page_title: Economic history of India
section_title: Medieval India
hierarchical_section_title: Economic history of India / Medieval India
caption_attribution_description: English: 1700 AD: An illustrative map of the world in the early colonial period. The Mughal Empire in India is at its greatest territorial extent.
context_page_description: The economic history of India begins with the Indus Valley Civilisation, whose economy appears to have depended significantly on trade and examples of overseas trade. The Vedic period saw countable units of precious metal being used for exchange. The term Nishka appears in this sense in the Rigveda. Historically, India was the largest economy in the world for most of the next three millennia, starting around the 1st millennia BCE and ending around the beginning of British Raj.
  Around 600 BCE, the Mahajanapadas minted punch-marked silver coins. The period was marked by intensive trade activity and urban development. By 300 BCE, the Maurya Empire had united most of the Indian subcontinent. The resulting political unity and military security allowed for a common economic system and enhanced trade and commerce, with increased agricultural productivity.
  The Maurya Empire was followed by classical and early medieval kingdoms, including the Cholas, Guptas, Western Gangas, Harsha, Palas, Rashtrakutas and Hoysalas.
context_section_description: Economy of India under Mughal Empire, Maratha Empire and among others was prosperous into the early 18th century. Parthasarathi estimated that 28,000 tonnes of bullion (mainly from the New World) flowed into the Indian subcontinent between 1600 and 1800, equating to 20% of the world's production in the period.
  An estimate of the annual income of Emperor Akbar the Great's treasury, in 1600, is £17.5 million (in contrast to the tax take of Great Britain two hundred years later, in 1800, totaled £16 million). The South Asia region, in 1600, was estimated to be the second largest in the world, behind China's.
  By the late 17th century, the Mughal Empire was at its peak and had expanded to include almost 90 percent of the Indian subcontinent. It enforced a uniform customs and tax-administration system. In 1700, the exchequer of the Emperor Aurangzeb reported an annual revenue of more than £100 million, or $450 million, more than ten times that of his contemporary Louis XIV of France, while controlling just 7 times the  population.
  By 1700, Mughal India had become the world's largest economy, ahead of Qing China and Western Europe, containing approximately 24.2% of the World's population, and producing about a quarter of world output. Mughal India produced about 25% of global industrial output into the early 18th century. India's GDP growth increased under the Mughal Empire, exceeding growth in the prior 1,500 years. The Mughals were responsible for building an extensive road system, creating a uniform currency, and the unification of the country. The Mughals adopted and standardized the rupee currency introduced by Sur Emperor Sher Shah Suri. The Mughals minted tens of millions of coins, with purity of at least 96%, without debasement until the 1720s. The empire met global demand for Indian agricultural and industrial products.
  Cities and towns boomed under the Mughal Empire, which had a relatively high degree of urbanization (15% of its population lived in urban centres), more urban than Europe at the time and British India in the 19th century. Multiple cities had a population between a quarter-million and half-million people, while some including Agra (in Agra Subah) hosted up to 800,000 people and Dhaka (in Bengal Subah) with over 1 million. 64% of the workforce were in the primary sector (including agriculture), while 36% were in the secondary and tertiary sectors. The workforce had a higher percentage in non-primary sectors than Europe at the time; in 1700, 65–90% of Europe's workforce were in agriculture, and in 1750, 65–75% were in agriculture.
caption: World map, c. 1700 CE.
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