JAZIA. ARAB. A capitation tax authorized by the Muhammadan law on all nonconformists. It was abolished by Akbar in the seventh. year of his reign. In Persia, firmans have been issued that the Zoroastrians should henceforth be allowed certain privileges which they had not enjoyed hitherto, such as allowing them to ride, wearing new or white clothes, and building and repairing their dwellings. The Shah, however, has neither abolished nor reduced the Jazia tax, which is levied from the Zoroastrian residents, the Muham \ madans being exempted from it. Jazia is from an Arabic word meaning subj ation, conquest, coin: pensation,—a capitation tax vied by the Muham madans on their subjects o another faith. It 1 appears from the Ayin-i-Akbai that the khalif Umar laid an annual tax upon every one who was not of the Muhammadan religion\ A person of high condition paid 48 dirhems, one of moderate means 24 dirhems, and one in an inferior station 12 dirhems. It does not exactly appear when this tax was instituted in India. Tod thought it was imposed by Haber in lieu of the Tumgha, which he solemnly renounced on the field of battle, after the victory which gave him the crown of India ; but we read of it long before this, for as early as the time of Ala-ud-Din, only a century after the final subjugation of Hindustan, we find it spoken of as an established tax. The tax was abolished by Akbar in the 9th year of his 'reign, and was not imposed again till the • 22d of Aurangzeb, who, with his wonted intolerance, directed that its levy should be attended with every circumstance of contumely which his in genuity could devise. From this period it appears
to have been regularly levied, and with particular severity in the time of Ferokhsir (in consequence of the appointment of Inayat-Ullah as Financial Minister, who had been Secretary to Aurangzeb), until the time of Rafi-ud-Darjat, when the Barba Syud, or twelve Spuds, abolished it, and the Hindus again recovered their consequence, Ruttun Chund, a Hindu, being appointed Financial Minis ter, and being possessed even of such influence as to be empowered to nominate the Muhamma dan Cazees of the provinces. After the death of Ruttun Chund, the capitation tax was once more levied, as it is stated to have been again repealed by Muhammad Shah, at the intercession of Maha raja Jai Singh and Gerdhur Badahur. Since that period no emperor was possessed of sufficient authority to enforce the Jazia, and this odious tax became extinct for ever ; but not till it had oper ated as one of the most effectual causes of the decline of the Muhammadan power, by alienating the affections of the Hindu population, which the early Moghul emperors had courted, and in some measure obtained.—Tuwareekh-i-Mahoniedshalree ; Elliot, Sum,. Glossary ; Rajasthan, i. p. 403.