'GAZETTEER OF PERSIA. VOL. III. PART I: A to K' [‎276r] (556/1278)

DAS—DAS
269
(2/7v
Trade. —Borazjun is the commercial cetre of Dashtistan and the article
on it may be consulted for an account of the trade of the district. The
standard of weight is not uniform throughout the district, but varies from
16 to 20 Tabriz mans of Bushire, being 18 at the important centres of
Borazjun and Chah Kuah.
Communications and transport. —The district contains no natural obstacles.
Within it lie the first 3 stages on the ordinary route from Bushire to
Shiraz. The transport resources of the district are estimated at 200 horses,
some camels, 350 mules, and 2,500 donkeys. Some quantity of wheat and
barley is purchasable locally, but not, as a rule, until the prospects of the
coming harvest are assured ; until this occurs the stocks in hand are
hoarded.
Administration .—In the middle of the eighteenth century much of Dash
tistan was under the power of Shaikh Nas, who ruled in Bushire, and the
history of the province seems to have followed more or less the fortunes
of that town, vide this 6 raze£teer—Bushire Town. In 1888 Dashtistan was
placed by the Amin-us-Sultan, under Prince Nasir, but, later, was given to
the Governor of Shiraz, and administered by a sarti'p acting as his deputy.
At the present time (1905) the political organization of DashiLtan is a patch-
work of marvellous complexity. The bulk of the district is under the
Governor of Ears, but some of the southern villages, including the group for
which the Shaikh of Chah Kutah is responsible, are subordinate to the
Governor of the Gulf Ports. The system of farming the revenues is re
sponsible for further confusion, especially as a certain degree of executive
power is always conferred on the ‘ farmer ’ along with the right to collect
the taxes, and the more so in the present case that the farmer of the greater
part of Dashtistan is the Governor of the Gulf Ports, who has leased it from
the Governor of Ears. Nor is the administration of the Governor commonly
direct, whether he be actual or titular. Half or more of the villages to the
north of Borazjun are held in farm, or, as it is frequently said, as a tiyul
or fief, by the 8 alar-i-Mu’azzam. Borazjun and its dependent villages,
forming the greater, part of the district, are ruled by the Papari Khan of
Borazjun, who also collects the revenues, a privilege for which he pays
5,000 tumdns annually ; he is properly answerable to the Governor of Ears,
to whose jurisdiction Borazjun has always nominally belonged, but, in
consequence of the farm in favour of the Governor of the Gulf Ports, to
which we have alluded, the relations of the Shaikh are at present, it would
seem, exclusively with the Bushire Government. The Shaikh of Chah
Kutah, who, in executive charge of that place and of several adjoining
villages, is subject, both in theory and in practice, to the Governor of the
Gulf Ports. With the exception of a deputy Governor and a telegraph
official at Borazjun, who looks after the Persian Govermnent’s telegraph
to Bandar Rig and beyond, Dashtistan contains no salaried employes of
the Persian Government.
The lot cf the subjects of the Khan of Borazjun is not a happy one ;
they are rack-rented and are obliged to yield their master military service
whenever he may require it, supplying their own arms and ammunition.
The subjects of the Salar-i-Mu’azzam and of the Shaikh of Chah Kutah are
probably little better off, and, of late years, there has been a good deal of
emigration from the district. The nominal land-revenue averages 50 to 60
i