89Towards a New Imperial Framework It is interesting to note that at this stage a sizeable section of the nobility appreciated the changing situation and tried to adapt the Mughal imperial framework to it. They thought in terms of a basic modification in the nature and extent of the Mughal paramountcy over the zamindars. Samsam-ud-Daulah who in his capacity as mir bakhshi was in constant touch with the provincial and local bakhshis and news-reporters, was the chief exponent of this idea. ‘The Rajput rajas and the small and big zamindars’, as Samsam-ud-Daulah argued, (p.51) ‘had been the rulers of Hindustan who, because of their ill-fortune, could not withstand the blow of [the swords of] the Mughal emperors and had to accommodate with them by accepting their overlordship in all humility. We should therefore be content with this, for any deliberation for their chastisement would amount to putting our hands into the hornets’ nest.’74 Samsam-ud-Daulah illustrated his plea by referring to the repercussions of Aurangzeb’s policy towards the Marathas in the late-seventeenth century. Samsam-ud-Daulah tried to conciliate almost all the zamindars who could individually collect, on whatsoever account, even a small army of peasants to rise against the Mughals. His agents, spread all over the empire, tried to persuade the zamindars to accept mansabs and titles, jagirs and the zamindaris of their watans (home districts) along with some additional favours from the Mughal court. When the zamindars reached the court, an important friend or associate of the mir bakhshi escorted him to the audience hall.75
Samsam-ud-Daulah’s plea was probably for a formal acceptance of decentralization. He advocated giving away of fiscal rights, as it was in an ordinary case of ijara, and also some administrative rights by local Mughal officials to the zamindars. The plea did not find a ready response at the court. But the rationality of such a policy was well appreciated by some nobles in the provinces which emerged as ‘successor states’.76 The arrangement with the
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zamindars in these states meant additional power to them and also their participation in the government.
On the eve of Nadir Shah’s invasion of India the major institutions and the norms that regulated the Mughal system had reached almost a total collapse. At the centre it was not the emperor but the nobles who dictated the terms of their services to the state while in the provinces the governors had been emerging as virtually autonomous rulers. Their association with the imperial court or loyalty to the emperor and the Mughal system was effected on their own terms and in their own interest.
(p.52) However, the decline of imperial authority did not mean the disappearance of the imperial frame. The semblance of the empire had to be guarded, for it suited all the elements who had hitherto constituted the substance of the empire. It appears that the decline of the Mughal empire was accompanied by a rearrangement of the state structure based perhaps on a redistribution of imperial resources. Nadir Shah’s invasion of India in 1739 gave a final blow to the emperor’s authority by creating conditions for these developments to take firm root. The battle against the Persian invaders in Karnal was lost before it actually started. Two nobles, Samsam-ud-Daulah and Burhanul-Mulk entered the fray while Nizam-ul-Mulk, the wazir and the entire ‘Turani’ group preferred to stay away. And the emperor, the supreme commander, was a mere helpless onlooker.