VIZAGAPATAM.
The Circuit Committee says that the Rája of Vizianagram resumed numbers of these when he rented that tract and even seized 'the whole of the free gift, lands to the Bráhmans and others excepting those of village servants.' But hardly any of the inams were properly authorized grants; 'very few bear the seal of the Hyderabad darbar, which we consider absolutely necessary to authenticate such deeds, and most appear to have been granted to mullahs, servants and dependents of the Nawábs, who, however absolute upon the spot from their military command and the distance of their court, being in fact nothing more than renters, could not be legally empowered to make any alienations of the Sirkar lands.'
The Inam Commission visited this district in 1862. It did not touch inams in Jeypore (these are shortly referred to in the account of that estate on p. 272 below) but dealt with those in the three Governnment taluks and in the other estates, more than half of which were included in the Vizianagram zamindari. The procedure followed is set out in detail in the Inam Commissioner's instructions printed in G.O. No. 647, Revenue, dated 24th March 1862, and is too elaborate to be embodied here in detail. By the terms of the permanent settlement, the reversionary right in inam tenures then in existence was reserved to Government, though the kattubadi on them was included in the assets of the estates and is payable to the zamindars, and proprietors. The Inam Commission's rules allowed most of the inamdars to enfranchise their grants from the risk of this reversion by the payment of a certain annual quit-rent which was fixed according to circumstances and did not vary thereafter. Inams granted for services no longer required were enfranchised compulsorily. This latter course was followed with the old grants for military police services (which still existed in large numbers), the enfranchisement being on a quit-rent equal to half the full assessment. The inams in the Vizianagram estate had been examined between 1835 and
1838 when the estate was under Government management, and the kattubadi in their case was usually fixed at the difference between the then quit-rent and the full assessment. Mokhásas, which were held on honorary and almost nominal service tenure, were enfranchised at a fourth of the assessment; village police inams in zamindaris at five-eighths; tank-digging grants at one-fourth, and so on. Certain 99 years' grants for house and garden land in Waltair, granted by the Chiefs about 1790, were enfranchised at one-fourth or one-half of their then value. Village service inams in the Government taluks were not enfranchised till 1891-92, Similar grants in proprietary estates are now being
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