Below the nobles, there was “a small and frugal” middle class, not given to “ostentatious expenditure” but living on a standard suited to their respective offices and professions. The merchants in general led simple and temperate lives.
Social habits and practices
The vice of intemperance was not so common among the ordinary people as among the rich. “None of the people there,” remarks Terry, “are at any time seen drunk (though they might find liquor enough to do it) but the very offal and dregs of that people, and these rarely or very seldom.” They were temperate in their diet, and were civil to strangers.
Both Hindus and Muslim believed in the maxims and predictions of astrology. Prominent social practices of the period were Sati, child-marriage, kulinism and the dowry-system. Akbar tried to regulate social usages in such a way as to make the consent of both the bride and the bridegroom, and the permission of the parents, necessary for marriage contracts. He also sought to check marriage before puberty by either party, marriages between near relatives, acceptance of high dowries, and polygamy. But his attempts do not seem to have been effective in practice. Social evils increased during the eighteenth century, particularly in Bengal, and they have been frequently referred to in the works of contemporary European writers like Bolts, Craufurd and Scrafton, and also in contemporary literature. The Maratha society of the time did not, however, encourage acceptance of dowries. The Peshwas exercised an effective control over the social and religious affairs of Maharashtra, and their marriage regulations “evinced “, remarks Dr. Sen, ” a liberal spirit that may be profitably imitated by their modern descendants “. They were opposed to forcible marriages, but informal marriages were occasionally permitted by them if the motives of the contracting parties were correct. Widow-remarriage was prevalent among the non Brahmana of Maharashtra, as also among the Jats of the Punjab and the Jumna valley; and polyandry was not unknown among the latter. In the middle of the eighteenth century, Raja Rajballabh of Dacca made an unsuccessful attempt to introduce widow-remarriage. Though the women were generally “subject to the will of their masters”, instances of their taking an active part in political affairs are not rare.
Deterioration in the eighteenth centuryEconomic Conditions
In general, however, we notice a regrettable deterioration in social life during the eighteenth century, which forms, from many points of view, one of the darkest periods in the history of India. A modern writer has justly remarked that by the end of this century and the beginning of the next “in social usage, in politics, in the realm of religion and art, we had entered the zone of uncreative habit, of decadent tradition, and ceased to exercise our humanity “.One redeeming feature in this period of all-round decline was the continuity of the process of Hindu-Muslim rapprochement and amicable contact between the members of the two communities, in spite of the bitter political rivalries of several centuries. Akbar’s reign is remarkably
important and instructive for the existence of Hindu-Muslim harmony. Illustrations of this are not lacking even in the reign of Aurangzeb. Alawal, a Muhammadan poet, who translated in the seventeenth century the Hindi poem Padmavat into Bengali, was the author of several poems on Vaishnava subjects. ‘Abdullah Khan, one of the Sayyid brothers, observed the Basant and Holi festivals, and Siraj-ud-daulah and Mir Jafar enjoyed Holi festivals along with their friends and relatives. It is said that on his death bed Mir Jafar drank a few drops of water poured in libation over the idol of Kiriteswari near Murshidabad. Daulat Rao Sindhia and his officers joined Muharram processions in green dress like Muhammadans. It has been noted by a modern Indian writer on the authority of Jam-i-Jahan Numa, a Persian weekly of the early nineteenth century, how the Durga Puja, was celebrated at the Delhi court so late as A.D. 1825.
Economic Conditions
Economic condition in pre-Akbarid days
We have very meagre information about the economic condition of India during the reigns of the first two Timurids. Most of the historians have questioned the accuracy of the description of Hindustan given by Babur in his Memoirs. The Humayun-namah of Gulbadan Begam refers incidentally to the low prices prevailing in Hindustan; for example, at Amarkot, the birthplace of Akbar, the price of four goats was one rupee. The comprehensive economic reforms of Sher Shah must have effected an improvement in the economic condition of the people in his kingdom, which was not very much disturbed at least so long as the Sur administration retained its vigour.
Economic condition after the days of Akbar
So far as the economic condition of the country during the reigns of the great Mughuls, and those of the later Mughuls, is concerned, we get copious information from the Ain-i-Akbari and some incidental references in some other works in Persian; from the accounts of contemporary European merchants, travellers and writers; from the records of the European factories in India; and also from contemporary Indian literature. We can only attempt here to give a brief survey of the important aspects of the economic condition of India during the centuries of Mughul rule.
