1 ( 107 )
2 fact stranger merchants were practically debarred from entering the
3 country, and the whole of the trade, such it was, became monopolized by
4 the Sayer contractors or their.servants and a few practised traders, who
5 were in close alliance with them or knew how to. command powerful
6 interest at the Durbar.
7 11. At the time of the assumption of the country the Sayer was
8 ‘found to be mostly farmed out, and it was next to impossible to ascer
9 tain the extent of its resources, the number and nature of the strangely
10 miscellaneous articles it included, or how far it was susceptible of im-
11 provement. The accounts of the Cirear gave the nominal, not the real
12 settlements, and those furnished by the contactors themselves were of
13 course not to be relied on. As immediate reform thus became impracti-
14 cable without risk of serious error, the only thing to be done was to
15 watch’ the renters narrowly, and to set about collecting the required
16 information in every possible way.
17 12. In addition to this the revenues of the state were in a most
18 reduced condition, with a heavy load of arrears of uncertain amount to
19 be cleared off, and it was considered better therefore in every branch of
20 the administration to proceed gradually and with caution, grappling
21 with the most glaring grievances, and correcting the others one after
22 another as the state of the finances improved, and acquaintance with the
23 real state of the country advanced.
24 13. In this way many duties were allowed for a-time to remain which
25 can be justified by no abstract principles of political economy, but which
26 the state of commerce and other local circumstances rendered it advisable
27 to retain fora time at least, ifnot permanently. The rules however under
28 which these were levied were purged of all ambiguity, and, being expressed
29 in the simplest terms, are intelligible to the meanest trader; and the
30 Sayer may very clearly be said to have been collected without a wrangle,
31 14. Accompanying this Memorandum is a printed list of the seven
32 chundred and sixty-nine items of Taxation, which have been swept away
33 since the institution of this Commission. These amounted in the aggregate
34 to the annual value of ten lakhs and seventy-three thousand Rupees ; -but
35 bearing heavily as these must have done, it may safely beassumed that they
36 were not so much detested by the people on account of the money they took
37 from their pockets, as on account of the iniquitous use which was .made
38 by the izardars and their myrmidons, of the Police powers with which if
39 ‘was a necessary part of the system to invest, them.