The Jagat Seths financed the British at Plassey; six years later the Nawab had the two heads of the bank killed and their bodies thrown from a fort

Hiranand Shah, an Oswal merchant from Nagaur in Rajasthan, settled in Patna in 1652. His son Manik Chand helped finance the Mughal emperor Farrukhsiyar, and the family received the title Jagat Seth, "banker of the world." From Murshidabad they controlled the Bengal mint and its currency until 1760. The historian Robert Orme called them the greatest bankers known in the world. Their wealth was estimated at 140 million rupees in the 1750s. When Nawab Siraj ud-Daula demanded 30 million rupees, Mahtab Chand refused and was struck. Banglapedia writes that Plassey "was enacted by the company largely with the help of the Jagat Sheths." In 1763 Nawab Mir Qasim, at war with the Company, had Mahtab Chand and his cousin Swarup Chand killed, and their bodies were thrown from the ramparts of Munger Fort. Mahtab's son Kushal Chand inherited the title at 18. The Company moved the treasury and mint to Calcutta and took the diwani in 1765. A 2025 account says the Company never repaid what it owed the family^†. The last family member died in 1912 on a British pension. The family house at Mahimapur has been a museum since 1980.