We in the Centre for Policy Studies, in collaboration with the IGNCA, have recently published a couple of monographs on the geography, history, economy and polity of two localities of Tamil Nadu: Ullavur and Kundratthur. The books are compiled and edited by J. K. Bajaj and M. D. Srinivas. We have earlier posted the notice of the release function. In the note below, we describe in brief these books and what they teach us about the pre-British Indian polity of India.
More than three decades ago, when we founded the Centre for Policy Studies at Chennai, one of the main objectives before us was to learn how the polity of India functioned and what was the relationship between the State and the Society before the arrival of the British.
The classical civilizational literature of India is one of the sources where we may find answers to these questions. We did carry out some studies along that direction. The first few books of the Centre, especially Annam Bahu Kurvita: Recollecting the Indian Discipline of Growing and Sharing Food in Plenty, were based on our study of our civilizational literature including the Vedas, Upanishads, Itihasas, Puranas and Kavyas.
It was our good fortune that we had access to another source of information on the pre-British Indian polity. Sri Dharampal, who was one of the guiding authorities for our work, had, during his extensive archival explorations, come across the records of a survey that the British carried out in about 2,000 Tamil localities from 1767 to 1774. These localities constituted the so-called Chengalpattu Jaghire which the British had obtained from the then Nawab of Arcot. The Jaghire is located around the city of Chennai. In this survey, the British, it seems, were looking for an answer to the same questions that we were interested in: How were these localities being governed till then and also what could be the value of these? They needed answers to these questions before setting up their own administration in the Jaghire.
This survey was carried out by Engineer Thomas Barnard. The summary records of the survey in English are available in the Tamil Nadu State Archives. These were copied from more detailed accounts inscribed in older Tamil on palm-leaves by the traditional account-keepers of these localities, the Kanakkappillais. Such accounts had been traditionally maintained and Mr. Barnard got the Kankkappillais to draw up the details he needed in a similar fashion.
The accounts collected in these palm-leaves are very detailed. These give the name of the head of every household, his jati and occupation and the extent of his house and the backyard. These also record the details of every temple and every lake, pond, pool and well. The accounts also record the location and extent of every piece of cultivated and barren land. And, for the years 1762 to 1767, the accounts give the extent of crops that were grown in the fields during different seasons and their produce. Further, these accounts give us the process of deduction and allocation of nearly a third of the produce for varied institutions, functions and functionaries of the locality.
We have copied, compiled and analysed the entire archival records of the Barnard Survey. We have deciphered, copied and translated into modern Tamil the palm-leaf manuscript accounts for about 600 localities. We have also translated the accounts of a few localities into English.
The two books that we have published recently give the story of the land and people of Kundratthur and Ullavur based on the information we have gathered from the archival and palm-leaf manuscript materials of the Barnard Survey. In addition, we have used the large number of inscriptions that have been recorded from Kundratthur and from the near vicinity of Ullavur. We have also used the details given in the famed Kasakkudi copperplate of the Pallava period, which pertains to a village whose coordinates, as described in the epigraph, coincide with that of Ullavur.
While collecting, studying and analysing all this data and compiling the two monographs, we have identified some major aspects of a locality or grama of the pre-British Indian polity. Below we share the salient aspects of an Indian locality:
1. An Indian Grama has an Identity of its own. It is not a mere collection of Houses.
Everything that we have learnt about the Chengalpattu localities and especially the two that we describe in these books tells us that the locality or the grama is a well-defined, long-established, self-governing unit of the polity. Every locality has a long history of its own. It has its own demarcated boundaries and a system for keeping those boundaries inviolate.
The boundaries of an Indian locality were considered so sacrosanct and inviolate that Thomas Munro in his testimony to the House of Commons in the course of discussion on the East India Company Charter of 1813, said:
“A village in India does not apply to what is commonly called a village in this country [United Kingdom], a collection of houses; a village is certainly a portion of country, generally from two to four square miles, the boundaries of which are unalterable; whatever cessions or transfers of country are made in the course of war from one power to another, the boundaries of the village remain permanent; …”
In the two monographs on Ullavur and Kundratthur, we have given several maps depicting different aspects of the localities within their sacrosanct boundaries.
2. Every Indian Grama has a long history of its own.
The localities of India are mentioned in epigraphs inscribed on stone and copper. The localities have been talked about in epics, stories and legends. Many of the localities have their own sthala-puranas, the founding-legends. The two localities described in these monographs seem to have an especially long and well-described history.
As many as 55 inscriptions have been recorded from the locality of Kundratthur. These run from 1153 to 1726, from the peak of Chola period to nearly the end of the Mughals. The transactions and events recorded in these relate mainly to the locality itself, the king is mentioned in the inscriptions often only as a marker of date and time.
The history of Kundratthur is witnessed also by the great Sekkizhar. He was born here, compiled the life-histories and work of the 63 Naynmars, saint-poets, of the Tamil Saiva tradition, in his Periya Puranam and was raised to the semi-divine status of the 64th Nayanmar. Several places in Kundratthur remind you of Sekkizhar. There is a temple at the place of his birth. The imposing Nageshvarar temple is known to have been built by him and there is a separate shrine dedicated to him in that temple. The vast Balaravayar Tank in the centre of the town is named after his brother. There is also an impressive new memorial built for him.
The name of the locality comes from the Subrahmanyar Temple on top of the hill that overlooks the town from its southern end. The history of this temple is timeless, though the earliest inscriptions on its walls are from only the Chola times.
The temple on the hill (kundram in Tamil), commonly known as the Kundratthur Murugan, has a special place in the life of Kundratthur even today. The stream of pilgrims that visit the temple and many who hold their birth and marriage ceremonies in the presence of the Murugan make a considerable contribution to the economy and transport system of the locality.
The region around Ullavur has been mentioned in the Kasakkudi copperplate of the times of Nandivarman Pallavamalla. In fact, the coordinates of the village, the grant of which the copperplate records, correspond to the immediate vicinity of Ullavur, if not Ullavur itself. There are a number of inscriptions from the early Chola period in the temples of Thenneri, the vast lake in the north Ullavur that also irrigates its fields. The channels bringing water from that lake are specifically mentioned in the Kasakkudi copperplate. In the south of Ullavur, there is the Appan Venkatesa Perumal Temple lying on the heartachingly beautiful and sacred confluence of Palar, Cheyyar and Vegavathi. Inscriptions in this temple run all across almost every wall. All these are witness to the ancientness of Ullavur.
3. Indian Locality was Affluent and Prosperous
According to our estimates, on the basis of the data recorded in the Barnard Survey, average annual production of foodgrains in the whole of the Jaghire amounted to as much as 1 ton per capita. This is comparable to the most advanced nations of today. The Indian average today is only about one-fifth of that.
Ullavur is situated in a particularly fertile part of the land and is an intensely agricultural village. Production of Ullavur in the eighteenth century amounts to 2.5 ton per capita. This is two and half times the average of the Jaghire.
4. Indian Grama was not exclusively agricultural
Notwithstanding the abundant production of foodgrains in the Jaghire as a whole and in particular localities, these localities were not exclusively agricultural. According to the data of the Survey only about half of the households in an average locality could be said to be predominantly agricultural. Besides them, there were the households of the weavers, carpenters, iron smiths, gold smiths, traders, teachers, scholars, medicine-men, temple priests, dancers, etc., as also the militia, the accounts-keepers, the corn-measurers and the caretakers of irrigation and keepers of the village boundaries, etc. According to the current criteria adopted by the Census, most if not all of these localities would be counted as urban given the diverse occupations of their people.
In Kundratthur, agriculture seems to have been secondary. This was a mainly a canter of religion, culture and scholarship. Among the total of 471 households counted here in the eighteenth century, 116 belonged to the weavers and their associated specialists.
Ullavur was indeed an intensely agricultural locality. It produced six different paddy crops in the three seasons. Among the six crops, some were of highly specialized fragrant paddies.
5. Indian Locality was Beautiful
From the older accounts and descriptions and from even from the current state of some of the localities, it can be confidently said that the localities of India and the houses within them were made to a well-ordered plan. There were a large number of temples, ponds, pools and tanks, groves and gardens in and around every locality. All of this created a beautiful and comforting ambience.
In our monographs on the two localities of this region, we have tried to convey some of this beauty in the large number of pictures that we have presented. We have posted some of the more striking pictures along with this article.
6. Indian Locality was Self-Governing
According to the data of the eighteenth century that we have compiled, around one-third of the produce of the locality was allocated for different public functions, functionaries and institutions.
There was an elaborate arrangement, sanctified in tradition, for making deductions from the produce. There were two distinct kinds of deductions. The first was called Suthanthiram, Swatantram in Sanskrit, and the second was called Merai. Suthanthiram deductions were made in two steps. First, a defined deduction for a long list of beneficiaries was made before the crop was threshed or measured. The second Suthanthiram deduction was made after threshing but before measuring. From the measured produce two kinds of Merai deductions were made. One of these Merais was taken out half from the Cultivators’ share and half from the Revenue share of the produce. The other Merai was taken out entirely from the Revenue share. These four deductions together constituted around one-third of the produce.
The list of functions, functionaries and institutions for whom these deductions were made was quite long. It included the Palaiyakkarar and Tukkirikkarar who looked after the security of the locality, the Kanakkappillais who kept the accounts, Vettis who looked after the irrigation, Alavukkarans who measured the produce. It also included the temples and the associated priests, scholars, dancers and musicians. It included the teachers of the locality schools and the higher scholars. It included the carpenters, iron smiths, gold smiths, barbers, washermen and medicine men associated with the locality. There were also deductions for the founding inhabitants, the Mirasudarars and the so-called Cultivators’ Servants, the Paraiyar. The locality thus budgeted and provided for all of the public functions that the State is supposed to perform.
Besides these specified deductions from the produce, most of the beneficiaries mentioned above also held certain parts of the cultivated land as Maniyam, whose revenue accrued to the Maniyam-holder. According to our calculations, around one-fourth of the cultivated land of the entire Jaghire was assigned as Maniyam. In Kundratthur, Maniyams formed around 20 percent of the cultivation. In Ullavur, where the land was highly fertile, the Maniyams formed a relatively smaller part at around one-eighth of the cultivation.
The long list of beneficiaries who held the right to the revenue of a part of the land essentially became formal sharers in sovereignty. The locality ran all its public affairs through these beneficiaries who were maintained through both the revenue of their Maniyams and allocations in the form of Suthintaram and Merai made by the locality. This made the locality sovereign in its own affairs.
The self-governing locality formed the primary unit of the Indian polity. Among the beneficiaries of the deductions and Maniyams, the locality also included institutions and functionaries at the regional level and thus created the larger circle of polity beyond itself.
A few months before Independence, Mahatma Gandhi presented a conception of the polity of oceanic circles and commended it for the future Independent India. In that conception the locality formed the centre of the polity and it constituted larger and larger polity in the form of expanding oceanic circles, all of which were at the same level, none above or below the other. Together they constituted the nation. The localities of Chengalpattu and especially the localities of Ullavur and Kundratthur that we have described in detail in these two monographs offer functioning exemplars of the oceanic polity of Gandhiji’s conception.
The task before us
Nowadays, there is much talk about decolonising our polity, out institutions and our discourse. We shall be able to transcend the colonial system that the British have left behind when we restore the sovereignty of the localities and return to them their traditional function of governing themselves through their own resources and people. That would probably take some more time. But for us to keep moving in that direction, it is important to retain the memory of the sovereign self-governing localities of not-too-distant a past. To keep the memory alive, we have to keep doing at least the following—
Intensively study the beautiful, affluent, prosperous and self-governing localities of the pre-British India from every part of the country;
Preserve, compile and study the inscriptions, copperplates, palm-leaf accounts and archival documents of different periods and from different parts of India;
Revive and restore to their pristine grandeur, some of the localities like Ullavur and Kundratthur, to serve as exemplars of what a decolonized India shall look like.
This is the process that shall lead to an authentic history of timeless India. This is also the process through which India shall rise again from the deep slumber into which she lapsed during the colonial rule.
Pictures of the two localities of Ullavur and Kundratthur.
Hindi version of this article.
