318 DR. BABASAHEB AMBEDKAR : WRITINGS AND SPEECHES
(iii) The District officers of the Peshwa Government, the Desais and Deshpandes render no kind of service to the British Government. Their Inam lands, which were granted to them by the Peshwa Government as remuneration for services, have been continued to them by the British Government subject to a small deduction in the form of a Judi. This was not merely a pension to those with whom the settlement was made by the British Government for lifetime. It has also become a hereditary pension to their descendants who could lay no kind of claim to such a grant. Here again the amount of annual loss is Rs. 8,14,545-8-4.
(iv) The Village Servants who had become useless both to the village community as well as to Government were freed from the obligation to serve. But their emoluments were not wholly resumed. They retained their Inam lands and in some cases paid full assessment and in others only half of the assessment.
These instances will show that the Government of Bombay has always treated Watan and Inam property as falling in a special class. It has never regarded it as a mere matter of remuneration for service and even in cases where it bore the character of remuneration it never applied the principle of “ no work no pay.”
The policy now adopted in the case of levying Judi on the Mahar Watan lands is a complete departure for which there is no precedent.
To prove the utter inequity and injustice of treating Watan property of Mahars as mere remuneration I beg to draw attention to the Kulkarni Watan. The Kulkarni Watan fell in the class of Watans belonging to village Servants useful to Government which class included three Watans that of (1) the Patil, (2) the Kulkarni and (3) the Mahar. The Kulkarni Watan as a hereditary Watan continued up to 1914. In 1914 by Government Resolution No. 5070, dated 30th May 1914, the Kulkarni Watan was commuted and the Kulkarni was relieved of the obligation to