Irfan Habib:The Agrarian System of Mughal India: 1556-1707 (Second Revised Edition)

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This is a new edition of a classic first published in 1963. It contains much that is fresh in both description and perception, for example in the treatment of agricultural technology, price movements, and the village community. There is also an expanded bibliography, a new descriptive index, and new illustrations and maps.

About the Author:

Irfan Habib was Professor of History at the Aligarh Muslim University (1969 to 1994), and Chairman, Indian Council of Historical Research (1987 to 1993). His other works include An Atlas of the Mughal Empire and Essays in Indian History-Towards a Marxist Perception. He has co-edited the Cambridge Economic History of India, Vol. I, and History of Humanity, UNESCO, Vols. IV and V.

Excerpts from Reviews of the First Edition:

'Once in a very long while something happens to stir the...extensive waters of Indian historiography. The publication of Irfan Habib's The Agrarian System of Mughal India is generally recognized-even in Tapan Raychaudhuri, Enquiry

'...a brilliant achievement in breadth and depth...'
Percival Spear, A History of India, Vol. 2

'The author's diligent search for sources and careful scrutiny of the texts deserve the highest praise.'

Riazul Islam, Bulletin of the School of Oriental and African Studies

'...a fine book...a major event in South-Asian historiography.' -p. Hardy in English Historical Review

'...a work developed on rigorous and diligent lines...The author reviews a century and a half of Indian agrarian history from a quite definitely socialist standpoint.'

-Luigi Pignatelli, East and West

'This erudite treatise...marked by wide knowledge and scrupulous accuracy...His elaborate bibliography, a model of its kind, reveals the colossal task which has been undertaken.'

-Collin C. Davies in History

'No serious student of the history of the sub-continent can afford to ignore the penetrating analysis of the weakness of the Mughal regime contained in the final chapters...'

-G. R. G. Hambly in Journal of the Royal Central Asian Society

'...a book which will be read with profit by the undergraduate as well as by the research historian of medieval India...a superb piece of work.'

-J. H. Bloomfield in Journal of Asian Studies

'[One] of the books on earlier epochs which have profoundly influenced the writings on modern Indian history'.

-Amiya Kumar Bagchi in The Political Economy of Underdevelopment

Excerpts from Reviews of the Second Edition:

'Students of medieval Indian history should consider themselves unfortunate if they do not possess the volume or if they do not read it'.

-Meena Bhargava, The Book Review

'The reprinting of the 1963 classic is a publishing event. The book initiated a historiographical revolution in the world of medieval Indian history...What he [Irfan Habib] has done in this book is to add a tremendous amount of new evidence which enriches and deepens his original contribution.'

-Rudrangshu Mukherjee, The Telegraph