Archival Organization and Records Management in the State of Andhra Pradesh India, Vol-1 (An Old and Rare Book)

Email

Whatsapp

Facebook

Pinterest

Twitter

Copy link

The Andhra Pradesh State Archives which is one of the leading archival and historical research institutions in the world has in its possession, extremely valuable records and archives which date back to the beginning of the 15th century. These records and manuscripts are in Telugu, Kannada, Marathi, Sanskrit, Urdu, Persian and English. The oldest of these documents are those of the Bahmani, Qutb Shahi, Adil Shahi, Vijayanagara and Maratha periods. There are also State documents of the Mughal Empire's Deccan and Central Indian subahs from the time of Shah Jahan onwards, besides the archives of the Asaf Jahi period. The origins of the Andhra Pradesh State Archives go back to the year 1894. In that year the documents and records of the Daftar-i-Diwani, the Daftar-i-Mal and certain other daftars, the details of which are given in Chapter IV of this book, were amalgamated and centralized under the auspices of the Nizam's Government into a Central Archival Institution, viz., the Archival Office of the Daftar-i-Diwani. These records of the various daftars had been in the possession of various families of landlords, jagirdars and noblemen. In 1924, the Dafar-i-Diwani was constituted into an independent Directorate under the Government of Hyderabad, and later it was redesignated as the Central Record Office in 1950.

the Though the Daftar-i-Diwani was created in 1894 A.D., the Mughal records which form an important part of the archival holdings of the Andhra Pradesh State Archives were formerly in the Mughal Central Government's Archives in Qila-i-Arak (Aurangabad Fort) in Aurang. abad. It must be remembered that the last 30 years of the long reign of Emperor Aurangzeb (1658-1707) were spent in the Deccan when the emperor was grappling with the growing inroads and intrusions of the Marathas, the Portuguese, the English, and various other powers in the South. Aurangzeb was engaged in the conquest of various principalities in the Deccan and the south, including the Qutb Shahi kingdom, in the last three decades of his long and troubled reign, during which period, for all practical purposes, the city of Aurangabad was the seat of the Mughal imperial government and as such the de facto capital of Mughal India. A large chunk of the Mughal government's official records and archival holdings which were kept in the Mughal daftars in the Deccan's four Mughal subahs of Aurangabad. Berar, Bijapur and Dar-us-Surur (Burhanpur) have in this way come into the possession of the Andhra Pradesh State Archives.

The Mughal Daftars which were established by Aurangzeb in the Aurangabad subah-one of which was set up in the Qila-i-Arak around 1695 A.D., were the precursors of the Daftar-i-Diwani (Mughal Archives wing) and the Hyderabad Central Record Office. It is, therefore, correct to say that the Andhra Pradesh State Archives in Hyderabad (India) today is a successor office of the Mughal Central Government's Archival Daftars in Aurangabad, the most important one of which was located in Qila i-Arak, Aurangabad. The Mughal Archival holdings of the Andhra Archives comprise of nearly 200,000 documents of the period from 1630 to 1724 A.D. There are 5,000 Mughal documents pertaining to Shahjahan's period, and about 150,000 Mughal documents of Aurangzeb's reign. There are another 20,000 odd documents of the reigns of Shah Alam Bahadur Shah I (1707-1712), Jahandar Shah (1712-1713), Farrukhsiyar (1713-1719), Muhammad Shah (1719-1748), and other later Mughal emperors of India.

The Mughal imperial documents in the Andhra Pradesh State Archives constitute an extremely valuable archival hoard which is of prime significance in reconstruction of the history of India from 1600 to 1800 A.D. This is by far the richest classified collection of Mughal documents to be found anywhere in India or elsewhere in the world. and is of great historiographical significance and historiological value. This basic fact is worth repeating. The range of subjects dealt within the Mughal records, that is to say, the matters and time-periods.-matters of State and public policy as well as grants to individuals, and the territorial areas they pertain to, are very wide. The main draw-back is that proper reference media and contemporary index lists do not exist for much of these collections of records. This problem, as also that of their archival preservation is now being tackled on the basis of a time-bound programme of action (P.O.A.), viz., the Andhra Pradesh Archives Mughal Records P.O.A. (1978) from September, 1978 onwards.

The Andhra Pradesh State Archives is a repository of the administrative and historical records of the State of Andhra Pradesh and possesses not only the recent administrative records of the State but also the records of the Deccan in Persian. Marathi, Telugu, Kannada, Urdu and English from 1406 A.D., covering the reigns of the ruling dynasties like those of the Bahmani. Qutb Shahi, Adil Shahi and Barid Shahi kingdoms, and also of the Mughals from the regnal period of Emperor Shah Jahan (1627-1658). There are also archives pertaining to the dynasty of the Asaf Jahs (Nizams) of Hyderabad. This is one of the richest repositories of Persian records in the world apart from the Persian records of Iran.

The origin of the Andhra Pradesh State Archives goes back to the year 1894 A.D. In that year the entire records of the Daftar-i-Diwani, and certain other daftars which were under the custody of certain Jagirdar families, were taken over by the Nizam's Government and a new archival office called Daftar-i-Diwani was created for preserving these records. It was raised to the status of a Directorate in the year 1924 and was redesignated as the Central Record Office in the year 1950 by the then Government of Hyderabad.

After the formation of the Andhra State on the 1st October, 1953, all the records pertaining exclusively to the Telugu-speaking districts of the erstwhile Madras State were separated from the Madras Record Office at Egmore, Madras, and transferred to the newly created Andhra Record Office established at Kurnool, the capital of the Andhra State.

After the formation of the Andhra Pradesh on 1st November, 1956, the Andhra Record Office was continued as a branch of the Central Record Office, Hyderabad, at Kurnool till 31st April, 1957. It was merged with the Central Record Office, Hyderabad, on 1st May. 1957, and the records of the Secretariat departments (G.Os.) of the Andhra area including Board of Revenue records, Survey Records, Proceedings volumes, Gazetted Electoral Rolls, confidential records, etc., dating from 1920 onwards up to 1952 were transferred to the Central Record Office at Hyderabad, located at Erram Manzil, Hyderabad. In the year 1962 the Andhra Pradesh State Archives Department was reorganized on the pattern of the National Archives of India and technical posts of Archivists, Assistant Archivists, etc., were sanctioned by the Government Central Record Office and the Department were renamed as the Andhra Pradesh State Archives.

The formation of the Andhra Pradesh State in 1956 paved the way for the speedier growth and the scientific re-orientation of this Department and it has developed gradually from a mere record office into a modern Archives and Research Institution with scientific preservation of archives and records, their documentation, and dissemination of the veritable mine of information available in the records to the researchers in various fields. As such, the fast accumulation of the records from various sources created an acute accommodation problem. The need for a spacious complex of buildings with modern amenities was felt.