"ملف 19/175 البحرين - تجارة اللؤلؤ" [و‎‎٥] (٨٣/٩)

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lESIOEMOt.
Ho s
The ^gonoy,
Biihrdin. Persian 'Ulf.
31/3/24
from The Political Agent,3^hr. f in.
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0 The Hon'ble the Political Resident.Bushire.
Pearling Castoms
Recently 3h&ik Heraiii deputed iiheik Abdulle bin ^se to convene s
Majlis of the leading Nakhudts & to explain to them the new lic«n3 : ng
^ules. The Wskhudas agreed to accept the situation,but brought up
various points for consideration.The most important of these was the
question of interest. Since the commenceiaent of the reforms & the
cessation of the ielifeh Court from inanition .cases regarding accounts
hsve been sent to the Sh^ra'. : coounts have been so bfcdly kept in the
past, or not kept at all,that Shaik Hamad s court .or the Joint Court,
could not possibly deel with them.The accounts^ of%4n^requted going in
to "btfoY* a decision could be retched.In the llr r- court
a compromise of some sort is usually errived r t. The ihar* 1 does not
however r dmit of interest being cherged.lt has been the custom in the
past for the owner^fcf the boats to take a large advrnce of grain from
a merchant et about 20^ interest,repayable after the end of the next
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season. This gr^in the IJakhudf sells to convert into cash with which
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he pays ^isqam 1 to the divers for the following season.On each advance
he ciitorges 2o £ interest in the diver's account. Similarly when the
season is «bout to commence, the Ka .-chuda takes another advance (& custom
s it that he must take it from the seme merchrnt who sdvrnced him ^or
the Tisqam) also at 20^ repay^ible et the end of the season, "ith this
he pays the divers their '3Plaf T . The Nakhuda buys grain & converts
it into c»sh(o- sometimes pays the divers in kind & they have to sell
it at a loss to get cash) because merchants will not advance c^sh,which
would be 1 ram T according to the Shara' but they ere able to satisfy
their consciences pockets) by selling grain at exhorbitant interest,
which they do not consider to be money-lending.
At the end of the season the advances are recovered from the divers
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