Medial trade relations of india
Answers
In the medieval period, the middle classes masses had been largely belonged to merchants and other professional classes such as vaidyas and hakims (Ayurvedic doctors) and other officials.
Trading Classes
Among the merchant classes, some specialized in wholesale trade, and others in the retail trade. The wholesale traders were known as ‘seth’ or ‘bohra’ and the retail traders were known as ‘beoparis’ or ‘banik.’
In south India, the community ‘chettis’ formed the trading class. Besides, there was a special class, ‘banjaras,’ who specialized in the trading.
The banjaras used to move from one place to another place, sometimes with thousands of oxen, laden with food grains, salt, ghee, and other daily use stuff.
The ‘sarrafs’ (shroff) are specialized in changing money, keeping money in deposit or lending it, or transmitting it from one part of the country to the other by means of ‘hundi.’
The ‘hundi’ was a letter of credit payable after a certain period. The use of hundis made it easier to move goods or to transmit money from one part of the country to another.
When needed, the hundis were cashed at a discount rate, which sometimes included insurance so that the cost of goods lost or destroyed in transit could be recovered. Taking the advantage of these facilities, the Indian merchants could easily ship goods to countries of West Asia as well where there were Indian banking houses.
English and Dutch traders who came to India during the seventeenth century found that the Indian financial system was highly developed, and the Indian merchants were very active and alert.
The trading community of medieval time in India was considerably large in number and included some of the richest merchants of the world. For example, Virji Vohra had a large fleet of ships and he dominated Surat trade for several decades; Malaya Chetti dominated the Coromandel Coast; Abdul Ghaffoor Bohra was much popular trader who left 85 lakhs of rupees in cash and goods at the time of his death in 1718.
Merchants and traders lived in lofty houses with colored tiles, wore fine clothes, and had people carrying flags and banners before them when they moved out in public.
The French traveler, Bernier, however, written: “the merchants tried to look poor because they were afraid that they might be squeezed of their wealth.”
Bernier’s observation might be wrong because the emperors right from the time of Sher Shah passed many laws to protect the property of the merchants.
The laws made (for the traders) by Sher Shah were very strict. Secondly, Mughal Emperor Jahangir made a provision that "if anyone, whether nonbeliever or Musalman should die, his property and other belongings should be left for his heirs, and no one should interfere with them.”
In a case where the respective (rich) person had no heir, an inspector should be appointed and also there would be separate guardians to guard the property, so that its value might be expended in a lawful and social expenditure, such as the building of mosques and sarais, repair of broken bridges, and the digging of tanks and wells."