APPENDIX G 
261 
to British administrators, but I think it is an anachronism, and 
it is certainly contradicted by the records of Akbar’s time. Thus 
the first of Todar Mal’s amending regulations sanctioned in the 
27th year insisted (Akbarnama, iii. 351) that the assessment 
should be made strictly according to the dastar-ul ‘amal, or 
schedule of cash-rates to be charged on the area under each 
crop, and subsequent clauses dealt with the measurement of 
crop-areas in each season. Similarly the rules for collectors and 
their clerks (Ain, i. 286-288) show the assessment-procedure in 
detail. The crops on the ground were measured, areas of crop- 
failures were deducted, the Demand on each peasant was cal- 
culated on the area so adjusted, and these figures were then total- 
led for the village, giving an assessment statement on the basis 
of which the revenue for the season was to be collected. If 
these documents mean anything at all, they mean that in the 
27th year, and in the 4oth, the prescribed method of assessment 
was Measurement ; the Demand on a village was not a lump sum 
fixed beforehand, but was calculated by applying fixed Demand- 
rates to the area cropped in each season. 
As to the second hypothesis, so long as direct administration 
continued, with the Demand assessed by Measurement, it would 
have been possible to provide figures showing the aggregate of 
Demand. The rules for collectors and their clerks show that 
assessment-statements for each village were forwarded to head- 
quarters season by season, and, so long as this procedure was 
followed, there would have been no difficulty in compiling the 
figures for aggregate Demand on subdivisions, districts, and 
provinces; in fact it would be safe to assume that such com- 
pilation was regularly carried out for administrative purposes, 
so that the figures would be available for the officials who drafted 
the Account of the Twelve Provinces. 
If, however, we accept the conclusion reached in Chapter IV, 
and it seems to me to be fully established by the evidence, that 
direct administration lasted for only five years, after which the 
Assignment-system was re-introduced, then it is scarcely possible 
that the figures under discussion can represent an existing record 
of the Demand at the period when the Ain was compiled. There 
Is no suggestion in the rules, or elsewhere, that seasonal assess- 
ment-statements were required from assignees, and the figures 
for current Demand available at headquarters would be limited 
to the comparatively small portions of the Empire which were then 
Reserved. On the other hand, the prevalence of Assignments