Jizya

Subject – History

Context – need to revisit Shivaji’s idea of Hindu culture

Concept –

Jizyah, also spelled jizya, historically, a tax (the term is often incorrectly translated as a “head tax” or “poll tax”) paid by non-Muslim populations to their Muslim rulers.
The Quran and hadiths mention jizya without specifying its rate or amount, and the application of jizya varied in the course of Islamic history.
In India, Qutb-ud-din Aibak imposed jizya on non-Muslims for the first time.
Jizya was abolished by the Mughal ruler Akbar in 16th century but was re-introduced by Aurangzeb in the 17th century.
Together with kharāj, a term that was sometimes used interchangeably with jizya, taxes levied on non-Muslim subjects were among the main sources of revenues collected by some Islamic polities, such as the Ottoman Empire and Indian Muslim Sultanates.
Jizya rate was usually a fixed annual amount depending on the financial capability of the payer.
Muslim jurists required adult, free, sane males among the dhimma community to pay the jizya, while exempting women, children, elders, handicapped, the ill, the insane, monks, hermits, slaves, and musta’mins—non-Muslim foreigners who only temporarily reside in Muslim lands.
Dhimmis who chose to join military service were also exempted from payment, as were those who could not afford to pay.

Chhatrapati Shivaji

ShivajiBhonsale I also referred to as Chhatrapati Shivaji, was an Indian ruler and a member of the Bhonsle Maratha clan.
Shivaji carved out an enclave from the declining Adilshahi sultanate of Bijapur that formed the genesis of the Maratha Empire.
In 1674, he was formally crowned the Chhatrapati of his realm at Raigad.
Over the course of his life, Shivaji engaged in both alliances and hostilities with the Mughal Empire, the Sultanate of Golkonda, Sultanate of Bijapur and the European colonial powers.
Shivaji’s military forces expanded the Maratha sphere of influence, capturing and building forts, and forming a Maratha navy.
Shivaji established a competent and progressive civil rule with well-structured administrative organisations.
He revived ancient Hindu political traditions, court conventions and promoted the usage of the Marathi and Sanskrit languages, replacing Persian in court and administration.
Shivaji offered his assistance to Aurangzeb who then, was the Mughal viceroy of the Deccan and son of the Mughal emperor, in conquering Bijapur in return for formal recognition of his right to the Bijapuri forts and villages under his possession.
- Dissatisfied with the Mughal response, and receiving a better offer from Bijapur, he launched a raid into the Mughal Deccan.

Aurangzeb

He assumed the title Alamgir, World Conqueror.
He was the sixth Mughal emperor, who ruled over almost the entire Indian subcontinent for a period of 49 years.
- Aurangzeb stretched his territory from Kashmir (in the north) to Jinji (in the south), and from the Hindukush (in the west) to Chittagong (in the east).
Widely considered to be the last effective ruler of the Mughal Empire, Aurangzeb compiled the Fatawa-e-Alamgiri, and was among the few monarchs to have fully established Sharia law and Islamic economics throughout the Indian subcontinent.
He was an accomplished military leader whose rule has been the subject of praise, though he has also been described as the most controversial ruler in Indian history
Under his reign, India surpassed Qing China to become the world’s largest economy and biggest manufacturing power, worth nearly a quarter of global GDP and more than the entirety of Western Europe, and its largest and wealthiest subdivision, the Bengal Subah, signaled proto-industrialization.