THE 18th CENTURY PERIOD AS A TRANSITION

Can we generally agree that the 18 th century was a period of ‘DARK AGE’?

The 18th century is an intensely debated period in the Indian History. The main
arguments center around two dimensions- the Mughal Decline and it’s after
math.

The 18th century is a transition period from the decline of the Mughal Rule in
India and the subsequent establishment of the Brithish Colonial Rule. The
opinions pertaining to the Mughal decline and it’s aftermath in the 18th century
display a pattern of evolving historiographical standpoints and perspectives. It
was William Irvine and Jadunath Sarkar who wrote the earliest possible histories
of this period. They both viewed the entire issue of Mughal decline and the
aftermath in terms of their character and personality of the Emperrs and their
nobles.

According to Wiliam Irvine , the decline was an outcome of the degeneration in

the character of the Emperor and nobles .

Jadunath Sarkar places the entire reason for the Mughal power decline due the
the prejudiced religious policies of Aurangzeb which provoked antagonism and
thus a reaction.

However the perception of some historians were based towards the

understanding of operational mechanisms and structures of the Mughal regime.
Satish Chandra highlighted the structural shortcomings in the Mughal setup
where the structure include two main institutions – the mansab and the jagirs.
According to Satish Chandra, the Mughal decline is to be viewed in terms of
Mughal failure, towards the end of Aurangzeb’s reign to effectively maintain the
system which went in disarray . To quote Satish Chandra “While the Empire
reached it’s climax under Aurangzeb , the system failed to be sustained and this
eventually made collapse inevitable.”
Athar Ali’s thesis on the other hand is based on bejagiri pertaining to Aurangzeb’s
reign. He illustrates the problem of decline in the light of the annexation of the
Deccan states , the absorption of the Marathas and the Deccanis into the Mughal
nobility , and the subsequent shortage of jagirs or bejagiri with nobles competing
for better jagirs which were increasingly becoming scarce. This view is however
reviewed by J.F Richards and questions the issue of the absence of jagirs arguing
that the Mughal annexation of the Deccan also amounted to the argumentation
of the Empire’s revenue resources. He further explains his view by arguing that
the decline was an outcome of Aurangzeb’s deliberate decision to keep the most
lucrative jagirs in khalisa in order to sustain the Deccani campaign and the
Marathe campaign. Satish Chandra in response clarified his argument by giving
distinction the crisis of jagirdari system and bejagiri as coceptualised by Richards.
According to Satish Chandra the jagir crisis occurred simply due to the non
functionality of the system and not due to the growth of ruling class and the
scarcity of the revenue. Satish Chandra argued that the tripolar relation between
the jagirdar , zamindar and khudkhastas or resident peasants and imbalance of
these relations and its ineffectiveness led to collapse.

Irfan Habib in his classical work on Mughal Agrarian System attributes the decline
of the Mughal Empire on the basis of inherent flaws of the Mughal land revenue
structures. To quote him , “the mechanism of the collection of revenue that the
Mughal’s had evolved, was inherently flawed.” And the excessive exploitation on
the peasantry went hand in hand with his flaw that led to peasant protest. These
peasant protests weakened the political and social fabric of the Empire. Another
scholar M.N Pearson views the Mughal decline in relation to the absence of an
impersonalized bureaucracy. According to him , “ once Mughal military reached
it’s climax, patronage slackened and the shortage of Jagirs endangered
restlessness within the bureaucracy and this eventually led paved the way for the
decline of the Empire.” Futher Athar Ali explains the decline as a cultural failure
in intellectual and technological terms in comparison to the west.
All these shortcomings and variations of the crisis range from the notion of the
Dark Ages characterized by the utter breadown of Mughal rule. But is it relevant
to call the 18th century generally as Dark age comes at the cost of scrutiny and
discussions among various Historians/ Scholars. That the 18th century was a ‘dark
age’ for India has been viewed by several European administrative historians and
contemporary observations by Henry Beveridge, James Mill and John Marshman.
The pre colonial political anarchy in contrast to the so called ‘progress’ under
British benevolence were to main point of the 18th century debate. This
perception also became integral part of discussion among some of the Indian
scholars . Gualam Hussain’s characterization of the 18th century as ‘an age of
senseless , slothful princes, and if the grandees , ignorant and meddling’ seems
well justified with the above perception. It is justified that the disintegration of
the Mughal empire led to the alternative political trend that of the autonomous
states in the 18th century. However at some point it is not true that these
distintegrated autonomous states showed character of anarchy and instability.
For instance , in Bengal the administration was efficient under Murshid Kuli Khan
and Alivardi Khan and so was of Hyderabad’s and Carnatic before the French
intervention. Also in Travancore under the rule of Marthanda Varma not only
reorganized it’s administration and improved it internally but also became
powerful force in the region. This shows their interest and little effort to
restructure the economy of his state leading to modernization. So it can be clear
that the indigenous did have some vigor to improve and also this factor leads us
to question that what would have been the nature of the Indian polity if these
energy to improve were allowed to mature without colonial intervention .

The study of ‘Dark Age ‘ is characterized by the art and culture , literature ,
religious as well as educational decline in the context of 18th century India.

But was there really a cultural decline? as argued by some personalities like
Alexander Dow and Forbes. Herman Goetz argued that the political instability did
not rally lead to an overall cultural decline in India. He wrote: “….must we not
come to the conclusion that the 18th century and early 19th centuries have been a
period not only of political and economic decline , but also of the highest
refinement of Indian culture.”
Also in the art culture of India it was in the 18th century that the nature of
creativity reached it’s height of grandeur. The Puritanism of Aurangzeb and the
financial crisis of the later Mughals led to the development of important regional
centers of cultutral activity. As a result the art culture of Lucknow , Hyderabad ,
the sates of Rajputana and the Rajput staes in Punjab hill region became
important cultural centeres. One such artistic development in this period were
the miniature paintings that thrived in Rajputana with a distinct character, style
and content. Historian Randhawa in his work, Indian Miniature Painting wrote-
“some of the bests creative efforts in this field , notably of the krishnagarh and
Bundi schools were spontaneous and innovative and possessed a style of romantic
beauty which was unrivalled in Rajasthan Painting.” In the execution of paintings
the 18th century miniatures of Rajasthan and Kangra maintained high asthethic
standards. Likewise the development of literature during this period was
commendable. The Urdu and Bengali literature flourished in great heights. The
great literary works of Bharatchandra Ray , Rameshwar Bhattacharya made its
grandeur possible. Also the musical culture flourished with geat dignity in the 18 th
century. In Carnatic music the 18th century was the period of famous trinity-
Tyagaraja, Muthuswami and Syama Shastri created a new area in the history of
Carnatic music with original ragas. The era of the musical trinity was one of the
most creative epochs in the cultural life of India.

The religious sphere and education have been the main areas of attention in
comparing the darkness of the 18th century. It is argued that the religion in the
18th century was characterized by superstitious practices and that the 19th centry
reform movement inspired by European intellectual influence restored the purity
of the religion. According to R.C Majumdar , “ A new ideology suddenly burst forth
upon the static life , moulded for centuries by a fixed set of religious ideas and
social covemtion . It gave birth to the critical attitude towards religion and a spirit
of enquiry into origins of state and society with a view to determining the proper
scope and function.”( ‘British Pramountancy and Indian Renaissance’)

The religious crisis of the 18th century however cannot be sidelined and there was
a serious attempt to purify and reform it during the 19th century.
Also in terms of education we cannot generally look into it on a negative light.
Reports of Thomas Monro for Madras Presidency as well as William Adam’s
Report for Bengal presidency throw light on the positive side of educational
condition of India during the 18th century. There are reports of many faction of
the people from the society attending the schools and major educational centres
of Sanskrit learning in Benaras, Ujjain, Tirhut, Nadia , Rajashahi, Tanjore and
Trivandrum along with chief centers of Islamic learning at Jaunpur, Lucknow and
Patna. William Adam also came to a conclusion that there was a village school for
every 400 persons. The content of education however did not reflect the advance
made in knowledge particularly in science, technology and social thought.
Education in the 18th century India was more of an exercise in memory than
excitement to the mind and the teacher-taught relationship induced a sense of
conformity and hardly encouraged original thinking.

The period of 18th century India is a controversial topic. However it is noteworthy

for us to maintain that even the 18th century witnessed innumerable amount of
crisis socially , politically and economically alongside the demolition of the Mughal
Rule , the vitality in the intellectual as well as cultural realm and the essence of
the society was not at all disturbed , the real disruption it may be argued however
occurred actually after the colonial intervention.