The poll-tax on non-Muslims -- there were several distinct traditions of legal opinion on the desirability and mechanics of imposing this tax.
Key things to remember in the Mughal context:
Men of religion (including men of non-Muslim religious traditions) were exempt.
Households headed by widows were exempt.
The poor and indigent were exempt.
The sick and the disabled were exempt.
So the question is, who did pay? => Merchants, ruling elites, landed elites, scribal groups, literati --
so, of course, much ink was spilt in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries condemning Aurangzeb for re-imposing jizya -- because it turns out that it had targeted the most vocal and most visible and most influential Hindu groups ...
Key things to remember in the Mughal context:
Men of religion (including men of non-Muslim religious traditions) were exempt.
Households headed by widows were exempt.
The poor and indigent were exempt.
The sick and the disabled were exempt.
So the question is, who did pay? => Merchants, ruling elites, landed elites, scribal groups, literati --
so, of course, much ink was spilt in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries condemning Aurangzeb for re-imposing jizya -- because it turns out that it had targeted the most vocal and most visible and most influential Hindu groups ...
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