A Revenue Village is a small administrative region in
India
India, officially the Republic of India, is a country in South Asia. It is the List of countries and dependencies by area, seventh-largest country by area; the List of countries by population (United Nations), most populous country since ...
, a
village
A village is a human settlement or community, larger than a hamlet but smaller than a town with a population typically ranging from a few hundred to a few thousand. Although villages are often located in rural areas, the term urban v ...
with defined borders. One revenue village may contain many
hamlets
A hamlet is a human settlement that is smaller than a town or village. This is often simply an informal description of a smaller settlement or possibly a subdivision or satellite entity to a larger settlement. Sometimes a hamlet is defined f ...
. Each revenue village is headed by a ''Village Administrative Officer'' ''(VAO)''.
History
The advent of the concept revenue village dates back to the system of land reform introduced by Raja
Todar Mal
Raja Todar Mal (1523-24 – 8 November 1589) was an Indian minister, economist, and military commander who served as the Finance minister, Finance Minister (Diwan-i-Ashraff) of the Mughal empire during the reign of Akbar, Akbar I. He was also ...
, minister of revenue in the court of Emperor
Akbar
Akbar (Jalal-ud-din Muhammad Akbar, – ), popularly known as Akbar the Great, was the third Mughal emperor, who reigned from 1556 to 1605. Akbar succeeded his father, Humayun, under a regent, Bairam Khan, who helped the young emperor expa ...
. The essence of the reform was the assessment of the land revenue according to the extent of cultivation, the nature of the soil and the quality of the crops. In the 18th century, the
Marathas
The Maratha Empire, also referred to as the Maratha Confederacy, was an early modern India, early modern polity in the Indian subcontinent. It comprised the realms of the Peshwa and four major independent List of Maratha dynasties and states, Ma ...
were to excel in the preparation of area maps of revenue villages for the aid of native rulers. Though at times the system broke down and was deployed unevenly within the
Mughal Empire
The Mughal Empire was an Early modern period, early modern empire in South Asia. At its peak, the empire stretched from the outer fringes of the Indus River Basin in the west, northern Afghanistan in the northwest, and Kashmir in the north, to ...
, it was the underlying basis of the later day revenue system introduced in
British India
The provinces of India, earlier presidencies of British India and still earlier, presidency towns, were the administrative divisions of British governance in South Asia. Collectively, they have been called British India. In one form or another ...
n administration.
[ B. Arunachalam]
Indian prelude to British cadastral and revenue maps
Coordinates, March 2006.
The revenue village was and is still designed as the lowest administrative unit in the settlement hierarchy. It was designed to improve revenue collection mechanism and regulate the process and not for village planning and development.
References
Government finances in India
Local government in India
{{India-gov-stub