Commentary on
William Logan’s ‘Malabar Manual’
VED from VICTORIA INSTITUTIONS
Revenue and administrative changes
It is foretold! The torrential flow of inexorable destiny!
The English Company came to do trade. However, unwittingly they had to take up the administration of the semi-barbarian locations. For, in the various feudal language location, no one was bothered about creating any enduring systems. All that was the thought about and aimed for was ‘respect’. Without ‘respect’, an individual is a ‘pinam’-പിണം, that is a dead body.
Once the administration became their responsibility, the English Company officials had to literally set up and create each and every kind of infrastructure in the land right from start. Including the administration, the police, the judiciary, the roadways, the waterways, the postal system, public healthcare, public sanitation and much, much more. ഇന്ന് ഇന്ത്യയിലെ രാഷ്ട്രീയക്കാർ നിന്ന് വിലസുന്ന മിക്ക ഭരണ സംവിധാനങ്ങളും ഇങ്ഗ്ളിഷ് ഭരണം ഇവിടെ വെറും നിലത്ത് പൊടിതട്ടി, കുഴികുഴിച്ച് വിത്തിട്ട് വെളളമൊഴിച്ച് വളർത്തി പന്തലിപ്പിച്ചവയാണ്.
For doing all this there was need for revenue. It is quite curious that the English administrators did not think of sales tax at all. Instead, they tried to go along with the revenue collection model that was already there in the land. That is of collecting a tax on the agricultural products.
This was a Himalayan endeavour. These persons who did not know actually anything about agriculture and produces of the subcontinent went on improving their ideas, so as to arrive at the best suitable system. However, they were hampered by the various vested interests involved. The first of this was their own natives-of-the-subcontinent officials. They were mostly corrupt and could very easily misuse their position. For, in the feudal languages, any official job automatically becomes a social position.
QUOTE: Was Janmi, as Mr. Græme says, an empty title after his share of the produce of the land had been thus mortgaged ? END OF QUOTE.
In English, it might seem that a person who has become a ‘former’ official, has not much of a difference in the verbal codes from an ‘official’ who is incumbent. However in feudal languages, it is not so easy. Titles are codes of ‘respect’. And it bear many kinds of social power and prestige, which are not there in English for any official.
QUOTE: river-side portion of Ponnani town which stands at its mouth is always in more or less danger from erosion, and in fact the town is only preserved by groynes, for the proper maintenance of which a special voluntary cess is paid by the mercantile community. END OF QUOTE.
That is from the description on Ponnani River.
QUOTE: “After completion, the roads should be maintained in good order by the labour of the community. Bullocks carrying merchandise might be tolled so as to provide a fund to meet contingent charges, etc.” END OF QUOTE.
That was mentioned with regard to the building of the various news roads to the various interior parts of Malabar by the English Company.
QUOTE: The ryots, on the other hand, viewed the government as the inheritors in succession to Tippu and Hyder Ali of the pattam or land revenue assessment, and this was explicitly stated to the Commissioners by a deputation of influential Mappillas whom the Commissioners called together to consult on the subject. If the Commissioners had followed out the rule laid down in the fourth paragraph of the agreement with the Iruvalinad Nambiars which has already been commented on, the status of the ryots of Malabar would have been very different at the present day. END OF QUOTE.
There are obviously a lot of conflicts of interests, as the English Company went ahead to breakdown the oppressive social layers. Actually the English Company was not any kind of inheritors of anything in the subcontinent. They were a totally different group who was bring in a lot of enlightenment to the social system.
Naturally the higher castes who were in the earlier days the main officials of the English administration, including the socially powerful peons (kolkars), had their own interest in seeing that the English Company’s native-English officials were led to all kinds of confusions and disorientations, as a means to delay the more or less certain liberalisation of the social system.
QUOTE: They declared the trade in timber to be free, abolished the levy of profits on black pepper, coconuts, etc., as impolitic, and instructed the Supravisur to levy a modern tax in the shape of licence on the retail tobacco trade. END OF QUOTE
The English administration was bringing in standards in everything. Written codes of law even in the case of tax collection was being introduced. Many age-old revenue inflictions were removed.
QUOTE: These leases, after recapitulating the Provisions of the Commissioners’ agreements of 1792 and 1793, prohibited the levy of all exactions recently abolished and allowed only the collection of land revenue and the charges for collection while deductions were made for bringing waste lands into cultivation. END OF QUOTE.
This was to rein in the irascible powers of the various rajas and other small-time chiefs in South Malabar on the people in their own locations.
QUOTE: There can be no manner of doubt that the system of settlement adopted by the Joint Commission, of which Mr. Duncan was President during the greater portion of its existence, was very unsuited to the circumstances of the country.
The Zamorin had in a very characteristic letter, as he himself put it “opened his heart” to the Joint Commissioners, and at an early period in 1792 had assured them that “By the ancient customs of Malabar the Nayars held their lands free ; they paid no revenue to any one, but were obliged to attend their Rajas when called on to war.” END OF QUOTE.
The point to be checked is what the circumstances of the ‘country’ were. It was a land that functioned on feudal languages. A huge percent of the population were placed in hierarchical layers, from which they revered those above and treated as stinking dirt those who were below. Into this cantankerous ‘circumstances of the country’, the English administration and the egalitarian English language were bringing in a total wiping out of the hierarchical codes.
Naturally the vested interests who got a chance to write into the book, Malabar, were writing their own perturbations. For, it was an uneasy situation. Because the lower-placed populations, who had been traditionally ‘respectful’ would become stark rude and insulting, once they get the upper hand, if the language was Malabari or Malayalam.
QUOTE: The result, of course, was that the petty chieftains, accustomed to independence, shook their swords or barred the doors of their defensible houses when the tax-gatherers came, and large balances of course accrued. END OF QUOTE.
Off course, the petty chieftains should now be declared as ‘great’ ‘freedom fighters’ against the English! For, they were fighting against the English attempts to uplift the lower populations.
However, there is the other side to the social communication involved. The traditional rajas would find it quite difficult to converse with the native-officials of the English Company in Malabari or Malayalam. For, in the usual course of things, the petty kings could address them as Inhi or Nee. And they would have to stand with a perpetual bow before these ‘rajas’.
The satanic languages, Malabari and Malayalam were the culprits.
QUOTE: “They (the Rajas) have (stimulated perhaps in some degree by the uncertainty as to their future situations) acted in their avidity to amass wealth, more as the scourges and plunderers than as the protectors of their respective little states. END OF QUOTE.
The fact is the rajas of the subcontinent had always remained as scourges and plunderers of the majority populations of the land. However, the in the new social circumstance, they could very well understand that they were moving down to the levels of the higher castes, who had treated them with venerations. So, the higher castes and other social seniors were going to become their social competitors.
QUOTE: The posts of native dewans were abolished, and it was resolved to make a radical change in the administration by the appointment of covenanted servants as revenue assistants, to be employed throughout the district, on which account the existing regulations were modified. END OF QUOTE.
This was an item that could have directly led to the emancipation of the lower castes. The way was now opening for the lower castes to aspire for governmental jobs. However, they needed to be properly trained, and their innate rudeness to those who they did not venerate had to be ironed out.
QUOTE: The establishment of a rule for the registration of all writings of the transfer of landed property END OF QUOTE.
This was the promotion of the Land Registration department. I think it was first set up by Mr. Murdoch Brown, who was in charge of the Randattara Plantation in Anjarakkandi.
QUOTE: For the purpose of collecting the revenue Captain Watson was next entrusted with the organisation of a new corps of armed police, consisting of 500 men, whom he trained and equipped in a fashion much resembling the present constabulary force. The Malabar militia, an irregular force and undisciplined, serving under their own native chiefs, was then (June 10th, 1801) disbanded. END OF QUOTE.
Slowly the administration was setting up quality systems. The age-old cantankerous, dirty pejorative word-using (Inhi, enthane, enthale, eda, edi, Oan, Oalu &c.) rude systems were giving way to higher quality, much more disciplined official systems. However, these changes would take time to stabilise. For, an English-speaking officialdom had to be created.
In fact, in the Madras Presidency, by the 1900s, a good quality English-speaking officer class had come to take charge of the government offices. They were different from the crass satanic native-officialdom of yesteryears in that they would not use the pejorative form of addressing or referring to people who came to their offices. However, the clerks and the peons were still from the satanic language group. They would address the common people as Inhi, and even as eda and edi. The police constables also would do the same.
The English administrator could make the quality change only in the case of the officer class. Before they could bring in this quality change in the lower officials, the idiot Clement Atlee destroyed everything.
QUOTE: But Major Macleod's mistakes did not end here. For, coming fresh from the country east of the ghats, where the ryots had been accustomed for generations to be a down-trodden race, he seems to have mistaken altogether the character of the people with whom he had to deal. END OF QUOTE.
It is almost certain that the higher-caste officials were out to misguide the English administrators to make minor errors and grievous errors. For, at stake were the traditional rights over the populations whom they had kept in shackles for centuries. This kind of misguiding the native-English officials have been repeated almost all over British-India.
Publications which came out in the native languages as purported translations could be very cunningly made to seem exceedingly rude and oppressive by the mere changing of a single word. For instance, the word Aap in Hindi can be changed into Thoo. And in the language of the southern parts of the Subcontinent, the word Inhi / Nee can be used instead of Ingal/Ungal/Neevu etc.
The terrific dropping-down-the-canyon feeling that these words can create in a person’s mind might not be clearly understood by the English administrators.
QUOTE: The time allowed for the purpose was ludicrously insufficient; the establishments employed were underpaid and notoriously corrupt when such a chance was placed within their reach. The natural results followed as a matter of course. The accounts were fabricated, actual produce was over-assessed, produce was assessed that did not exist, and assessments were imposed on the wrong men. END OF QUOTE.
This is what the English administration had to face. The basic issue was to find quality people to officiate. In a feudal language set up, this is almost an impossible thing, unless a totally different officer class could be created from among the natives. However, the fact is that in the British-Indian location, they could create it slowly. However, the officialdom in the native kingdoms, just outside British-India was top to bottom corrupt.
QUOTE: The people were unable to find a market for their produce, and had to part with their grain at ruinous prices to pay the revenue. END OF QUOTE.
This is mentioned as due to a grave error on the part of one English Chief. How much misinformation and misguiding the native-officials gave is not seen mentioned.
QUOTE: The Nayars were no doubt spread over the whole face of the country (as they still are) protecting all rights, suffering none to fall into disuse, and at the same time supervising the cultivation of the land and collecting the kon or king’s share of the produce - the public land revenue in fact. END OF QUOTE.
This might be the very reason that the Nayar officials would have strived to misguide the English officials. For, it was their traditional source of wealth that was being taken out for the administration of a welfare state.
QUOTE: THE FUNDAMENTAL IDEA that certain castes or classes in the state were told off to the work of cultivation, and the land was made over to them in trust for that purpose, and in trust that the shares of produce due to the persons in authority should be faithfully surrendered. END OF QUOTE.
Actually the holding power of this trust was encrypted in the feudal language codes, which in turn kept the various population layers in position. However, with the coming in of Land Registration and the advent of an administration that was immune to the feudal language codes, and the caste system, every kind of exploitative connections began to tumble down. However, there was nothing of quality ready to replace this social system.
QUOTE: But with these material objects it will be observed were conveyed such things as “authority in the Desam,” “Battle wager” and “Rank” and “Customs” which are clearly outside the idea of dominium as understood by Roman lawyers. It would have been well therefore if, before adopting the view that janmam was equivalent in all respects to dominium, a full investigation had been made of the points wherein they differ. END OF QUOTE.
The above statement is something like ‘attacking a Strawman’. The English administrators were not trying to establish Roman administration in the subcontinent. The writer who mentions this is either trying to act pedantic, or simply trying to confuse the situation. In fact, the local officials who quite obviously were good in English were trying their best to create a mess of out of the English administration. For, it is in a social mess that the ancient creepy officialdom of the subcontinent had survived and prospered.
QUOTE: The idea of property in the soil—the Western or European idea — was evidently not the idea uppermost in the minds of the persons who executed this deed. END OF QUOTE.
The above foolish statement is not actually foolish, but sinister in its attempt to act dumb. First, it is not Western or European ideas that were brought in, but native-English ideas. Not even Celtic systems were encouraged, let alone European.
To this extent, it is somewhat a Straw man’s argument. Attacking an idea which has not been proposed at all in the first place.
Second point is that it is indeed true that the property in soil might be what was understood by the native-English administrators. For, they might not have any information on rights that verbal codes give to individuals over other individuals and their personal properties.
QUOTE: The European looks to the soil , and nothing but the soil. The Malayali on the contrary looks chiefly to the people located on the soil END OF QUOTE.
Ignore the nonsensical word ‘European’. The quote is correct to some extent. But does not clearly mention that it is the definition assigned to the people or the individual, in feudal language indicant codes that is looked at. And there is no Malayalis in Malabar, if the word is meant to mean the population of Travancore.
QUOTE: The system was admirably conceived for binding the two classes together in harmonious interdependence. This excellent arrangement necessarily fell to pieces at once when the Civil Courts began to recognise the force of contract—the Western or European law— as superior to the force of custom—the Eastern or Indian law END OF QUOTE.
The idiot who wrote the above-words are again and again using the words ‘Western or European’ to the extent of creating an irritation. The place is not ruled by Continental European, but by native-English. Most of the Continental Europeans are the exact antonyms of the native-English.
As to the point raised, the English administration was not thinking of the two closely related higher-caste classes alone. There were many others, who do not get any mention in any other history records of the location, other than in the case of some as slaves. The English administration was trying to improve everyone. Naturally the close symbiotic relationship between the two higher caste classes would not be able to survive.
It is true that it will have it tragic side. That of a rude lower classes arriving at higher positions. However, the native-English administrators did feel that they could improve the individual quality through English.
QUOTE: Prior to 1856 or thereabouts, when a janmi wished to get rid of a kanakkaran he allowed the pattam to fall into arrears and then sued for the arrears and in execution sold the kanam interest. END OF QUOTE.
Naturally, when the new systems of judicial intervention came into a crass semi-barbarian social system, there would be persons who would use or misuse it to their own advantage. As to the English officials, it was a learning experience.
QUOTE: This system—another necessary result of the Hindu social organisation — was evidently conceived in much wisdom for protecting the interests of the cultivating castes. Here again however ideas borrowed from the European law of property in the soil have come in to upset the well-conceived customary law of Malabar. END OF QUOTE.
The above words are merely the wailing of the castes which were certainly finding the social changes totally devastating to their own traditional rights. The ‘well-conceived customary law of Malabar’ is nowhere seen in the history of the place, other than periodic raiding, molesting, plundering, pillaging, hacking, back-stabbing, cheating, kidnapping, enslaving, selling as slaves, selling women to merchants in the seaports etc.
QUOTE: Under the native customary law the cultivator could not be ousted except by a decree of the tara, for the janmi was powerless unless he acted in strict accordance with the Nayar guild END OF QUOTE.
Why should the English administration care two-pence for the decree of the tara or of the Nayar guild? The English administration was out to bring in an egalitarianism in the social set up which had never before seen attempted in recorded history in the land.
QUOTE: The effect of this disturbance of the ancient system of customary sharing of the produce has next to be traced.
“Of this produce one-third was allowed to the farmer for his maintenance, profit, etc., one-third for the expenses of the Tiyars, Cherumars or other cultivators attached to the soil, one-third went as rent to the jelmkaar or landlord. END OF QUOTE.
This book, Malabar, had been written for the sake of information for the English administrators about the district. And the various natives-of-the-subcontinent officials had used this opportunity to misinform the English administrators.
When looking at the above quoted statement, everything looks quite refined and okay. However, there is no mention that the various layers downward are defined as stinking dirt in the verbal codes. The personality depreciation that this brings about has to be seen to be understand. That of a higher caste child addressing a lower caste adult of around 40 with an Inhi (lowest you), and referring to him or her as an Oan or Oalu, and addressing her by mere name. And at the same time, the lower caste adult has to use reverential words to and about the higher caste child.
There are no solutions to this in feudal languages. For, if this strict enforcement of degrading and respecting are removed, then the exact opposite will take place. The lower caste adult will use the degrading words upon the higher caste child. Which is more terrific and satanic in what they propose.
QUOTE: They were in short, as already set forth, CO-PROPRIETORS bound together in interest by admirable laws of custom. END OF QUOTE.
What ‘admirable laws of custom’ are being alluded to in a land where populations try their best to usurp the positions of the higher positioned persons? For, ‘respect’ in verbal codes is the key to social stature.
QUOTE: From that date forward the land disputes and troubles began, and the views above described of the Joint Commissioners were not the only causes contributing to the anarchy which ensued. END OF QUOTE.
The above words are very obviously the words of some native higher-caste official. The whole history of the Malabar, Travancore and even of the whole of the subcontinent is a history of all kinds of social insecurity and anarchy. And imagine the crass rascality in placing all the responsibility of that on the native-English administrators who were doing their best to understand an insane social system.
It is amply seen that it was noticed by the English administration that no person in the subcontinent was stable. The actuality of this issue was that each person in the native language existed in number of human personalities. That of Nee-Nee, Nee-Ningal, Nee-Thangal. In this complex verbal relationship, each change of verbal code, changes the individual.
And to make the whole thing more complex, a change in the social level of the other person could also create terrific mood swings in the person.
Feudal language codes are like attachments to a flywheel. When the flywheel moves, it pull along with it a lot of other links and attachments. The verbal codes will change in far-off locations.
QUOTE: He took an early opportunity of calling together the principal janmis of South Malabar to confer on the important question of fixing the Government share of the produce. END OF QUOTE.
The English officialdom was at a loss at understand the social system, which was totally different from anything pristine-English could design or create.
QUOTE: Very numerous and well-founded were the complaints that it is usually impossible to obtain receipts for rent paid END OF QUOTE
There is a terrible information in the above quote. In the subcontinent, the dealings are not between gentlemen of any kind of equal stature in communication. One is an Ingal (higher You in Malabari) while the other is an Inhi (lowest you in Malabari).
The lowest ‘you’ will quite easily be defined, mentioned and terrorised by other more terrible word-codes. He or she cannot ask for anything from the higher man, if he is not willing to give it. The only way to ask is to plead, which the other man will simply discard with a Inhi Poda or Inhi Podi (derogative verbal forms meaning Get lost, you despicable being!). Curiously, these words are not abusive as the word ‘abusive’ is understood in English. For in translation, it only means, ‘you go’! These words can be used to a person defined as lower. These words become ‘abusive’ only if a lower man uses it on the higher man. Or if he or she uses on current-day Indian officials. Current-day Indian officials using this on the lower populations is not a crime. However using it on the officials is a crime. That is the real state of the ‘free’ nation of India.
QUOTE: The jamnis' managers were as a body impeached, and with good show of reason, for fraudulent dealings in various ways with the tenants under them. END OF QUOTE.
The English administration was trying to bridle the reckless powers of the supervisor class, i.e. the Nayars.
QUOTE: On only three out of ninety-eight estates examined in the low country taluks, it was found that the cultivators were enjoying the share of produce set apart for them under Mr. Rickards’ scheme of assessment ; on all the others, the cultivators’ shares of produce had been encroached upon most seriously in most cases and most outrageously in some. END OF QUOTE.
This is how the systems were working. The English administration was doing its best to create ideal agricultural relationships. However, the feudal language codes were acting on their own and creating different social relationships.
QUOTE: A garden, therefore, came to be known as a garden of so many coco, arcca, or jack trees, and of so many pepper-vines END OF QUOTE
The English administration was trying its best to make taxation intelligent and as per written laws. Till that time, it was more or less the whims and fancies of the supervisor class that decided everything.
QUOTE: Malabar under Hyder Ali : and it was with the husbandmen, and not with the landlords, that the settlement was made. (Paragraph 196 of the Joint Commissioners’ Report, 1793 END OF QUOTE.
On a close scrutiny, it was found that that the Mysorean invader Hyder Ali’s officials had more or less disregarded the higher castes and tried to more or less give the possession of the land to the real agriculture workers and farmers. It might seem as if some great socialism and communism were being imposed. However, these are not steady reforms. In a short course of time, new lords will spring up from the new land owners. And they will start oppressing and degrading their former master classes. The language codes are like that.
QUOTE: And of course this under-estimating of the capabilities of the land was not procured for nothing.
Individuals who could manage to square the officials got off with comparative immunity, while those who could not do so had their lands excessively assessed END OF QUOTE.
This is how the native-officialdom tried to make a mess of all great reforms that the English Company administration tried to bring into this semi-barbarian land. It is the same now in India, Pakistan and Bangladesh. Those who bribe the officials and are servile to the officialdom gets their things done. Others who deal with them with self-dignity stand to lose.
Off-course, it might seen that it was the higher caste members who became the leaders of the miniscule movements which tried to create a ruckus in the subcontinent against the English rule. Almost all their meetings and protect marches were poorly attended. After all who would like to go under these rascals who had tormented the lower castes and populations for centuries with words like Inhi / Nee, Eda, Edi, enthada, enthadi &c.? But then, there were plenty of the poor people who were hoodwinked. For instance, if the communist party leaders of those times are scrutinised, it would be seen that almost all of them were from the traditional higher castes. They wanted to continue their dominance over the lower castes, in the guise of ‘revolutionary leaders’. Off course, many of them had their one foot in native-English nations. For instance, there was one ‘great’ communist leader and later CM of Kerala. He quietly relocated his son to the US.
QUOTE: It would at all times have been a difficult operation for intelligent and trained officers to distinguish between what was true and what was false in the deeds produced (unstamped and unregistered cadjan leaves) and in the statements made by the people, on which Mr. Graeme proposed to found his revised assessment ; but when this operation was made over for performance to the ignorant and interested heads of villages, failure was quite certain END OF QUOTE
The perseverance and the patience of the native-English officials was beyond imagination. People telling lies, no one trustworthy, officials corrupt &c. And yet, the wonderful capacity of the native-English officialdom carried the day.
QUOTE: The Mysorean officials, it would seem, imposed an apparently severe tax on the “seed of assessment” and “fruitful tree” respectively, probably for the sake of throwing dust in the eyes of the people at headquarters in Mysore, while in reality, in distributing the lump sums thus assessed on particular districts, they found congenial and remunerative employment in fixing the assessments on individuals. END OF QUOTE
The true antiquity of the modern Indian officialdom and people.
QUOTE: In 1782-83, in the time of Arshad Beg Khan, a complaint was made of the severity of the assessments, but no attention was paid to it and, on the contrary, two of his subordinates (Venkappa and Venkaji) levied an additional contribution of 15 percent of charges for collection in all the Desams (compare paragraph 120). END OF QUOTE
In a feudal language society, who really cares for the complaints and problems of the common man? Everyone knows that if the common man improves, he becomes a danger. And even the Common man is frightened of another Common man improving!
QUOTE: ‘The Desadhikaris are excessively backward in the survey of the rice-lands and pay not the least attention to orders, demeaning themselves in such a way as evidently to prove their luke-warmness in the cause ; that he (the Principal Collector) had been unable to make the least impression on them (the Desadhikaris); that the accounts they give are ‘grossly false beyond description' ; and that they sedulously conceal the deeds, ‘making it next to impossible to ascertain the resources of the country. END OF QUOTE.
These traditional Desadhikaris are self-serving local hoodlums. They would care two-pence for creating a great social set up. However, since they were disobeying the English officialdom, modern India should honour them as great ‘freedom fighters’.
QUOTE: Desadhikaris made large fortunes, the country 'teemed with fictitious deeds' ‘temporary deeds, and agreements were executed to suit present purposes, and were prepared with a view of corresponding with a survey notoriously fallacious.' A number of returns and deeds was eventually obtained, ‘but the great majority was of the most grossly fraudulent description. END OF QUOTE.
The relief and the solace must have come with the crushing down of these traditional ‘freedom fighters’ and the commencement of a Civil Service officials who were good in egalitarian English.
QUOTE: The Tahsildars were to cheek the accounts and send them to the Huzzur, but after repeated reminders, etc., the accounts came in driblets and without verification by Tahsildars. END OF QUOTE.
The native-English officials must have wept in horror as they went on to discover the true ‘talents’ and ‘geniuses’ of the subcontinent.
QUOTE: In 1843 a small establishment was entertained, and about half of them were copied hastily info a form of Kulawar Chitta (individual account); but directly it was sought to verify or use them, their worthlessness was seen and Mr. Conolly at once stopped further expenditure. END OF QUOTE.
In the subcontinent, people are made ‘small’ by the feudal languages. They have very limited vision, unless they have commanding positions. They cannot communicate beyond certain barriers.
QUOTE: In 1765-66 Hyder Ali paid a visit to these Nads, and his agents and his tributary, the Coimbatore Raja (Maha Deo Raj, usually styled Madavan in Malabar), afterwards till 1767-68 managed the country and levied irregular and violent contributions both on the personal and on the real property of the inhabitants. END OF QUOTE.
There might not be any need to attribute the full blame on Hyder Ali. The land was run on feudal languages. The officialdom will deal quite cantankerously with the common man. The common man cannot argue, debate or explain his point at all. For, that would amount to absolute impertinence.
QUOTE: By their orders the Nads were rented to Mohidin Muppan and Haidros Kutti, who collected 100 per cent, of the pattam (rent), but finding that insufficient to enable them to meet their engagements, they imposed further contributions and seized personal property. Finding this means also fail, they carried some of the inhabitants to Seringapatain with whatever accounts of the pattam (rent) were extent. END OF QUOTE.
That was the typical manner of tax collection in the subcontinent, by the varying rulers who came one after another, in each minute location.
QUOTE: These statements were found by him on examination to give in most cases grossly false accounts of the rent (pattam) receivable by Janmis, so they served very little purpose beyond furnishing facts to show how false they were on this point. END OF QUOTE.
This is the real sort of governmental reports in India. It is similar to so many other statutory records found in the governmental files now. Reports are simply created to finish the work of submitting a report. Most of it would of useless content. This was the state of affair in India for a long time. May be this is correct in Pakistan and Bangladesh also. However, with the coming of digital technology, many of the records have become slightly better. For, currently digital technology runs on English. However, the moment feudal language encodings come inside the computer working, various kinds of emotions connected to hierarchies will enter into them. And the pace of digital communication will slow down to erroneous levels.
As of now, the problems of such diabolical emotions will enter into the communication only when human beings have to be addressed or connected to through the digital technology connected to government work.
QUOTE: The general information on which he relied was defective, because it did not enable him to distinguish between rent paid by intermediaries and rent paid to intermediaries by sub-tenants. END OF QUOTE.
It would be easily understood that the native officials were mostly trying to befool the English officials.
QUOTE: The Verumpattam or actual rent was, they continued, in some places concealed, and in other places understated with the connivance of the Mysorean officers owing to favour, intrigue, or local causes. END OF QUOTE.
The most wonderful aspect of the English administration all over the world was the more or less quaint efficiency. However, when feudal language speakers are involved in it, everything twists, twines, whirls and twirls around each and every point. For, the language codes are not planar, but feudal. In each specific location, the focus and loyalty would be on to some minor personage of ‘respect’.
QUOTE: while, as matter of fact, it is extremely doubtful if any such deduction ever really took place. The remission probably went into the pockets of the officials. This fact must be constantly borne in mind when comparing the assessments of South Malabar with those of the north END OF QUOTE.
When assessing and comparing any social, administrative or police issues or systems in India, Pakistan and Bangladesh, with that of any native-English systems, it must be constantly borne in mind that the subcontinent runs on feudal languages. The officials are corrupt. The history and other claims that they make are mostly lies. Their major aim is to amass money for themselves and to send their children to native-English nations. Wherever they go, they will create social disintegration.
QUOTE: It was also generally assumed that the ryot could not have sub-tenants so long as Government waste land of good quality existed for any one to cultivate who felt so deposed. END OF QUOTE.
This is a very good point. There are plenty of forest lands. Can’t the enslaved populations simply go and start on their own? Well, that is where the power of the feudal languages comes into play in a very powerful manner. In a feudal language system, the downtrodden populations cannot unite. They will compete against each other. They will not ‘respect’ each other. Their ‘respect’ would be towards the higher ups, who can degrade them. The more they are degraded, the more they love and ‘respect’ the higher classes. The higher classes will unite to see that the lower caste do not go independent.
This is where the American war for ‘Independence’ has to be looked as afresh. There is actually no tragic situations comparable to what the enslaved populations in the subcontinent are suffering. Yet, they revolted against a very noble nation, hearing the stupid demagogy of such insipid fools like George Washington etc. Whatever goodness seen in the US was only the mere reflection of the noble standards of pristine-England.
QUOTE: The courts view him as trespasser, but the original idea is that all cultivators are in duty-bound to reclaim waste land, in Malabar and trespassers on waste land are unknown END OF QUOTE
The above statement is packed in cunning misinformation. Actually, it was not possible for the lower castes to take any waste land for cultivation and thus become a landlord. This was precisely what was done by the Converted Christians of Travancore kingdom in British-Malabar. This was something they would not have been allowed to do in Travancore kingdom.
As for Malabar, it would be a foolish idea to imagine that the Hindus (Brahmins) and the Nayars &c. would have allowed their slave populations to go in for independent cultivation in the forest lands.
QUOTE: it must of necessity have arisen that many of the original "ryots” attending to their own interests, have become proprietors and have dropped the other characters of labourer and farmer. END OF QUOTE.
Under the English rule, this is the possibility. Actually, this was what the Converted Christians of Travancore did. They came to British-Malabar and occupied the Malabar forests in the sly. However, in Travancore, if they had attempted to become land owners, it would have created a huge ruckus in the social system. They would probably have been slaughtered if there was no protection for them from the English East India Company administration based in Madras.
QUOTE: All these considerations force one to the conviction that Sir Thomas Munro’s ideal Ryotwari settlement is not a thing of permanence, and that sooner or later, even in the model Ryotwari districts, a state of things will be brought about similar to what has existed in Malabar from the very first. END OF QUOTE.
Actually there is more to this, than is obvious. The social system in designed by the design codes in the language. Whatever formal and statutory changes are enforced on a social system, everything will wind back to the original design that it there in the language system. Only by changing the language can a perpetual design change in the social system be brought in. In which case, it is an automatic change, which does not require administrative intervention.
In this context, it might be good to mention that when England gets filled in by people who speak feudal languages, England will change for the worse.
QUOTE: who employ, superintend, and sometimes assist the labourer, and who are everywhere the farmers of the country, the creators and payers of the land revenue,” END OF QUOTE
The native-English officials of the English East India Company are trying to understand a social system without any information on the design codes in the local languages.
QUOTE: for thinking that even in Malabar individual property in the soil, in the European sense of the word, was not in existence at the beginning of British rule END OF QUOTE.
What is the ‘European sense of the word’ is not known and also not relevant here. However, in the English sense of the word, there naturally will be a lot of difference. For, the social system here is tied powerfully to the feudal language word-codes. Individual ownership will then be a hierarchy of ownerships. It will be like a woman married into a polyandry family. The single woman will be owned by all the brothers, but the elder brother will have more precedence and he can command all the brothers under him. This hierarchy will be maintained to the very youngest brother. Under the youngest brother, there will be male servants. They do not have any right over the woman, other than to tend to her various needs such as washing, cooking, cleaning the house, doing routine household work etc. These persons can be compared to the lower castes and the slaves. The brothers can be compared to the varying layers of the higher castes, who ‘own’ the land.
QUOTE: That being so it is evident that the recognition by the courts of the janmi as dominus and the enforcement by them of contracts have wrongfully benefited the janmis and have deprived the others of the just rights. END OF QUOTE
The importing of Roman items is definitely misleading. There is no Roman or Continental Europe involved in British-Malabar. As to the courts making mistakes, it is true that the English administration’s all endeavours were mistakes if seen from the perspective of the traditional upper classes. Everything was being changed. However, almost none of these changes were in sync with the codes of the native feudal languages. In fact, they stood in stark opposition to the hierarchical language codes. To that extent, whatever good is done, will not reach its perfection expected in English. If English had been the language here, the social system will automatically change into an egalitarian one, even if there are statutory feudal structures in the society.
QUOTE: The grant of freedom to a community thus organised meant (as soon as custom had given way) freedom for the "strong to oppress the weak ; freedom for the newly created proprietor to take an ever increasing portion of the share of net produce left over after paying the Government dues. END OF QUOTE.
The writer of the above words is trying to take up the argument of the opposite side and using to support his own side. The ‘strong to oppress the weak’ was the custom of the land. Now, the caste hierarchy has broken down. The lower caste man who has improved will do the same thing, as he is now the ‘strong’.
This is the way things work out in feudal language systems. There is no fundamental change in any social reform other than change of persons in the various positions. The positions all remain the same.
QUOTE: to obtain the name of every field in the country, so as to serve as a ground for an actual survey ; END OF QUOTE.
Only a native-English team can even think of such a endeavour. Not that it is impossible for others. It is just that in a feudal language system, there is nothing attractive in creating efficient systems. For, in such systems, what is craved for are just systems in which the top people get ‘respect’. Even a dirty location is liked, if it is a place where they get ‘respect’.
QUOTE: Are they tenants-at-will of the former class? END OF QUOTE.
In feudal language systems, there are social codes, rights and claims over individuals which are beyond the scope of statutory laws.
QUOTE: In 1850-52, owing to general complaints of over-assessment of gardens, the whole of the old Kurumbranad Taluk was again surveyed, and a decrease in the assessment of only Rs. 366 was the result. END OF QUOTE.
What is remarkable was the determination to redo a survey of a full Taluk. Indeed this subcontinent was blessed that such individual of steely determination came from England to create systems and infrastructure.
QUOTE: but on the 9th June 1825, after two year’s struggle to carry out Mr. Graeme's Pymaish, Mr. Vaughan reported the ‘total failure in the promises made by the inhabitants to revise and give in true and correct accounts END OF QUOTE
It is not that people do not want to give the correct and true accounts, but that there are huge impediments across the social system and layers. Human relationships are not as seen in English.
QUOTE: It will be seen from the above that it is difficult to compare the Wynad wet land assessments with those of the low country, for here there is a fourth kind of pattam (rent) to be dealt with. END OF QUOTE.
If this was the kind of complications that existed inside such a miniscule geographical area, imagine the astronomical levels of complications that the English administrators had to deal with at the whole subcontinent level. In each locality, there is a multitude of populations connected to each other with very specific weird relationships and claims.
QUOTE: while, on the other hand, the greater cost of labour and the breaking down of the system of serfdom have tended to increase the original cost of the produce END OF QUOTE.
Cheap, slave labour was being removed and the enslaved populations were getting their first experience of liberty to decide to whom to work for and at what wages.
QUOTE: Wynad, however, is an exceptional taluk, chiefly owing to its unhealthiness; and the breaking up of the system of serfdom since the assessments were fixed must have had a much greater influence on agriculture in Wynad than it had elsewhere, because in Wynad there was but a limited class to take the places of the slaves who chose to leave their ancient masters and work for hire on the European coffee-estates END OF QUOTE.
This is the conflict of interest that is downplayed. The feudal lord classes were the losers while the slaves and the other lower castes were the most obvious beneficiaries of the advent of the English rule. The birdbrain who is now campaigning against England, sitting inside England, for reparations from England, represents the former. Indeed his ancestral family surely lost much satanic rights and wealth. Naturally, he will find England responsible for that. However, what about the tens of thousands of enslaved populations over the centuries? His ancestral family will have to give them proper compensation.
In the US, the black slaves improved beyond the wildest dreams of the African lower class blacks, during their days of enslavement in the US. However, such a development never perched upon the slaves of Malabar. For, they were the slaves of feudal language speakers.
QUOTE: Under any other circumstances the Adiyan cannot be dispossessed, and he has the right of burial within the garden. END OF QUOTE.
This ‘right of burial’ is a resounding one, denied to all the very low castes. The very low castes are assigned a burial ground far off from human habitation. I have personally seen an situation some twenty years back, wherein the town had grown around the lower caste burial ground. The sight of this very low caste burial ground was depreciating the real estate value of the locality. The low castes were intimidated by the social seniors and their burial rights taken off.
The communication is not like in English. In the feudal languages, it is downright pejorative words used. Nee, Eda, poda etc. are very freely used on them, in a very disregarding and down-casting sound. As if speaking to throwaway piece of waste.
QUOTE: It is certainly noteworthy that if a Nambudiri in Travancore sells this freehold land to anyone but a Nambudiri, an obligation to pay Mupra (in the case of wet lands, and Ettayil onnu (1 in 8 in the case of garden lands) immediately attaches to the lands, END OF QUOTE.
These were the unmentioned attributes of the subcontinent social system, seen when the native English came in.
QUOTE: Putran, literally the son, but in Malabar construed to mean the heir, whether a nephew or son END OF QUOTE.
Quite an interesting information.
QUOTE: The mortgagee gives two fanams, which is placed in a small vessel of water ; the mortgagor, holding the deed in his hand, pours the water over it, which the mortgagor receives as it falls, and either swallows it, or puts it upon his head, or upon his feet, or upon the ground, according to the relative caste of the two parties. END OF QUOTE
The relative statures are encoded in the language codes.
QUOTE: It appears the private Janmams of conquered states were not respected by the conquerors. END OF QUOTE.
That could be the fact of the matter with regard to all customs. Each raiding and conquering team from the neighbourhood decides the next land ownership.
That much for heritage in a social system splintered up feudal languages.
QUOTE: This tenure prevails only in the neighbourhood of Calicut END OF QUOTE.
Imagine the level of complication that the English administration had to face, as it strived to create a good nation in a semi-barbarian location. Each small-time local area with its on traditional systems, which might not have any concurrence with the other small-time locations all around!
QUOTE: The judicial administration of the Kirar territory is conducted by the officers of the British Government. The raja is merely permitted to collect rents on the lands comprised within the Kirar limits, and has no power to interfere with the collection of special rates chargeable under the municipal or fiscal law END OF QUOTE.
It took time, patience and perseverance to slowly shift the administration of the land to that of a welfare state based on written codes-of-law. Earlier it was the whims and fancies of the feudal lords and small-time rajas, trigged by the various emotions connected to feudal language codes that decreed the rules and laws.
QUOTE: The tax was abolished with the sanction of Government, conveyed in their order of 23rd February 1880. END OF QUOTE.
That was the English administration crushing the draconian rights of the officials of the Cannanore Arakkal family over the people in the Laccadive Islands.
QUOTE: When the land has been all thus settled, it will probably become possible to abolish the trade monopolies with their irksome restrictions, and to throw the island trade open. END OF QUOTE.
Again the English administration is slowly freeing the people of the Laccadive Islands from the stranglehold of the Cannanore Ali raja family.
QUOTE: "That with the exception of the introduction of the monopoly of the sales of tobacco and spirits, the Travancore Sirkar or its Agents are prohibited from imposing new taxes, levying unusual duties or arbitrary exactions of any kind on the inhabitants of Tangassari, and that an attempt to do so by the Travancore Sirkar, will forfeit all claim to a continuance of the Farm. END OF QUOTE.
This is with regard to the Tangasseri area which was leased to the Travancore kingdom. The amount of care taken by the English administration to see that no low-class government official of the Travancore kingdom gets to harass or molest any citizens of British-India, is quite admirable.
QUOTE: The janmi has, by the action of the Civil Courts, been virtually converted into a dominus, and the result on the workers, the cultivators, has been, and is, very deplorable. END OF QUOTE
The cunningness of the above quote is beyond words. In a land where the majority population was slaves and semi-slaves, the English administration is trying its best to introduce corrective measure without terrorising the upper-class populations much. And it is these attempts that are being misinterpreted with misinformation.
It is true that most of the native-English systems were too good for the low-quality feudal language social ambience in the subcontinent. For, all routes of social communication go through the winding pathways of feudal language code. Nothing is straightforward. There is no way for the different layers of populations to converse with each other without one-side getting crushed, snubbed and maimed by words.
Yet, it was the English administrators who tried their level best to create something good inside the enwrapping mess.
QUOTE: Turning lastly to the most important point of all, the oppressiveness or otherwise of the Government shares produce at the Government commutation rate it may be remarked in the first place that high prices of produce are like a high flood-tide, submerging all inequalities of assessments, as rocks are submerged by the tidal wave. It is only when the tide recedes that the rocks are laid bare. Since 1832 a high flood of prices has set in which as yet shows no sign of ebbing. END OF QUOTE.
This is a very vital information. When the English administration brought in peace and prosperity in the land, economy boomed. Commercial products started getting higher prices. This was happening in a minute land, which was for centuries the regular and periodic battlegrounds of varying killing, maiming and hacking attacks and counterattacks.
QUOTE: The Government of Fort St. George having received information through various channels that great inequalities exist in the present revenue jamabundy of the province of Malabar, transmitted orders some time back to the Principal Collector to frame by survey and assessment a new jamabundy upon improved principles founded on a liberal consideration of the relative rights of the Sirkar, of the proprietor and cultivator END OF QUOTE.
These are the suo motu actions of a very vigilant egalitarian government.
1. My aim
5. The first impressions about the contents
7. An acute sense of not understanding
8. Entering a terrible social system
9. The doctoring and the manipulations
10. What was missed or unmentioned, or even fallaciously defined
11. NONSENSE
12. Nairs / Nayars
15. Content of current-day populations
16. Nairs / Nayars
18. The terror that perched upon the Nayars
20. Exertions of the converted Christian Church
23. Keralolpathi
24. About the language Malayalam
25. Superstitions
26. Misconnecting with English
27. Feudal language
29. Piracy
30. CASTE SYSTEM
31. Slavery
32. The Portuguese
33. The DUTCH
34. The French
35. The ENGLISH
36. Kottayam
37. Mappillas
38. Mappilla outrages against the Nayars and the Hindus
40. What is repulsive about the Muslims?
41. Hyder Ali
42. Sultan Tippu
43. Women
45. Ali Raja
46. Kolathiri
47. Kadathanad
48. The Zamorin and other apparitions
49. The Jews
50. SOCIAL CUSTOMS
51. Hinduism
52. Christianity
53. Pestilence, famine etc.
54. British Malabar versus Travancore kingdom
55. Judicial
56. Revenue and administrative changes
57. Rajas
58. Forests
59. Henry Valentine Conolly
60. Miscellaneous notes
61. Culture of the land
62. The English efforts in developing the subcontinent
63. Famines
64. Oft-mentioned objections
65. Photos and pictures of the Colonial times
66. Payment for the Colonial deeds
67. Calculating the compensation