It is possible to characterise agricultural production in the sixteenth-seventeenth centuries as subsistence agriculture:

1. Although the primary purpose of agriculture in Mughal India was to feed people, so basic staples such as rice, wheat or millers were the most frequently cultivated crops.

2. However, the focus on the cultivation of basic staples did not mean that agriculture in medieval India was only for subsistence.

3. We often come across the term Jins-i-Kamil literally, perfect crops in our sources which means that the Mughal state also encouraged peasants to cultivate commercial crops such as cotton and sugarcane.

4. Cotton was grown over a great swathe broad strip territory spread over Central India and the Deccan Plateau whereas Bengal was famous for its sugar.

5. Such cash crops would also include lentils this shows how subsistence and commercial production were closely intertwined in an average peasant’s holding.