Sir Thomas Munro is appointed as the…

June 1820 CE

Sir Thomas Munro is appointed as the British colonial Governor of the Madras Presidency, which encompasses most of southern India, and where he founds systems of revenue assessment and general administration that will substantially persist into the twentieth century.

He is regarded as the father of the 'Ryotwari system'.

An official report by John Stuart Mill for the British East India Company in 1857 explains the Ryotwari land tenure system as follows:

"Under the Ryotwari System every registered holder of land is recognised as its proprietor, and pays direct to Government. He is at liberty to sublet his property, or to transfer it by gift, sale, or mortgage. He cannot be ejected by Government so long as he pays the fixed assessment, and has the option annually of increasing or diminishing his holding, or of entirely abandoning it. In unfavourable seasons remissions of assessment are granted for entire or partial loss of produce. The assessment is fixed in money, and does not vary from year to year, in those cases where water is drawn from a Government source of irrigation to convert dry land into wet, or into two-crop land, when an extra rent is paid to Government for the water so appropriated; nor is any addition made to the assessment for improvements effected at the Ryot's own expense. The Ryot under this system is virtually a Proprietor on a simple and perfect title, and has all the benefits of a perpetual lease without its responsibilities, inasmuch as he can at any time throw up his lands, but cannot be ejected so long as he pays his dues; he receives assistance in difficult seasons, and is irresponsible for the payment of his neighbours. . . . The Annual Settlements under Ryotwari are often misunderstood, and it is necessary to explain that they are rendered necessary by the right accorded to the Ryot of diminishing or extending his cultivation from year to year. Their object is to determine how much of the assessment due on his holding the Ryot shall pay, and not to reassess the land. In these cases where no change occurs in the Ryots holding a fresh Potta or lease is not issued, and such parties are in no way affected by the Annual Settlement, which they are not required to attend." (John Stuart Mill, Examiner of the India Office, "Return to an Order of the House of Commons (June 9, 1857), showing under what tenures, and subject to what Land Tax, lands are held under the several Presidencies of India." Quoted by Romesh Dutt, The Economic History of India in the Victorian Age. From the Accession of Queen Victoria in 1837 to the Commencement of the Twentieth Century, Vol.II. London, Kegan Paul, Trench Trübner (1904), pp. 93-4. On line. McMaster ISBN 81-85418-01-2)

The Ryotwari system will be extended subsequently to the Mumbai area.

Munro will gradually reduce the rate of taxation from one half to one third of the gross produce, which will still be an excessive tax.

The levy is not based on actual revenues from the produce of the land, but instead on an estimate of the potential of the soil; in some cases more than fifty percent of the gross revenue is demanded.