The story
On March 22, 1793 the Governor-General Lord Cornwallis proclaimed the Permanent Settlement, a land revenue system for Bengal, Bihar and Orissa. Zamindars, the hereditary revenue collectors, were recognised as landowners and made responsible for paying a fixed annual sum to the Company, forever. Anything they raised above that sum was theirs to keep.
The East India Company had held the diwani, the right to collect Bengal's revenue, since 1765, after the Battle of Buxar. Collections were unstable, and the famine of 1770 had devastated the province. Cornwallis and his advisers, influenced by English ideas of private landed property and improving landlords, hoped a fixed demand would make the Company's income predictable and encourage zamindars to invest in agriculture. A sunset law made payment strict: if the sum was not paid by sunset on the due date, the estate could be sold at auction. Many old zamindari families lost their estates within a few decades, and city merchants bought them. Cultivators had little protection from rent increases, and the Company's revenue did not grow with the economy, which was a flaw as prices rose. The zamindari system lasted until the early 1950s, when India and East Pakistan abolished it.
Why it mattered
- It created a class of landlords loyal to British rule, and a land market that reshaped rural Bengal.
- The fixed revenue lagged behind rising prices, so the government's share of the land's value shrank over time.
- Peasant tenants faced rent pressure, and tenancy disputes shaped Bengal's politics into the twentieth century.
- Its abolition after 1947 was one of the first major land reforms in India and East Pakistan.
Sources
- Cornwallis Code Britannica
- Bangladesh: The British period, c. 1700-1947 Britannica
- Dinajpur Zamindari Banglapedia
Drafted by AI (Claude) from the sources above and checked against them by AI; no historian has reviewed this page. Spot a mistake? Suggest a correction. How pages are made
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