maritime activities economy and social customs of the muslims of ...

Under the English administration the taxes were oppressive. Natural calamities added
fuel to the fire. The rentism and assignees i n c d the price. of the articles by common
agreementlu. William Collins Jackson, the Company's Collector at Ramanathapuram
imposed an embargo on the import of grain through sea with an intention of providing
increased demand to the hoarded grain of the company. The prices of the grain shot high.
The inhabitants were unable to obtain the food articles1%. The import and export of grain
trade suffered. This affected the traders in the field.
The Polygars began to rebel1 from 1793. The insurmctions of the Polygars of 1799-
1801 was defeated becauae of the superior military power of the Company and its vast
resources. In the midst of military operations against the insurgents, the Engllsh East lndia
Company entered Into a political transaction of major significance with the Nawab on 31st
July 1801. The English East lndia Company concluded the treaty of Carnatic which provided
for the transfer of power and authority of th Carnatic to the English. This marked the formal
British mle over Carnatic. The Nawab of Arcot and other auxillay powers ceased to exerciss
any political authority. The treaty vested the perpectual and exclusive civil, militay and
revenue authority wlth the English. The Nawab was made a pensioner. One fifth of the total
revenue was to be pald to himla'. On the transfer of the territories, the English became the
masters of Coromandel. The administration was in the hands of the British East India
Company till 1857, when the Indian territories came under the direct administrative control
of the British crown and lndia became politically and economically a vassal state of British
Empire.
Even by the second quarter of the seventeenth century, the English had established a
well founded network of trading factories centered on the Fort St.George. The clty of
Madras was the chief centre from whkh the British rule expanded. It became the chief
factory of the English on the Coromandel and the headquarters of English East lndia Company.
The Engllsh acquired a site from the Raja of Chandragiri in 1640 and it was developed as a
fo~fied settlement. The town was called Chennapattanaml". The trade of the most of the
Coromandel ports had to depend on Madras. A large part of import and export trade was
channelled through Madras port.'=.