to the Company all the lands in the 24 Parganás as a perpetual property, based upon a jágír grant. The sum of Rs. 222,958, the amount at which the land was assessed when first made over to the Company in 1757, was paid to Lord Clive from 1765 until his death, in 1774, when the whole proprietary right in the land and revenues reverted to the Company.
The history of our acquisition of the port and city of Calcutta is totally distinct from the foregoing. The Company obtained possession of certain villages, corresponding to the existing site of Calcutta, in return for a present to the son of Aurangzeb, in 1700. In 1717, during the reign of Farrukh Siyar, it acquired a more formal grant, but only in the nature of a tálukdárí, or copyhold tenure, and as such subject to a yearly rental. The fixed rental which the Company paid to the Muhammadan officers for the township of Calcutta (under the description of Calcutta, Sútánutí, and Govindpur) was Rs. 8836, whilst the Kifáyat, or surplus revenue over and above the fixed rental which the Company realized as tálukdárs, amounted to Rs. 98,295. The gross revenue of the town of Calcutta, before 1757, amounted to Rs. 107,131. In December 1757 or 1758 (for Mr. J. Grant gives both years), the Company finally obtained a lákhiráj, or rent-free grant, under the Royal Authority (Fifth Report, pp. 487-92, Madras Reprint).
These were the circumstances and conditions under which the East India Company acquired the 24 Parganás, which thus rank early among their landed possessions. The following are the names of the twenty-four Fiscal Divisions or Parganás which the District comprised :—(1) Calcutta, (2) Akbarpur, (3) Amírpur, (4) Azímábád, (5) Baliá, (6) Barídhátí, (7) Basandárí, (8) Dakhín Ságar, (9) Garh, (10) Háthiágarh, (11) Ikhtiárpur, (12) Kharijurí, (13) Kháspur, (14) Maidánmal, (15) Mágurá, (16) Mánpur, (17) Maydá (18) Munrágáchhá, (19) Páikán, (20) Pechákulí, (21) Satal, (22) Sháhnagar, (23) Sháhpur, and (24) Uttar (northern) Parganá.
Mr. J. Grant, in his Report to Lord Cornwallis on the Revenues of Bengal, published in the Fifth Report of the Select Committee on the affairs of the East India Company, 1812 (Madras Reprint, 1866, p. 491), gives the divisions of the District arranged in twentyseven mahals or estates, as follow :—(1) Calcutta, (2 and 3) Abwáb Faujdárí, (4) Akbarpur, (5) Amírábád, (6) Azímábád, (7) Barídhátí, (8) Dakhín Ságar, (9) Garh, (10) Háthiágarh, (11) Hávilí Shahr, (12) Ikhtiárpur, (13) Kharijurí, (14) Kháspur, (15) Mágurá (16)
