Building a Pit of Human Shit as the Revenue Model of Murshid Quli Khan

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WITH MURSHIDABAD as his capital, Quli had divided the Bengal Subah into thirteen circles or Chaklas. Each Chakla was further subdivided into thirteen jahgirs or tracts headed by a Jahgirdar or Zamindar who was personally accountable to Quli. These apart, a total of twenty-five Khālsas fell under the thirteen Chaklas. These khālsas were farmed out to revenue contractors. 

If this was not enough, Murshid Quli Khan had by then established his own mint in Murshidabad, the surest imprint of an independent king. 

It was doubtless a well-structured and well-oiled revenue administrative system. Ghulam Husain Salim Zaidpuri, in his Riyaz-us-Salatin, gives a detailed description of how this system functioned. 

But Murshid Quli’s revenue “reforms” had an appalling human cost. 

While the cultivators were no longer squeezed by the aforementioned “double set of leeches,” they were now caught in an inescapable stranglehold of a new, giant boa constrictor. They fell from the frying pan into an inferno.  

Nawab Murshid Quli Khan enforced his new revenue regime through naked terror. Torture and ruthlessness were his monetary policy. The revenue had to be deposited with him to the last dam. Failures and excuses were met with bestial torture. 

It appears that Murshid Quli Khan took inspiration from Balban, a bigoted barbarian who predated him by more than 400 years. Like Balban, Murshid Quli ruled Bengal strictly in accordance with the Islamic law. He kept a chasmic distance between him and his Jahgirdars and Zamindars. They had no direct access to him. Only the Amils and Mutsadis could send prayers in reverential language, to have the honour of being in his Presence. And woe befell them if he sent for them. In the words of Ghulam Husain, in Quli’s Presence, “they quailed and… remained standing breathless like statues.” Hindu Zamindars were prohibited from travelling in Palkis even if it befitted their status. Amils and Mutsadis could not ride on horseback; Mansabdars had to compulsorily wear uniforms in his Presence. 

Nawab Murshid Quli Khan had reduced his whole officialdom to the rank of quaking lepers ensuring that there was no one who could claim the status of being his second-in-command. In his view, confident delegation of authority was for weaklings and lesser mortals.

NOTHING ILLUSTRATES THIS better than the manner in which he enforced revenue collection. The worst of today’s mafia-style loan-sharking techniques pale in comparison to Quli. 

At the end of each month, Murshid Quli summoned his Jahgirdars, Zamindars, Amils, Mutsadis, Quanungos (Keeper of Revenue Records) and Ijāra-dars (revenue contractors) to the Diwan-Khana of his Chihel Satun (Hall of Forty Pillars) palace. They were kept there in a state of quasi imprisonment under the intimidating gaze of his soldiers. Then he confiscated all their contracts and account books and studied them in minute detail. If there were any outstanding dues, the concerned official was treated to hell on the spot. He was deprived of performing even his basic bodily functions until he settled his dues. He was not allowed to eat food, drink water or answer calls of nature. This ordeal went on for weeks. No amount of pleading for mercy melted Quli’s heart. Quite the contrary. The greater the entreaty, the harsher the punishment. The blighted official was suspended in air by his heels, his head facing down, his body forming a triangle to the ground. Then, sharp, coarse stones were continuously rubbed like sandpaper on his soles and then beaten with iron rods and bamboo sticks. Other errant officials were flogged with cat o' nines till they passed out. The flogging was resumed after they returned to their senses. 

This savage punishment was the innovation of Murshid Quli’s peon named Nazir Ahmad.  

 All these punishments clearly had the desired outcome: the official agreed to pay the dues. How he did it did not matter to Murshid Quli Khan. 

Then there were genuine cases in which the official had simply run out of all options to meet Quli’s monthly revenue target. And if the official was a Hindu, his fate was triply worse. First, he had to endure the aforementioned bestial torture. Second, he had to convince Quli that he was speaking the truth and that  even he was killed, the Nawab couldn’t get more money than what he had already paid. Third, if Quli was convinced of the man’s honesty, he forcibly converted this Hindu official and his whole family to Islam. 

Then we have perhaps the most revolting punishment recorded in human history. It was the brainchild of the bigoted Syed Razi Khan, husband of Murshid Quli Khan’s granddaughter. This noxious pervert had been elevated to the powerful position of the Deputy Diwan of the Bengal Subah. He ordered his men to dig a pit whose height and width were that of an average man and got it filled to the brim with human excreta. He called this pit of filth, derisively as Vaikunth, the abode of Mahavishnu, a name sacred to Hindus. 

Now it was time to bring the zamindars, amils, et al., who had either defaulted or not settled their dues or had not met their monthly target. These luckless men were first tortured to the hilt. And when they arrived here, they were suspended on their heads, their feet tied to a horizontal pole or beam. Then they were  slowly lowered into this pit till they were neck deep in human ordure. Then they were lifted up and lowered again. And again. And again. And again. Till they gave their inevitable consent to pay up. 

WE NEED TO RECALL that this was the trauma that Quli’s ranking officials underwent. To spell the obvious, they in turn, inflicted a similar nightmare throughout their own Jahgirs. The ultimate consequence was the fact that Bengal’s farmers lived on the brink of impoverishment; sure, their lands now yielded a handsome surplus most of which directly filled Quli’s burgeoning coffers. 

This is how Murshid Quli Khan was able to send one crore and three lakh rupees to the Mughal treasury in Delhi each year in both cash and kind. He did not count the money but weighed it. The Riyaz-us-Salatin gives a graphic account of Quli’s remittance of this substantial wealth. 

Murshid Quli Khan’s heartless bleeding of Bengal was on a scale more horrific than it had been under Shah Jahan, who had diverted its wealth to fund his prolific vanity projects like that expensive graveyard known as the Taj Mahal. 

To be continued