THE REIGN OF AKBAR (1556-1605) 85

all over the country were assessed on the basis of the high
prices necessarily prevailing in a large camp crowded with
animals; but, witnout carrying the analysis further, it may
fairly be said that these uniform rates, and this over-assessment
 of pulses, were sufficient by themselves to render the
assessments unworkable.
[n the roth year there was the beginning of a progressive
change, in that the staple crops were valued at local prices,
a practice which naturally reduced the overcharge on the
pulses. The evidence of this change is found in the appearance
 of maximum and minimum rates in place of a single
figure. In Awadh, for instance, a region lying at some distance
 from the capital, wheat, having been charged go dams
in the gth year, was charged 52 to 60 dams in the roth,
and gram, which had been 80 dams, was charged 40 to 56.
[t is of course impossible that a local assessing officer should
have been allowed an option to assess at 40, or at 56; the
only reasonable explanation is that these are local rates
applicable to different parts of the province, and since the
grain-Demand was still uniform, the differences in charge
can be attributed only to differences in price. Assuming
that the local prices were correctly fixed, this measure
would operate to mitigate the worst evils which had come
to light, but there still remained the fundamental defect
of a uniform grain-charge over a wide region of varying
productivity, a defect which must have been felt increasingly
as. the area of the administration extended.
The cash-rates from the roth to the 14th year show no
general tendency beyond a gradual increase in this local
differentiation, but from a passage in the Akbarniama
(11. 333), we learn that they ceased to be used in assessing
the Reserved land. In the 13th year it was found that
Muzaffar Khan, the Minister who was in charge of both
general and revenue administration, was overworked, and
he was relieved of the charge of the Reserved land, which
was entrusted to Shihabuddin Ahmad Khan. This officer
discontinued the detailed annual assessment, and in its
place established a nasag, a term which, as is explained in
Appendix D, I interpret as Group-assessment (or possibly
Farming), of a village, or a pargana, as a whole The