Information and Persian Newsletters during Mughal India

Abstract

History suggest that the system of information existed in structured manner during pre-Mughal period, and the role of Afghan ruler Sher Shah was vital to systemize it. With the establishment of the Mughal rule in India, the system developed to secure the flow of information from the Centre to the peripheries and vice-versa, besides between different centers in a more scientific and systematized way. This method of supplying information was probably taken from Abbasids, who had evolved it on the line of Romans and Iranians, and it was initially introduced in India by the Ghaznavids. The rulers' appointed news writers during the period between 16th and 18th centuries used to write newsletters on daily, or bi-weekly basis; and this same system for collection and reporting of news in manuscript form continued to exist and even flourish in North India right until the uprising of 1857. These reports, rich in details about the social and cultural life of the subcontinent, provide significant material for historical research.<br /> Inland trade in India increased in the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries as a result of emergent urbanization. In the fifteenth century the network of local roads radiating out from the provincial capitals increased considerably. Nonetheless, the art of <em>vaqaye nawisi</em> and communication progressed to an extent during Akbar's period, which could be termed as the initial phase of the modern newspaper and postal system. These newsletters which were termed as <em>Waqaye, Sawaneh, Roznamcha, Akhbar</em> etc were suffixed by words like <em>Huzur, Darbar, Darbar e Mo'alla</em> etc. <br /> <strong> </strong><br /> <br />