POLITICAL HISTORY.
Meanwhile the weak and corrupt administration of the Chiefs in Council, and the oppression of the ryots and the smaller zamindars by Sítaráma Rázu (who was not only de facto ruler of practically the whole of the zamindari area in the district, but also renter of the havíli land) had brought the district into a very unsatisfactory state. A Committee of Circuit consisting of five Members of Council (see p. 167) was sent to investigate matters, and reported in 1784 in the strongest terms of condemnation. It said that the havíli land was most oppressively administered by Sítaráma and was in the last stage of desolation; and as for the rest of the district, that constantly increasing taxes had resulted in a decrease of population and the ruin of several of the handicrafts; that the ryots were allowed to retain barely one-fifth of their crops; that the excessive customs duties had strangled trade; that there were no courts of justice; that the villages were 'composed of wretched hovels, the people meanly clothed and meagre through the extremes of labour and hard fare'; that ' the zamindar, converting all his gains to private purposes, and the native, destitute of all property and aiming at nothing more than a subsistence and the discharge of his assessment,' were alike indifferent to the needs of the future; that in spite of orders to reduce the number of his forces, the Rája of Vizianagram still maintained 7,760 troops of his own (including l,620 sepoys dressed and armed after the European manner)at an annual cost of nearly 5½ lakhs of rupees and had a call on even more belonging to Pálkonda, Jeypore, Golgonda, and Ándra (his 'subjected tributaries') and to Kimedi and Tekkali; and that of the zamindars he had dispossessed, some had fled to Jeypore and were living on the bounty of the Rája there, others (like Kurupám) were in receipt of a pension, and yet others (including Bobbili, Páchipenta, Kásipuram, Sálúr, and the Tát Rája of Bissamkatak) were in imprisonment at Vizianagram.
The Committee considered it necessary in the interests of the people at large that the power of Vizianagram should be curbed; and recommended that all his troops except some 2,000 sibbandis for service in the malarious hills and a body-guard of 767 peons and 50 horse should be ordered to be disbanded, the cost of their upkeep (four lakhs) being added to the peshkash (five lakhs) which the Rája now paid; suggested that the Jeypore, Pálkonda and Golgonda chiefs should be given separate cowles and rendered independent of Vizianagram, and that the imprisoned zamindars should be set at liberty; and made numerous proposals for the improvement of the revenue and other branches of the administration.
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