuddumy holdings in Cuttack, while zati is used for the dependent tenures.5

When head

The

If the headman refused, on the part of the village, man refused to to agree to the amount of assessment required by the

agree to assessment.

1 Orissa, Vol. II, 166. Evidence before the House of Commons, Select Committee (1832) of Mr. Sullivan, 12 and 13; and of Mr. Fortescue, 2237, 2238. Directions for Revenue Officers, 4.

2

Campbell's Cobden Club Essay, 197. Mr. Fortescue's evidence before the Select Committee of the House of Lords (1830), 402, 404. Fifth Report, Vol. II, 41.

3

M. de Laveleye in the Revue des Deux Mondes, tome 100, p. 160. Land Tenure by a Civilian, 45, 61. Whinfield's Landlord and Tenant, 5. Harington's Analysis, Vol. II, 62.

5 Whinfield's Landlord and Tenant, 5. Harington's Analysis, Vol. II, 62.

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officers of Government, the settlement was sometimes made with the cultivators direct; or the revenue was farmed in theka (farm) or ijarah (lease) for a year or sometimes for a term of three or even five years; and the headman was assessed for the lands cultivated by him like the rest of the villagers.3

LECTURE
I.

a farmer of the revenue.

village respon

The headman was not generally a farmer of the revenue, Headman not or a contractor for it like the Mahomedan zemindars. In settling the amount to be charged to the village he acted chiefly in the interests of the village; and when the amount was settled, he collected that amount in money or kind from the villagers chiefly in his capacity of revenue officer. He was responsible for its collection; but does not appear to have been so otherwise than as a representative at once of the Government and the village. The assessment, as I have said, was upon the cultivators individually; but the whole village, and the headman as its representative, was But he and the responsible for its collection. Probably in still earlier times sible. when the village may have been the political and fiscal unit, the assessment may have been simply upon the village in a single sum, as was the practice since the British rule in the South of India. The various rates paid by the various classes of ryots would seem to point to a time when the village was assessed in a single sum, and the distribution of that sum amongst the ryots was made by the village and was a matter of indifference to the State. Afterwards, when the State came into more direct relations Directions for Revenue Officers, 4, 173. Fifth Report, Vol. II, 353, 575.

2 Land Tenure by a Civilian, 60.

* Ib.

See Freeman's Growth of the English Constitution (London: Macmillan & Co., 1872), pp. 9, 10.

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