Alam - Mughal Uzbek Relations

Trade, State Policy and Regional Change: Aspects of Mughal-Uzbek Commercial
Relations, C. 1550-1750
Author(s): Muzaffar Alam
Source: Journal of the Economic and Social History of the Orient , 1994, Vol. 37, No. 3
(1994), pp. 202-227
Published by: Brill
Stable URL: https://www.jstor.org/stable/3632256
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JESHO, Vol. XXXVII, ? E.J. Brill, Leiden
TRADE, STATE POLICY AND REGIONAL CHANGE:

ASPECTS OF MUGHAL-UZBEK
COMMERCIAL RELATIONS, C. 1550-1750"
BY
MUZAFFAR ALAM
(Centre for Historcal Studies, Jawaharlal Nehru University, Ne
The coming of the Mughals to India in the sixteenth cen

the pre-existing links between India and Central Asia. Th
drew closer in terms of trade, population and culture. Materi
regions was deeply affected by the accelerated movemen
people, while institutions of learning, religion and politics in
the imprint of the other. Not much work has been publis
until recently, even on general aspects of India's relationship
Asia. Indeed, the significance of the trade of these regions
overlooked in modern writings on the Mughal-Indian econ
reason for this has been the nature of - or perhaps the w
have used - the available sources. In recent years, howev
been some notable publications in English which enable us to
questions relevant to this trade'). The present paper is int
attempt in this direction, drawing principally on some mater
sixteenth to early eighteenth centuries. The paper opens with
the movement of goods, followed by an examination, in t
third sections, of the evidence on merchants and their rel
* An earlier draft of the paper, presented at a conference on the Polit

the Ottoman, Safavid and Mughal Empires, Istanbul, June, 1992, elicited
from Stephen Dale, Suraiya Faroqhi, Ashraf Ghani, Edmund Herzig, H
Ludden and Andre Wink. Seema Alavi, Daniel Balland, Neeladn Bhatta
Subrahmanyam helped in revising the paper. I owe a particular debt of gr
Professor S. Nurul Hasan for facilitating access to the valuable arch
Tashkent, Dushambe and St. Petersburg. The maps are based on Histo
(Tehran, 1971) and Irfan Habib's An Atlas of the Mughal Empire (Delhi
1) S. Gopal, Indians in Russia in the 17th and 18th centuries, English trans
duction and notes of a selection of Russian Document (Calcutta, 1988); idem
tral Asia, 16th and 17th centuries, Presidential Address, Medieval India Se
History Congress, 52nd Session, (New Delhi, 1992); Stephen F Dale, 'In
in the Eighteenth Century' in Sugata Bose (ed.), South Asia and World Capitali
pp. 140-156; idem, 'Indian Merchants in Iran', paper presented at th
Political Economies of the Ottoman, Safavid and Mughal Empires, Ista
Jos Gommans 'Mughal India and Central Asia in the Eighteenth Century-
to a Wider Perspective', Itinerarno, 15, 1, (1991) pp. 51-70.

154.59.124.32 on Tue, 18 Oct 2022 13:28:49 UTC
TRADE, STATE POLICY AND REGIONAL CHANGE 203
state. The relevant materials on this particular question are limited. B

they allow us to raise doubts about the oft-repeated view that the Mug
or the Uzbek rulers were hostile or, at least, indifferent to trade and trade
and that before the dawn of modern era the merchants of these two regio
had no significant role in politics. In the fourth section I have consider
the impact of this trade on the northern Indian economy and politics.
The vast expanse of Central Asia was connected with India both through
land and sea-routes. Seafarers first reached the Persian shores and hence
took the land routes to the north of the Amu Darya across Khura
principal routes on the mainland went through the Khyber and
passes. Lahore, Multan, Kabul and Qandahar were the major entre
these roads. In addition, there were the Kashmir routes which led th
the Kara Koram to Yarqand, where the routes from Ladakh, Tibet
and India were joined by those leading to Kashgar. From Kashga
caravans proceeded to Samarqand and Bukhara. Samarqand, th
major city of Transoxiana, was the junction of the main routes from
(via Kabul and Kashmir), Persia (via Merv) and the Turkish territ
The city of Samarqand, together with Bukhara, was thus the centr
Indian merchants for their trade in Central Asia. In a late sixteenth
manuscript collection of papers relating to the office of the chief qddf
quddt) of Samarqand, titled MajyimCa-t-Wathhfiq, numerous Mult
reported to have been involved in commercial and monetary transact
the city3). As early as 1326, Indians, next to Turks and Tajik
reported in a waqf-nama to be among the notable visitors (d'inda-o-ra
while in the fifteenth century lands (ardi), villages (dih, qarya, mawd
rest-houses (ribat) of the Hindus are mentioned in the sale and p
deeds from the Samarqand region. Interestingly, according to the aut
2) W Barthold, Turkistan Down to the Mongol Invasion, English translation by H.

(London, 1928), p. 83; Irfan Habib, An Atlas of the Mughal Empire. (Delhi, 1982), S
and 5B and Notes, pp. 11-12 and 15-16; Mohan Lal, Travels in the Punjab, Afgha
Turkistan to Balkh, Bokhara, and Herat (Patiala, 1971), Chapter VII, pp. 373-462.
3) MajmiCa-z- Wathd'iq (a collection of papers from court of the Qadi of Samarqand,
related to the late sixteenth century), Abu Rayhan al-Biruni Institute of Oriental
Tashkent Ms. No. 1386, ff. 182a-184a and 188b-189a. In addition, documents on the sale
and purchase of Indian slaves also refer to several Multinis and Ldihoris. Some of these
documents have been reproduced with Russian translations in H.G. Mukminova, Sot-
szalnaya Defferentstatsta Naseleniya Gordov Uzbekistana (Tashkent, 1985). But Mukminova's
decipherment and translation are not always accurate.

154.59.124.32 on Tue, 18 Oct 2022 13:28:49 UTC
204 MUZAFFAR ALAM
30 D 50 60 70 SO 90
n7/ > I I
X Astrokhon
Boku SEA
Tobriz
*B9ghdod Bukhoro *Toshkent
?S \ ,- U2 ? .rqond
asro *Isfoahan 4 1Nz EmwYorknd
Basra rS Koshghor
THE SAFAVIDS Herat
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Map I.

154.59.124.32 on Tue, 18 Oct 2022 13:28:49 UTC
Rashhdtft Cayn al-haydt, the place where Khwaja Bahd al-Din Naqsband
founder of the Naqshandi order, was born and which by the time o
author had come to be identified as mawlid (birthplace) of the saint and
as qasr-z cdanfdn (palace of the saints) was earlier known as Kushk-i Hindu
The Sharaf-ndma-z-shdhT mentions the business of the Indian merchants
Shaybani territory5). This information is corroborated by other sources
1558, Anthony Jenkinson of the English Muscovy Company, for instan
met in Bukhara a number of merchants from North India and Beng
The fabulous wealth and unmatched trading skill of the Indians often s
to have excited enough jealousy on the part of the local people to land t
into trouble 7).
On the basis of the Persian material it is difficult to identify all the
modities which the Indian traders brought into Central Asia. Textil
varied range appear, however, to have been important items of expo
the Majmina-t- Wathd'iq the Multdnis figure as trading in chint of diffe
hues, plain coarse calico (fota) and fine cloth of Thanesar, silk bro
(jdmawdr), and fine calico (solagazi), as well as napkins and handkerc
(mzndil) of Lahore8). Varthema saw Indian goods in Central Asia fro
far as Bengal and Gujarat, and according to him many of these In
goods manufactured in Bengal and Khambayat also reached 'Tartary'
sia and Turkeyg). Varthema's observations are confirmed by a Persia
4) O.D. Chekhovich, Bukhavrskye Document, XIV Veka (Persian documents with Ru

translations and note, Tashkent, 1965), pp. 40 and 51, and also pp. 91 and 109 for tuj
Hind and Hindif; dem, Samarkandskye Document, XV-XVI Veka (Moscow, 1974) pp. 67
125, 244 and 247; Fakhr al-Din CAli bin Husayn WaCiz Kishiff, Rashhdt Cayn-al-Hayd
by Ali Asghar Muiniyan (Tehran) pp. 743 see also Mir Muhammad Yfisuf bin K
Baqa, Tadhktra Muqfm Khnf, Firdausi Library, Dushambe, Ms. No. 521, f. 34a.
5) Hdfiz Tanish bm Mir Muhammad Bukhiri, Sharaf-nama-t-shdhf, Institute of Or
Studies, St. Petersburg Ms. No. D88, ff. 451, Fasc. edited and translated into Russ
2 parts by Munira Salakhetdinova (Moscow, 1983 and 1989).
6) Anthony Jenkinson, Early Voyages and Travels to Russta and Persia, edited by E.
Morgan and C.H. Coote, 2 vols. (London, 1886) 2, pp. 87-88.
7) In Bukhara It was generally believed that a successful way that a lover could me
exorbitant demands of his beloved was to locate and plunder the fabulous wealth of
Hindu merchant. Tadhkira Muqim Khant ff. 33a-35a; Muhammad Hakim Khdn, Munt
al-tawarkh, ed. Ahrar Mukhtarov, 2 vols (Dushambe, 1982 and 1985) 2, pp. 195-19
such an incident in Imdm Qull Khlin's time.
8) MiajmCa-t- WathgPiq f. 184a.
9) Ludovico di Varthema, Itinerary, English translation by John Winter Jones
discourse by R.C. Temple (London, 1928), p. 79. See also K.M. Ashraf, Life and con
of the people of Hindustan (Delhi, 1970), p. 145, and W H. Moreland, India at the Death of
(Delhi, 1962), p. 209. Moreland questioned the veracity of Varthema's evidence, princi
because, as he concluded in the 1920s, Varthema has no support from any other ac
See also Jean Aubin, 'Deux Chr6tiens au Yemen Tdhiride', Journal of the Royal Asiatic So
Third Series, 3,1, April, 1993, pp. 36-52 for an evaluation of Varthema.

154.59.124.32 on Tue, 18 Oct 2022 13:28:49 UTC
206 MUZAFFAR ALAM
deed of 1589, which gives details of

handkerchiefs, coarse and fine calico
khdssa sondrgdmi), multi-colour ch
from Gujarat (katdn Gujardti) were am
between a Multani merchant and a l
ther identified the kinds of cloth im
Bukhara. He writes: "The Indians doe
doe all roll their heads, and all other k
made of cotton wool and Crasca..."
prized possessions of the Central As
Later in the seventeenth and eightee
be the chief exports from India. An i
envoys of the Uzbek rulers to the cou
(1658-1707) was to procure variet
establishment 13) Some of the Indian
weavers and encouraged them to
Rajab, Ustdd Kajar, all from Multan, a
such weavers14). Generally these weav
chants; in cases of defiance, they had
reaffirm their loyalty and commitme
Spices, sugar, indigo, together with
as animals were some important ad
Spanish visitor to Timur's court du
10) MajmtCa-z-Watlhd)iq, f. 183.

11) Jenkinson, Early Voyages, p. 87
12) Muhammad Hakim KhAn, Muntakhab-al-
century, Maktibdt-o-Asndd (a collection of le
early nineteenth centuries), Institute of Or
13) "Ibztiyda-z anwdc aqmzsha wa amtiCa ld
Makhibit, Munsha'dt, Manshiirdt (a collection o
compiled in the eighteenth century), Abu R
Library, Tashkent Ms. No. 289, Subhlin Quli
see also his letter (Cindyat-ndma) to an Irania
14) Majmiica-t-Wathdriq, f. 188b. The phrase
here to describe a slave, has been translate
cited by Gopal, Indians in Central Asia). The
Indian (Hindf-al-Asl) slaves in Samarqand w
15) Jitkar Lhori has to do so by taking an o
orders of Dary Khn I divorce my wife
Mukminova mistranslates a conditional clause
"he divorced his wife by uttenng the word
Gopal, Indians in Central Asia, p. 12.

154.59.124.32 on Tue, 18 Oct 2022 13:28:49 UTC
nutmegs, cloves, mace, ginger, etc." in Samarqand came from India16).

Babur mentions sugar and medicinal herbs among the special export items
from India17)
Slaves, both Hindus and Muslims, also figured prominently among the
most favoured Indian commodities in the bazaars of Central Asia. But it
may be noted that Indian slaves reached there in a number of ways.
of them were secured in exchange for Central Asian goods, horses in
ticular; some were taken as prisoners during wars, while many others w
captured during raids on trading caravans 18). Slaves with specialized sk
were much sought after Timfir, after his invasion of Delhi, handed ove
large number of skilled craftsmen to princes, nobles and other member
his entourage, in order to have them taken to Samarqand. Many In
stonemasons were employed in the construction of his mosque in Sa
qand. There was a colony of slaves on the bank of the river Baran, who
been brought by a Timfirid prince from the suburbs of Multan to catch
and birds 19). In the course of the Mughal reverses during Shahjahan's C
tral Asian campaigns in the 1640s, many Indians were taken prisone
sold for petty sums in Balkh, Samarqand and Tashkent20).
On occasion, some unfortunate Indian merchants also found themselve
sold as slaves in the bazaars. One such story of a turn of fortune comes
the experience of one CAla-al-Din Khan. Around 1645, CAla-al-Din w
Balkh as a trader. After two years, having sold his goods, while retu
home, he was enslaved and taken to Bukhara, to be sold to the Khiva
three years later. He found himself eventually owned by a Tatar wo
but he managed to escape after stealing a horse. He was arrested at C
noyar and was then sent in 1661 to Astrakhan, where he is reported to
applied to the Russian Tsar to become a Christian21). However, the f
CAli-al-Din was a very rare feature of the Indo-Central Asian trade
It is not without significance that while we have references to numer
instances of the sale, purchase and manumission of Indian slaves in the
16) Gopal, Indians in Central Asia, p. 12.

17) Zahir al-Din Muhammad Babur, Bdbur-naima, English tr. A.S. Beveridge (Lo
1969), p. 202; Gopal, Indians in Russia, Document No. 71, p. 68.
18) Several documents in MajmiCa-z-Wathd)iq refer to both Hindu and Muslim In
slaves (ghuldmadn-o- kanfzdn-i-Hindi) with Islamic and Hindu names, like Ibrahim and Ma
or with Persian secular names which also indicated their qualities, like Khwush-
Mushk-ndz, Gul-bahar, Triti, Zirak and Dawlat-qadam (ff 36a, 42b, 43b, 46b, 49b,
203b and 209a).
19) Gopal, Indians in Central Asia, p. 4.
20) Ibid, p. 17 This was however an unusual situation.
21) Ibid, p. 18.

154.59.124.32 on Tue, 18 Oct 2022 13:28:49 UTC
208 MUZAFFAR ALAM
vant Persian records of the earlier

eighteenth century sources do not
either in India or Central Asia. How
century when the slave trade ent
markets of Bukhara, Khiva and K
source of supply. Most slaves cam
and desert fringes of Iran and Af
status of the slave trade under th
slaves into Central Asia. If a sig
explained both in economic and so
India had begun to manufacture eno
of Central Asia as well as Iran and
exchanging Central Asian horses a
cannot establish the precise volume
concern for statistics. But it is notab
Indian merchants had brought th
region under their control.
Horses, dry and fresh fruits and m
cipal imports from Central Asia, wh
teenth centuries, when Indian trad
as Moscow and St. Petersburg, sab
yuft, mirrors, copper and iron be
Indian markets 25).
Horses were imported to India in ve
middle ages. The Gurjara Pratihara
large standing armies which inclu
22) Diya al-Din Barani, Tdrfkh-z-Ffr~iz S

pp. 310-315, for instances of slave figure
Mughal chronicles one rarely finds the pr
Mughal ideology To the Mughal Emperor
institution of slavery was "abominable",
(Calcutta, 1927) I, p. 263.
23) Gommans, 'Mughal India and Centr
24) K.N. Chaudhan, The Trading World of
1760 (Cambridge, 1978), pp. 237-305 for th
period. The Punjab specialized in the man
together with Bengal, Gujarat and the Coro
in India. Om Prakash, The Dutch East India
(Princeton, 1985), pp. 73, 176-181 points at
the second half of the seventeenth centur
markets in Persia.
25) Gopal, Indians in Russia, pp. 29-31, 77, and 199-200.

154.59.124.32 on Tue, 18 Oct 2022 13:28:49 UTC
during the period is indicated by numerous manuals on horses such as

Asvayurveda of Gana, the Aiva"-stra of Salihotra, of Nakula, and others26
It was perhaps during this period also that the use of the iron stirrup and
heavy armour, both for the horses and horsemen, became more general an
had a significant impact on warfare and social organization.
As cavalry came to be the mainstay of the political and military system
under the Delhi Sult~ns and the Mughals, the trade in horses became
major component in the relations between India and the territories beyon
the North-West frontier, known collectively in the Delhi Sultanate as mulk
bdlad or mulk-: bdlddast ('the high land' or 'the land on the higher side'). Th
bdlddastf lands seem to have been the principal source of supply of w
horses under the Sultans, even though a large number of fine horses
came to India through the sea-routes from the Gulf countries and Per
Early in the fourteenth century Mongol tribal groups, amongst others, u
to come down with their herds for the winter and sell them in the territori
of the Delhi Sultans2). According to Ibn Battfita28), the people of Asaq
Azaf in the steppelands of southern Russia exported horses to India
droves of 6,000 or thereabout. Various merchants had a share of about 200
horses each in these herbs. For each fifty horses, they engaged the servic
of a keeper called qdshf who looked after them and their feeding on the w
These traders wholly travelled by a route north of the Caspian Sea, throu
the Dasht-z-Qtzpidq and Transoxiana down to the Khyber Pass.
The trade in horses was voluminous as well as profitable. Through
medieval times, Central Asia remained the principal source of supply
horses for all purposes. In the sixteenth century, according to Babur, seve
to ten thousand horses arrived in Kabul every year29). During the sev
teenth century the demand rose enormously and the Indian traders, accor
ing to a report, sometimes purchased as many as a hundred thousan
Central Asian horses at Kabul30). As early as in the fourteenth century th
profit in this trade was estimated at 2500 per cent" ).
26) R.S. Sharma, 'Central Asia and Early Indian Cavalry, C. 20 B.C.-1200 A.D ', m
A. Guha (ed.) Central Asia: Movement of Peoples and Ideas from Times Prehistoric to Modem (Delh
1970), pp. 174-181.
27) Simon Digby, War Horse and Elephant in the Delhi Sultanate, (Oxford 1971), pp. 35
28) Ibn Baptfita, The Travels of Ibn Battpta, English tr. H.A.R. Gibb (Cambridge, 1962
2, pp. 477-479
29) Bdbur-ndma, p. 202.
30) FranCois Bernier, Travels in the Moghul Empire, English tr. A. Constable (New Delhi,
1968), p. 203; N. Munucci, Stona do Mogor, English tr. W Irvine, 4 vols. (London), 2, p.
391.
31) Cf. Iftikhar Ahmad Khan, 'Commerce in Horses between Central Asia and Indian
during Medieval Times' (mimeographed).

154.59.124.32 on Tue, 18 Oct 2022 13:28:49 UTC
210 MUZAFFAR ALAM
Trade in horses often had a close connection with medieval Indian

politics. The services of horse traders and breeders were considered
by medieval rulers. Many of the well-known Indo-Afghan ruler
their own careers as horse dealers. This applies to the Lodis and Stir
fifteenth and sixteenth centuries as well as to northern Indian Afgha
of the eighteenth century, some of whom established their powers
trade routes to Central Asia. The political and military dimension
trade diminished only in the nineteenth century, when large Indian
of horsemen were substituted for small ones of infantry32). With t
nature of the relationship between India and the countries beyond i
western borders underwent an obvious change.
Some of the Central-Asian chroniclers also noted cotton as a p
export item from Bukhara to India. Narshakhi mentions a villa
dana, near Bukhara as a production centre of an expensive variet
ton, which was named after the village as Zandajaf and sold at the p
silk (ba-qimat-i-abrisham) in Fars, Iraq, Kirman and Hindustan33)
In addition, India received a large supply of dry fruits from Cent
Fruits from "Persia, Balkh, Bukhara and Samarqand" were avai
the markets of Delhi34). In the seventeenth century, when carav
grew stable and began to the more frequently used, fresh fruits als
to be received from Central Asia. The Mughal Emperor Jahaingi
1626) received melons from Karis and grapes and apples from
Samarqand35). This became possible, as we will notice below, in an
atmosphere in which the rulers, notwithstanding their differences, gave due
regards to the safety of the roads passing through their respective domains
and recognized the importance of trade. Jahd.ngir appreciated the achieve-
ment of his time as he highlighted India's close trade links with the Uzbek
country. He boasts that Akbar loved Central Asian fruits, but that during
the latter's rule the fine and the celebrated varieties did not reach India36).
Things improved further in the later half of the seventeenth century. Ber-
nier noted the sale of Central Asian fruits even in the Deccan37).
32) J. Gommans, 'The Horse Trade in Eighteenth Century South Asia', see JESHO 37,3
(1994), 228-247
33) Abfi Bakr Muhammad bin Jacfar al-Narshakhi, Tdrikh-t-Bukhdra (Persian version by
Muhammad bin Zafar) ed. Mudarris Rizawi (Tehran, 1972), pp. 21-22.
34) Bermer, Travels, p. 249
35) Nir al-Din Jahdngir, Tgzak-z-Jahdngfrf ed. Saiyid Ahmad Khan (Aligarh, 1864), pp.
173, 2098 and 212.
36) Ibid, p. 173.
37) Bernier, Travels, pp. 203-204.

154.59.124.32 on Tue, 18 Oct 2022 13:28:49 UTC
II
Tahjiks, Uzbeks, Khurasanis, Afghans, Hazaras, Barkis and Im-qis a

Multanis were the principal carriers of this trade38). The Armenians a
had a share in it and a good deal of this trade was transmitted throug
pastoral nomads who traversed the pastures between the Indus and Ox
rivers. These trading nomads were known as "Powindas". They were
chiefly made up of the Ghilza5i and Lodi tribes - of which the Lohan
Nasiris and Niyazis were the most marked subgroups39).
But it seems that Indians themselves, throughout the period, aspired
be the chief carriers of even the Central-Asian articles in India. They seem
to have had a keen appreciation for precious metals and a dislike for passi
them on to the foreign merchants. Jenkinson noted that 'gold, silv
precious stones . . they (Indians) bring none' 40). However, this did n
apply to certain merchants who were especially commissioned by Cent
Asian rulers to sell or to buy goods in India for their masters and who we
exempted from customs duties everywhere41).
The extraordinary strong Khatri participation in this trade, it should b
noted, seems to have coincided with the rise and growth of Mughal po
in India. The fourteenth-century historian Diya-al-Din Barani alread
noticed the presence of Hindu Multanis, precursors of the Khatris,
traders and moneylenders42). We saw that in the sixteenth century m
Multanis, both Hindus and Muslims, figured in a variety of monetary
commercial transactions in Samarqand. But, until about the end of the six
teenth century, traders from almost the entire subcontinent participated
India's trade with its north-western neighbours. The Central Asia
documents in effect mention other Hindustanis and Hindus in gener
together with the Multdnis43). Jenkinson met in Bukhara Hindu trade
from the farthest parts of India, including Bengal and the Gangetic plain 4
The Sharaf-ndma-z-Shdhi noted Deccani merchants in Kabul and Peshawar,
on their way to Khurasan, Transoxiana and Turkistan45).
38) Mirak Shdh Munshi, Maktibadt, Subhan Qull Khan's letter (nzshdn) for the rdhdd
(route-in-charge) of wilaydt Khinjan, ff. 152a-153b.
39) For Powinda qdfilas and qdfilabdshz, see Gommans, 'Mughal India and Central A
pp. 55-56.
40) Jenkinson, Early Voyages, p. 87, see also Ashraf, Life and Conditions, p. 147
41) Mirak ShTh Munshi, Maktzibdt, ff. 4a-5b and 72.
42) Diyf,-al-Din Barani, Tdrfkh-z-Firziz Shdhf, pp. 309-311.
43) Majmuca-t- Wathdiiq, ff. 182a, 188b; see also Dale, 'Indo-Russia Trade', pp. 149-151.
44) Jenkmnson, Early Voyages, pp. 87-88.
45) "jamckathlr az tuj`ir azjamicbildd-a-Hind wa Dakan wa Gujardt ... " (Hdfiz Tanish, Sharaf-
nama-t-Shadh, f. 451b).

154.59.124.32 on Tue, 18 Oct 2022 13:28:49 UTC
212 MUZAFFAR ALAM
We also cannot rule out the presen

of merchants from Sind, Gujarat,
Persian shores through the sea-rout
areas south and north of the Oxus.
qand, the envoy of Shah Rukh (14
sea-routes is well known*6). Man
sultanates were from Khurasan, th
Central Asia 47). The ports of Thatt
Multan and the Punjab to Hurmuz
trade of Western India to Persia. The bulk of the trade of Sind went to the
west, to the great Persian Gulf entrep6t state of Hurmuz centred on the land
ofJarun, but coastal navigation also linked the ports of the Indus delta with
Khambayat, in Gujarat, and the Konkan. It was perhaps because o
Thatta's central position that the Portuguese, after taking over Hurmuz
made a bid to capture it. One of the most formidable ports in India, Thatta
was the meeting point of several routes, some terrestrial and some fluvial.
In 1622, when the Portuguese still held Hurmuz, about one seventh of a
shipping to that port originated from Sind"8).
Thus, until about the end of the sixteenth century, the participants i
India's trade with Central Asia and Persia, both along the overland and
maritime routes, came from almost the entire subcontinent. Some nod
transit points like Multan and Lahore had emerged in the north-western
region, the merchants from this region profiting conspicuously from this
trade. But their share in it was still not overwhelming. The seventeenth and
early eighteenth centuries, however, belonged, almost exclusively to th
traders from the north-western provinces of the Mughal empire. A numbe
of developments around this time may explain this change. One of these wa
the spurt of the caravan trade, which, in part, resulted from the tightenin
European control over the sea-routes49). The India-Central Asia carava
46)Khwindmir, Habfb al-Siyar, 4 vols (Tehran, 1954), vol. 3, part 3, p. 335; see also 'Abd
al-Husayn's Introduction to his edition of CAbd al-Razziq Samarqandi's Matlac SaCdayn w
MajmaC Bahrayn (Tehran, 1974), pp. 9-10.
47) H.K. Sherwani and P.M. Joshi (eds), History of the Medieval Deccan, 1295-1724, 2 vols
(Hyderabad, 1974) 2, pp. 77-115, 218-220. It was in consideration of the Decanis'
familiarity with Khurasan that the fifteenth century Russian traveller, Athanasius Nikiti
chose to live in Bidar under the assumed name Khwaji Yfisuf Khur~isini (ibid. 1, p. 185
see also H.K. Sherwani, The Bahmanzs of the Deccan (Hyderabad, 1953), p. 148.
48) Sanjay Subrahmanyam, 'The Portuguese, Thatta and the External Trade of Sind,
1515-1635', Revtsta de Cultura (1991), pp. 48-58.
49) Ya. G. Gulyamov (ed.) Istorzya Uzbekzstan, (Tashkent, 1967) 1, p. 537, quoted i
Gopal, Indians in Central Asia, p. 6.

154.59.124.32 on Tue, 18 Oct 2022 13:28:49 UTC
trade was, in a large measure, a latter-day continuation of the enterprise

which centuries earlier had led Indian Buddhists to move out along the same
routes50). There were, however, some obvious disadvantages in these
routes. As they passed through difficult terrain, possibilities for their
improvement were extremely limited. Conditions were particularly
unfavourable to wheeled heavy traffic. Pack animals, which were the prin-
cipal means of transport could carry only limited loads. Further, the cost of
such transport was very high, all the more so because the animals had to
be unloaded for rest every day51). Again, because of the danger of theft and
violence, the merchants had to wait at the major sard)is until a sufficiently
large convoy had been formed.
W.H. Moreland cites the case of Manrique, who having missed a
caravan at Multan, found he would have to wait six months for the next.
In another case, Bento de G6es, a Portuguese missionary who travelled
from Lahore to China via Kabul, was to encounter difficulties from thieves
between Attock and Peshawar and then from marauders in the hilly passes,
who used to roll stones down on caravans, and wounded many of his fellow
travellers, even though his convoy had obtained a guard of 400 soldiers at
Peshawar. After reaching Kabul they halted because some of the merchants
would go no further, and others dared not, being so few52). The carriers of
the trade along such routes could not have afforded to be mere passive
onlookers to the politics around.
It was an indication of the importance of the sea-routes to Central Asia
and Persia that the Sind ports in Thatta and Lahari Bandar, yet again,
became significant towards the sixteenth century. As Henry Pottinger, a
member of the British mission to Sind in 1809, observed, "Thatta had been
an important trade centre between the Indian Ocean and Central Asia
before the Portuguese sack of the city in the sixteenth century. During the
period of Portuguese control of its trade, Thatta continued to be an active
commercial centre, boasting 40,000 weavers of calico and loongees ......
and artisans of every other class and description to the number of 20,000
more, exclusive of baners, money changers, shopkeepers and sellers of
grains, who were estimated at 60,000 more"53). Thatta also occupied a
50) Andre Wink, Al-Hind: the Making of the Indo-Islamic World, Vol. 1, Early Medieval India
and the Expansion of Islam, 7th-llth Centuries (Leiden, 1991), pp. 45-64.
51) A.M. Peterov has briefly discussed the rationale and historical reasons of the shift
from land to sea routes in his 'Foreign Trade of Russia and Britain in the Seventeenth and
Eighteenth Centuries', Modern Asian Studies, 21, 4, (1987), pp. 625-637
52) Moreland, India at the Death of Akbar, p. 205-207
53) E.H. Aitken, Gazetteer of the Province of Sind (Karachi, 1979), p. 116.

154.59.124.32 on Tue, 18 Oct 2022 13:28:49 UTC
214 MUZAFFAR ALAM
distinct place in India's trade with t

teenth century"54).
The emergent European dominat
seems to have reduced Indian control over the seas. In Sind in the seven-
teenth century the Mughals made some efforts to regain ascendancy,
the Indians could not re-establish themselves as the prime navigators the
Thatta, however, continued to be of some import, and India maintained i
sea trade with Persia and its neighbours, in particular through the Arme
nians. The Armenians, as trading partners of the Europeans, had acqu
a dominant position in the trading world of Persia and India in the seven
teenth centuries. Among the various trade treaties the Armenians sig
with the Europeans, their agreement with the English in 1688 was of spe
significance in this connection. Since 1605, when Shi.h CAbbas set up the
colony at Julfa, in the suburbs of Isfahan, they were well established in P
sia. Their strength and share in India's trade grew as they arrived at a tr
agreement with the English both in Persia and India in the seventeenth c
tury. The English utilized the Armenian familiarity with local langua
customs and the political authorities to promote their interests, while th
Armenians themselves used the European ships for their own goods
exploited the new connections, to emerge as the chief carriers of Europe
goods from India to Persia55). According to the agreement of 1688 t
were to share in all the trading privileges enjoyed to the English in matt
of employment to the Company's service. The Armenians, in retur
pledged to give up exporting Indian goods by the land-route and promise
to send these on Company ships.
III
All this, however, also created a climate in which the rulers of both Kabu
and Qandahar recognized the necessity of a policy of protection of the land
route, notwithstanding their political rivalries. Thus, the land-route in the
seventeenth and early eighteenth centuries not only competed successfully
with the maritime route, but it also seems to have posed a kind of threat t
it. The English had to persuade the Armenians to send their goods m ships.
The caravan routes proved reasonably secure and also quick, to the exten
54) Calvin H. Allen Jr., 'The Indian Merchant Community of Masqat', Bulletin of th
School of Oriental and African Studies, 40,4,1 (1981) pp. 39-53.
55) Mesrovb Jacobs Seth, The Armenzans in India (Calcutta, 1937), pp. 122-126, 282-283
and 604-606; Gopal, 'Armenian Traders in India in the Seventeenth Century', in Guha
(ed.) Central Asia, pp. 200-213.

154.59.124.32 on Tue, 18 Oct 2022 13:28:49 UTC
that Jahangir, as we noticed earlier, could boast of getting even fresh f

from Central Asia56). Further, in Iran in the seventeenth century,
Multanis", with support from the Safavid Shah, had also acquir
notable position in money transaction and trade57). The stability of
route, in a measure, also encouraged an unprecedented movement du
this period of Central-Asian scholars and poets, many of whom were
involved in trade58).
This was so in spite of the fact that the relations among the rulers al
the routes were always volatile. Rivalry between the Mughals and
Safavids over Qandahar, and the outbreak of wars with the Uzbeks ar
Kabul, Balkh and Badakhshan in Shahjahan's time (1626-1656) did
affect the traffic. Relations between the Uzbeks and the Safavids were ra
cordial. But they regularly informed each other of the details of t
caravans to ensure appropriate protection in each other's territory What
more interesting is that for this purpose the ruler of one territory often
direct contact with the provincial and local officials of the other, and o
in case of their failure or violation of norms was the ruler approache
Protection of trade and traders was integral to rulership. This was the c
even when the traders were just in transit, without concluding any for
transactions. An illustration of this can be found in the letters of Imam
Khan, the ruler of Bukhara (1612-1642), to the Safavid Shah and
officials, written when agents or traders from his territory passed thr
Persia on their way to Masqat60). Interestingly, in the early eighteenth
tury when Nadir Afshar came to power, the Uzbek ruler, Abul Fayd
tried, though in vain, to arrive at an agreement with him. He postu
that he give up the earlier Safavid policy and never invade Turan so
the people and the traders of their respective territories could move in
56) Seth, The Armenians, p. 231.

57) Mehdi Keyvani, Artisans and Guild life in the Later Safavzd Period, Contributton to the S
and Economic History of Persia (Berlin, 1982), p. 215.
58) Sanjay Subrahmanyam, 'Iranians Abroad: Intra-Asian Elite Migration and E
Modern State Formation', Journal of Asian Studies, 51,2, (1992), pp. 340-363.
59) Mirak Shah Munshi, Makthbdt, ff. 35a, 49b-50a for Imim Quli Khan's letters to
Shah of Persia, ff. 82a-83b for his letter to an Iranian noble. In one of his letters (f.
the Uzbek ruler mentions, In particular, how a governor of Mashhad in collusion
(ashdnadF payda kardeh) the frontier tribes (of Turkmen) caused consternation to the t
in the area (sabab-i-khawf turuq-z-tujjDr wa biddbtagF-ye aqtir wa amsar mishud); see also CAb
Mucmin Khan's letter to Shah cAbbis in a valuable collection of letters exchanged betw
the Mughal, the Ottoman, the Uzbek and the Safavid rulers of the late 16th and early
centuries titled Maktiibdt, Institute of Onental Studies, St. Petersburg, Ms. No. B2501,
60) Ibid, f. 75.

154.59.124.32 on Tue, 18 Oct 2022 13:28:49 UTC
216 MUZAFFAR ALAM
out without any difficulty6'). Such le

Mughal rulers, on the one hand, a
Khans, on the other. Again, special le
in other areas accompanied big mer
close relationship between trade and
The traders thus often saw the ru
at least, in Mughal India. The vast
unprecedented share in it of the K
munity, owed a good deal to the gene
the Mughals. In the early eighteenth
Punjab shook the Mughal state, the
suppressing the peasants63).
This aid assumes special importance
peasants, very many of these Khatr
the Kayasthas, had long been associa
now started making attempts to acq
departments, in an apparent bid to
helped create conditions for their tra
could locate twenty-six Khatris in Mu
Four of them held very high ranks,
referred to as 'nobles' (amfrs), whic
remaining twenty are all mentioned
close to high Mughal nobles both at c
local officials in the Punjab and Delhi
and fiscal offices at the centre. In a
Khatris in the category of petty func
mutasaddfs) in revenue and finance
(sarkdrs) of the big nobles65).
The increase in strength of the Kha
in light of the fact that the fortunes
tied to those of the ruling elites. Tra
61) Ibid, ff. 51b-53a and 54a-55b "wa ba hama

wa fuqard darim ki ba fardghat idmad wa shud n
62) Mirzd Sadiq Munshi Risald, Institute
A212, ff. 20b-22a for a letter of the Amir o
CUmdat-al-Tujjar, who was also the leader of
63) Muhammad Qdsim Lahori, Clbrat-ndn
64) Muhammad
Haig, H.shim
2 vols (Calcutta, Khdfif
1869) Kh.n,
2, p. 651. Mun
65) M. Alam, The Crists of Empire in Mug
169-175.

154.59.124.32 on Tue, 18 Oct 2022 13:28:49 UTC
vient to the coercive state system, while the markets were generated throu
the unproductive lifestyle of the ruling class, which thrived, in turn, on
irrationally high claim over the social surplus66). The financial difficultie
of the nobles, it could well be argued, affected the prospects of trade as we
But this model helps us appreciate the situation within a limit only. Furthe
the trade in India in general was little affected because of the financ
distress of the Mughal nobles in the eighteenth century.
Much work is to be done before we can say anything in definitive term
about the nature and extent of the Khatris' share in political power. But i
is interesting to note that the Khatris saw themselves as a people who com
bined tjyarat or trade with amdrat or dominion. Anand Ram Mukhlis, a not
eighteenth century Khatri poet and author speaks boastfully of numer
Khatris who excelled in both67).
What is of greater interest to us is that if, on the one hand, the Khatr
who were principally a business community had a share in administrat
and politics, some of the members of the Mughal ruling elites, on the oth
also participated in trade. Shahjahan not only defended the Indian overseas
merchants, especially the Muslim shippers, he also had his ships in Sur
kdrkhdnas in Burhanpur, like his son, Prince' Ddra Shukoh, and daugh
Princess Jahdn Ara68). Awrangzeb, as a prince, tried to build his own por
in Sind, and his grandson, Prince CAzim-al-Shan, as is well known, w
accused of saud-z-khas, monopolistic control over business, in Chittago
and Dacca69). Among the nobles, Shdyasta Khhn and quite a few others
Bengal, for instance have been noted in our sources as merchants
descending from a family of merchants (tiajrat-plsha and tdjir-zddeh)70).
From the history of the trade with Central Asia we get a considera
amount of evidence of a close link between trade and politics. The majmic
z- Wathd'iq refers to one Mirzd Salim, son of Mawlana Ibrdahim Sadr,
important member of the ruling elite (natyjat-al-umdra, amadrat mai 'b) who wa
66) Irfan Habib, 'Potentialities of Capitalistic Development in the Economy of Mu

India',Journal of Economic History, 29,1, (1969), pp. 32-78.
67) Anand Rim, 'Mukhlis', Safar-ndma, ed. S.M. Azhar Ali, Rampur, 1946, pp. 4,
10, 12, and 17-18 and 25-6 for his relations in Mughal service, and editor's Introduct
pp. 22 for Mukhlis's view of tyarat and amdrat.
68) Shaykh
(Lahore, Abul
1971). 1, Fath Qabil200,
pp. 147, Kh-in, Adab-z-CAlamgfrF
463, 640; 2, p. 819 ed. Abd-al-Ghafur Chaudhan, 2 v
69) Subrahmanyam, 'The Portuguese, Thatta and the External Trade of Sind', p.
70) Compare Ghulirn Husayn Salim, Rzydd-al-Salltin, ed. Maulavi Abd-al-H
(Calcutta, 1890), pp. 225, 229, and 344; Mir Ghuldm CAlI Azdd Bilgrrmi', Ma dthzr-al-Kir
2 vols (Hyderabad, 1913), 2, pp. 222 and 224.

154.59.124.32 on Tue, 18 Oct 2022 13:28:49 UTC
218 MUZAFFAR ALAM
engaged in commercial transactions 7

Imam QulT Khan and Subhan Qu
officials to encourage the merchants
ing countries to come to and trade
were seen as a source of bliss for soc
reinforced with such Quranic verse
highlight the importance of trade
traders, they believed, they also serv
The rulers, then, would not merely
would be keen to participate in it, a
bolic is the case which Mutribi recor
Emperor sold some slaves to his co
livelihood (wajh-z-haldl) according
Uzbek Central Asia our sources record at least two instances of the ruler's
involvement in trade. Imam Quli Khan preferred to secure goods fro
Masqat
royal and Subh.nand
establishment Quli
for Khin
sale tofrom India,
the nobles andboth for consumption
the members of the royalin the
family, through their favourite slaves. And since the Hajj offered an ideal
occasion for trade, they showed not merely special concern for the protec-
tion of the Uzbek HSijjis and traders, but also tried to promote good rela-
tions with the Sharif of Mecca 7 ).
Further, our sources also help us in getting some idea of how Indian mer-
chants adjusted to different social and political situations to maintain their
credit-worthy status and to protect and promote their trade. Their par-
ticipation in administration and politics apart, the fact that they operated
across frontiers imposed constraints on them. It had to appear that their
movements ensured good for all. They were thus allies, at home, of the
Mughals, earned favours from the Safavids and succeeded in maintaining
their own autonomous organization in Central Asia. In Astrakhan, as
Stephen Dale tells us, the Indian merchants lived in separate quarters and
followed their own customs and rituals. But, being unaccompanied by
71) Majmica-z-Wathd)iq, f. 183a.

72) Muhammad Rldi Balkhi, Rawdat-al-Inshd (a collection of letters, specimens of royal
orders, dedicated to CAbd-al-cAziz Khdn, ruler of Bakhara (1645-1681), in two volumes) Fir-
dausi Library, Dushambe, Ms No. 351, ff. 22a-24a and 28. Another anonymous tnshi collec-
tion, titled Munshaldt, in Firdausi Library, Ms No. 1862, also contains three such letters.
See also A.K.S. Lambton, 'The Merchant in Medieval Islam', in Idem, Theory and Practice
in Medieval Persian Government (London, 1980), pp. 121-130.
73) Mutribi Samarqandi, KJittrdt-i-Mutribf, ed. A.G. Mirzoyef (Karachi, 1977), pp.
53-54.
74) Mirak Shih Maktibdt, f. 74a.

154.59.124.32 on Tue, 18 Oct 2022 13:28:49 UTC
women, they had mistresses and sometimes even married women from th
local Turkic groups75). In the Uzbek territory too, the Hindus had th
own leader (dqsaqdl, kaldntar) to take care of their needs and maintain com
munity cohesion. The aqsaqdl appointed by a royal order (manshur), enjoy
the ruler's support to deal autonomously with the affairs of his communi
spread over the towns of the Uzbek Khanate 76). Not much is known abou
their internal organization. We can only speculate that they were there w
their own priests and had their own places of worship, like in Baku in Az
baijan. We can also speculate that the Hindu Khatris, like the other tradin
communities in the region 77), settled their disputes, including commerci
and succession issues, according to their own caste and family rules 78
The facilities for autonomous community organization, again, seem to b
a seventeenth-century phenomenon, a follow up of the Indians' Increas
strength of number and of a newly developing general policy in the regio
of tolerance and co-existence. The earlier pattern seems to have been a
different. While we notice Hindu quarters in fifteenth-century Bukhara
Samarqand, we also see the Indian merchants and master craftsmen gettin
almost completely absorbed into local society. They lived in mixed mohalla
their houses and shops surrounded by those of the local Uzbeks or t
Ta-jiks. Many abandoned their ancestral religion, took Muslim names, mar
ried Uzbek women and were identified with their in-laws 79). And in com
mercial and money matters they all had to approach the courts of the loc
qddis.
IV
That the trade with Central Asia had an important impact on the histor
of the region is stating the obvious. But the details of this impact are yet
be identified. We now probably know enough of the history of Mug
North India to be able to suggest a link between this trade and t
75) Dale, 'Indo-Russian Trade', pp. 147-148.

76) Mentioned among others are Bukhara, Balkh, Badakhshan, Qunduz, Taleq
Aibak, Ghur, Baghlan, Shabarghan, Termez, Samarqand, Nasf, Kesh, Shahr Sabz. Mir
Shih Munshi, Maktibdt, ff. 187a-188a.
77) For a useful discussion of the internal organization of the Armenians in Isfahan,
Edmund Herzig, 'Family Firms, Formal Partnerships and the Community Structure
Seventeenth and Eighteenth century Armenian Commercial Organisation', paper present
at the conference on the Political Economies of the Ottoman, Safavid and Mughal Empir
Istanbul, June 1992.
78) Herzig, 'Family Firms...'
79) Majmica-t- Watha'iq, f. 186a, where one Nanfi Multdni is identified with his local w
Sandal bint CAbd-Allah.

154.59.124.32 on Tue, 18 Oct 2022 13:28:49 UTC
220 MUZAFFAR ALAM
60 657 707'
oshkent -
KwUZOE"
Nosof
(Sk
/
jhre-Sobz
Mvry 4 Termer
urduz
Balkh Bodkhson
0 Tokeqofl
isNshopur Shoborghot (blBahhl

SM shtodAibok 35'
Herot
a )Peshowor
F
THE AFAVIDS hn
Lahore
HU DI A N .. r)a m
25
*(' 70'
Map II. * Tow

154.59.124.32 on Tue, 18 Oct 2022 13:28:49 UTC
vicissitudes of the North-Indian economy. A major impact of the trade was

the emergence in the Punjab of an ideology which was expressed in a
language borrowed from the world of trade. This new ideology, in a
measure, represented the traders' worldview. I am referring here to the
initial phases of Sikhism. In some passages of the Sikh scriptures of the Guru
Granth Saheb, the value system appears to be strongly influenced by a con-
sciousness intimately connected with trade and commerce80).
"The true guru is the merchant: The Devotees are his pedlars, The capital -
stock is the Lord's Name and to Enshrine the Truth is to keep its Accounts"
Further:
"Oye Traders, Trade in the True Merchandise

Buy ye the goods that last with ye
The Buyers is all-wise, let Him receive the goods with Pleasure"
And:
"Without capital, the Trader looks about in the four continents (in vain),
For he knows not the Reality that his capital lies buried within himself.
Without the merchandise, he grieves and grieves,
The False one is deceived by Falsehood.
He who has the knowledge of the Jewel (within himself) reaps
profit, over and over again,
And gathers his goods at home and fulfils
himself, (Mind),
Trade with the True Traders and dwell on the Lord,
through the Gurfi's words"
The visible growth by the sixteenth century of big and small towns in the
Punjab, Multan and Sind and the areas north of Delhi was another signifi-
cant feature of North-Indian history All these towns were connected with
each other through roads and riverine routes. The entire area then came to
be linked, on the one hand, to India's eastern and western seashores, while
opening up, on the other, to Central Asia and Persia through Kabul and
Qandahar. The well-known road building activity of Shar Shah Stiri (1530-
1545) here is worth noting: ".... and he [Sher Shih] built a road with
resthouses which commenced from the fort that he had constructed in the
Punjab and it ran up to the town of Sonargaon, which lay situated on th
edge of the Bay of Bengal. He built another road that ran from the city of
Agra to Burhanpur, on the borders of the Deccan. He made another roa
80) Chetan Singh, Regzon and Empire: Punjab in the Seventeenth Century (Delhi, 1991), p
173-203.

154.59.124.32 on Tue, 18 Oct 2022 13:28:49 UTC
222 MUZAFFAR ALAM
which ran from the city of Agra to j

another road with resthouses which r
In all he built 1700 resthouses on the
in every resthouse he built apartment
Among other things, the attempt was
growing commercial connections be
The areas around the routes bustled with rich commercial and manufac-
turing centres, which in turn also encouraged growth in the neighbouring
countryside. Urban centres in the Punjab and in its neighbourhood beg
to emerge and thrive in two lines running along the roads, Attock, Has
Abdal, Jhelum, Gujrat, Wazirabad, Sialkot, Emanabad, Bajwara,
Machiwara, Rahon, Phillaur, Nur Mahal, Govindwal, Sultanpur Nakodar,
Ludhiana, Sirhind and Ambala, Thanesar and Karnal all lay astride the
grand road to Kabul. These towns emerged in the late sixteenth and seven-
teenth century, following and accompanying the great building activities of
the Stirs and the Mughals. Lahore, chosen to be the provincial headquarters
in the sixteenth century, kept expanding underJahdngir, Shdihjahan and in
the early years of Awrangzeb's reign82). From these towns as their bases,
the Khatris became the principal carriers of India's trade with countries
beyond its north-western borders.
Many of the goods in demand in Central Asia then began to be produced
also in these towns themselves. Lahore, Bajwara, Machhiwara and Sialkot
were noted, among other things, for textiles. In Lahore were manufactured
shawls and in particular the mixture of silk and wool. The Punjab towns
were also stocked with indigo, both locally produced and from other parts
of the country. Lahore served together with Agra as "the chief market for
indigo.....because it was more convenient for the merchants who travelled
in caravans at fixed seasons by way of Kandahar and Ispahan to Aleppo;
and this is why the indigo which reached Europe from Aleppo or the Levent
was known as Lauri [or more properly Lahori]". Punjab also exported
sugar and rice to Central Asia83).
This development in almost the entire north-western region of Mughal
empire occurred in close connection with the markets for Indian goods in
Iran and Central Asia. An early eighteenth-century Mughal chronicler
notices Mult.ni and Lahori merchants in different parts of Iran including
81) 'Abbas Khan S~rwani, Tirfkh-i-Shir Shdih, ed. Imamuddin (Dacca, 1964), pp.
216-217
82) Chetan Singh, Regton and Empire, pp. 173-203.

83) Ibid, pp. 216-219

154.59.124.32 on Tue, 18 Oct 2022 13:28:49 UTC
720 730 740 INA 750 760 770 780
34 ,/A Sultanpur abada To pur4

Hasan Abdaa Punch apur
Nila Rawalpindi Baramgala
Ralaur
) aKishtwar
N ushahra 3
331 Jelu -himbar]
Alhtasa
Khoara ,(hari ltabad
Khawaspu rat / Chamba
Bhera Wazralkot Shahpur
,K "9,irabad.Paithan
ab Jamia Ghakkar Kangra -32
32- Eminabad *Kahnuwahan eas I
S BS MS
91 ,RA Khan Nuruddin jh
Naurangba Fatehabad ar
Go?vindwa , oJalandhar
Jhang Siatan Patti Haibatlpur SuanN~d ar
Naushahra Nurrnahat Phillaur - -31
1Sadghara Firozpur Ludhlana oMhachhiwar Plaur
Shor
Suo,du
S adghara /LaLluwa
K
arappa Dipalpur
h ar
Lasnr Khanna
Khan ahrih
Tulamba Pattan Ambal hzrabad
Qabula Bhatinda
Su"amu am
-( Tirawari e
Thanesar . 1 Saharanpur
Sarai Pul.cc
Karnal
oBhatnair Gharaunda
PaLPan'at rana
Samalkha
aissar
? Bhadra Hsr H Gnur
Hans Sonepat 29
*0 Sidhmukh Nareta Hapur
T Luckn
DELHI Ghaziud in Na
FCh al Sikandara
_40 60 8 Pataudi *u
20 20_40 60 80
Kms
Pataudiallabga
.Jhunjunu Rewar, Sohna 'al Khu
Narnaul . 28
720 73o 740 75 760 ~77 780
Map III. Towns and Production Centres in Punjab and Delhi
Century
Tabriz 84). Our sources also mention the Afghan tribes of Qandahar in
markets of Sind"5). Towards the later decades of the seventeenth century,
Shikarpur began to emerge as a major entrep6t mn Sind, where, later in the
eighteenth century, many trading families from the upper Indus country,
84) Muhammad Hddi Kimwar Khan, Tadhkirat-al-Salatin Caghta, (Portions dealing with
the post-Awrangzeb period). ed. Muzaffar Alam (Bombay, 1980), pp. 53 and 335.
85) Khwajd CAbd-al-Karm Kashmiri, Bayan-z-Wdqic, ed. K.B. Nasim (Lahore, 1970), p.
57

154.59.124.32 on Tue, 18 Oct 2022 13:28:49 UTC
224 MUZAFFAR ALAM
including the Multinis and the Khat

punis together with the Khatris an
regions of Iran and Central Asia 87). W
mark if we suggest a connection betw
Mughal power in the region. But this
sources to re-evaluate how the inter
related to the markets and economic
however, a somewhat clearer vision
of the Mughal crisis.
While the Punjab registered unpre
century, its economy suffered seriou
The silting of the Indus, first, affect
But the great caravan trade more tha
the silting Indus. At any rate, trade t
of the century was no longer of a v
among the richest provinces of th
eighteenth century the economy of t
into a crisis, which can very largely b
its trade with Central and West As
Ways in Qandahar in 1709 disturbed
of the Safavid empire, leading to t
Ghilza'i in 1722, Nadir Afshar's loot
all dislocated the existing pattern of th
western provinces of the Mughal em
was in a state of deepening political
Khanates had ceased to be effective. R
ing interference of the Kazakhs an
86) For Shikarpur, see Selectron from the Bomba

etc. Bombay 1855; J. Postans, Personal Observ
to note that certain Shikarpur families wer
decades of this century (see Report of the Bombay
Bombay, 1930, vol. 1, p. 195). I am gratef
references to my notice.
87) Mohan Lal, Travels, (1971) pp. 398, 406,
teenth century Naqshbandi sifif who used to
Asian disciples
Chanykov through
Collection, No. "Hindu.n-i-Shikirp
83, ff. 167a-174b. U
is not given; but the MS contains a number of
including
their Shaykh
associates Ahmad
and Sirhindi,
disciples Mirz;
in Central M
Asi
88) Alam, Crisis of Empire, pp. 134-147, 18

154.59.124.32 on Tue, 18 Oct 2022 13:28:49 UTC
resulted in the disruption of economic life89). The revenue of the P

and Multan declined sharply. In these circumstances, the artisans, the
urban communities, the peasants, as well as the half-settled tiller
pastoral communities who had profited from the sixteenth-seventeent
tury boom suffered the worst. Both the Sikh risings and the other ru
urban disturbances concentrated on and around the great route o
branches. Appreciating the reasons for the malaise, the rich Khatri
chants initially supported the Mughals, but eventually, in the wak
series of Afghan raids, they also lost their strength.
The trade with Central Asia continued in the eighteenth century
effectively it was then mostly under the control of the Afghans, who be
ted most from the reversal of the bullion flow through plunder. Some K
families migrated to the east, some others moved down to the so
Multan, where in Shikarpur they maintained their trade, while still ot
in the upper Indus country gradually regained their earlier posit
allies, perhaps even subordinates, of the Afghansg9).
It is difficult to ascertain the volume of the India-Central Asia trade for

any phase of the period we have surveyed. It is, however, noteworthy that
in Mughal times traders and the production centres of almost the entire sub-
continent were involved in this trade and that the merchants from Central-
Asia-Khurasan, Maward al-Nahr and Turkistan-reached as far south as
'Malibar'91). Their trade was of no insignificant consequence for the
societies they moved in. Again, we do not have enough data to be able to
arrive at a figure for the income this trade generated for the Mughals as
customs dues or as mint charges. But it is clear that this trade had a close
bearing on the economy, on state power and on the politics of the regions
in which it flowed. It seems also clear that the political authorities, on either
side of the frontier, appreciated the importance of the links between trade
as such and the overall stability of political power. The Mughals, the
Safavids and the Uzbeks were not oblivious of commercial affairs or
economic concerns in general. Several historians have recently put forward
89) L. Lockhart, Nadir Shah (London, 1938) pp. 35-45; Roger Savory, Iran under the
Safavtds (Camaridge, 1980), pp. 226-54; Encyclopedia Irantca, Vol. 5, pp. 193-195.
90) Commans, 'Mughal India and Central Asia'
91) Hifiz Tanish Sharaf-ndma-z-shadhT, f. 451a.

154.59.124.32 on Tue, 18 Oct 2022 13:28:49 UTC
226 MUZAFFAR ALAM
a positive interpretation of Mughal

the early eighteenth century Mug
evidence in line with this position93).
the Uzbek rulers' concern for trad
acted, reacted and intervened94). Furt
to adjust the diverse social and polit
attention. They appear to be rather t
society at one stage. Later, at anot
Mughals at home, earned favours fro
own autonomous organisation in the U
the Afghans a new ally to protect
actions, there is an anxiety to main
status as merchants95).
Finally the foregoing evidence also e
the crisis of the Mughal empire. W
mulated, two themes were analysed: t
system, and the oppressive fiscal s
disrupted the fabric of agrarian so
growth96). In recent years historian
and an alternative picture has start
crisis, evidence of dynamism and gro
teenth and eighteenth centuries97
92) Compare H.W Van Santen "De Vereni

Hindustan, 1720-1660", Ph.D. thesis, Leiden
'Indian Merchants and the Western Indian O
Asian Studies, 19, 3 (1985), pp. 441-449; Su
93) Alam, Crisis of Empire, pp. 8-9, 203.
94) For a different interpretation of these
'Political Participation in Mughal India', The I
(1972), pp. 113-131, idem, 'Merchants and
Economy of Merchant Empires (Cambridge,
Wink, The International History Review, XV
95) For a recent discussion on 'Hindu merc
of their organisation', see C.A. Bayly, 'Pre-
Mushirul Hasan and Narayani Gupta (eds.), In
Erzc Strokes (Delhi, 1993), pp. 2-24.
96) ForJdgfrddrf andjadgfr crisis, see Satish C
1707-1740 (Aligarh, 1959) Introduction; review
Crisis and the Village (Delhi, 1982) pp. 61-75; M
(Bombay, 1966). For agrarian crisis, see Irfan
(1556-1707) (Bombay, 1963) pp. 317-351.
97) Compare C.A. Bayly, Rulers, Townsmen
British Expansion, 1770-1870 (Cambridge 198
Agrarian Society and Politics under the Eightee
Alam, Crists of Empire.

154.59.124.32 on Tue, 18 Oct 2022 13:28:49 UTC
dynamism is not always tenable. I would suggest the need for a cautious re-
thinking There is evidence of an agrarian crisis in regions like in Punjab.
But the explanation for this should not be traced back only to the internal
working of the Mughal system. To understand the crisis we also need to
look at the fluctuations of trade caused by the factors beyond the pale of the
Mughal jurisdiction as well as at the vicissitudes in the relationship of the
Mughal state with the outside world.

154.59.124.32 on Tue, 18 Oct 2022 13:28:49 UTC

Alam - Mughal Uzbek Relations

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Trade, State Policy and Regional Change: Aspects of Mughal-Uzbek Commercial

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TRADE, STATE POLICY AND REGIONAL CHANGE:

The coming of the Mughals to India in the sixteenth cen

* An earlier draft of the paper, presented at a conference on the Polit

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state. The relevant materials on this particular question are limited. B

2) W Barthold, Turkistan Down to the Mongol Invasion, English translation by H.

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*B9ghdod Bukhoro *Toshkent

S._ ARABIAN GUJARAT /y '-BN

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4) O.D. Chekhovich, Bukhavrskye Document, XIV Veka (Persian documents with Ru

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deed of 1589, which gives details of

10) MajmtCa-z-Watlhd)iq, f. 183.

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nutmegs, cloves, mace, ginger, etc." in Samarqand came from India16).

16) Gopal, Indians in Central Asia, p. 12.

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vant Persian records of the earlier

22) Diya al-Din Barani, Tdrfkh-z-Ffr~iz S

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during the period is indicated by numerous manuals on horses such as

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Trade in horses often had a close connection with medieval Indian

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Tahjiks, Uzbeks, Khurasanis, Afghans, Hazaras, Barkis and Im-qis a

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We also cannot rule out the presen

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trade was, in a large measure, a latter-day continuation of the enterprise

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distinct place in India's trade with t

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that Jahangir, as we noticed earlier, could boast of getting even fresh f

56) Seth, The Armenians, p. 231.

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out without any difficulty6'). Such le

61) Ibid, ff. 51b-53a and 54a-55b "wa ba hama

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66) Irfan Habib, 'Potentialities of Capitalistic Development in the Economy of Mu

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engaged in commercial transactions 7

71) Majmica-z-Wathd)iq, f. 183a.

74) Mirak Shih Maktibdt, f. 74a.

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75) Dale, 'Indo-Russian Trade', pp. 147-148.

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isNshopur Shoborghot (blBahhl

Map II. * Tow

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vicissitudes of the North-Indian economy. A major impact of the trade was

"Oye Traders, Trade in the True Merchandise

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which ran from the city of Agra to j

82) Chetan Singh, Regton and Empire, pp. 173-203.

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720 730 740 INA 750 760 770 780

34 ,/A Sultanpur abada To pur4

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including the Multinis and the Khat

86) For Shikarpur, see Selectron from the Bomba

B9ghdod Bukhoro Toshkent