State and Peasant Society in Medieval North India uses a variety of sources-archival records, Indo-Persian court chronic and folk literature -to explore the perception of kingship in the peasant society and its linkages with the changing nature of interaction between the state and the peasant society in medieval north India, especially Mewat. Dwelling on this central theme, the essays in this book delve into a range of issues: the process of state formation in Mewat, the role of state in the socio-economic and religio-cultural transformation of the region’s Meo community, the conflictual engagement between the peasant community and state in the late medieval period and the perception of kingship in folktales popular in the peasant society. The book chiefly argues that a nuanced understanding of how the medieval state impacted the peasants’ lives can be better arrived at by looking into the subjectivities of their perceptions and experiences.
About the Author
Suraj Bhan Bhardwaj is Associate Professor in the Department of History at Motilal Nehru College, University of Delhi. His research interests include agrarian history and the history of community identity formation in medieval India. His recent publications are Revisiting the History of Medieval Rajasthan: Essays for Professor Dilbagh Singh (2017); and Contestations and Accommodations: Mewat, and Meos in Mughal India (2016).
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