Decay of the Mughal Empire
Till now we discussed the advent of Europeans and the weaknesses of later Mughal rulers, now we will take our discussion forward.
There is a rule that you should always remember while studying polity or history, whenever there is a weak center state the peripheral states may become assertive. This happened in the case of the Mauryan empire and later in the case of the Mughal Empire. As we discussed in earlier lessons how the Mughal empire was weak and how regional states became assertive. SO always remember this rule, weak center = assertive peripheral states.
So in this lesson, we are talking more about the nature of these peripheral states that emerged in 18th Century India
In the 18th century, major political formations developed in India. Mughal empire declined and disintegrated, and on the debris of the Mughal Empire rose a large number of independent and semi-independent states.
These states were somewhat similar to Mughal State, they adopted the same methods of administrations, same revenue structure, same law, and order. These states made collaboration with friendly zamindars to make their small states stable and accommodative of peace, law, and order.
We can divide these states into 3 categories
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Succession states
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Rebel states
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Coastal states and North East
Successor States: The governors of the Mughal Empire itself sensed the weakness in the central authority and became assertive and became independent of parent states.
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Nizam ul Mulk Asaf Jha got frustrated from Rangila and created the state of Hyderabad
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Murshid Quli Khan who was Dewan of Bengal since 1700 and later governor of Bengal declared independence too
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On similar lines, Awadh became independent under Burhan ul Mulk Saadat Khan
These guys kept friendly relations with the Mughal empire, they did not challenge Mughal sovereignty and kept the centre happy by paying large tributes from time to time. The other states which rose in these times were rebellious states.
Rebel States: These states were mostly newly emerged states, Local chieftains, zamindars, and peasants came together and became the backbone of these states such as the Marathas, the Jats, the Sikhs, etc. These states were unhappy with the Mughal administration and there was a conflict of interests between Mughal states and these new states. These rebellious states challenged Mughal Sovereignty. Whenever there was an opportunity, these states grabbed that opportunity and fractured Mughal State which was already declining. In the upcoming years, these states became fully independent and provided formidable resistance to the British East India Company. English actually defeated these guys and not Mughal Empire to win India, her prized colony. We will discuss how the British East India Company defeated these states one by one to gain control over entire India in upcoming lessons.
Finally, there was a third zone, where the Mughal empire failed to put their hands effectively as they did in earlier regions. These were the areas where Mughal influence had not penetrated to any degree. These regions were the southeast coast, southwest coast, and northeastern coast.
We have classified the states now let us discuss the nature of these states. As per Bipan Chandra, almost all the regional staes was non-communal and secular in nature, there was no discrimination on grounds of religion while making public appointments.
These states were rent extracting states, these guys, be it successor Staes or rebel states, introduced more zamindars and jagirdars, and encouraged more decentralization. They focused on increasing their agricultural revenue as much as they can at the cost of the peasantry.
Overall they failed to consolidate and create something new out of their struggle they inherited the same structure and construct of Mughals, and inherited their weaknesses too. They did good in terms of internal and external trade but it was short-lived, soon the Indian economy became over-dependent on foreign trade and the rest is history, a history where how local merchants exploited helpless Indians.
Regional states that we talked about in the recent lesson on Youtube did nothing special to modernize industries and the commercial sector, also no advancement in technology and in education.
And that proved advantageous for Britishers and the grabbed this opportunity with open hands and squeezed India.
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