There were many spices and textiles in India. So in 1608, EIC merchants reached India and landed in present-day Surat, Gujarat. The Mughals were ruling over the country. The Mughal army consisted of 4 million armed soldiers. Extremely powerful. The officials of the company knew that it’d be futile to fight them. So they decided on trying to establish a friendly relationship so that they could get permission to trade.
They tried to appease the local ruler. The captain of the ship, Captain Willian Hawkins, travelled a long way to Agra. The Mughal Capital. There he met the Mughal emperor Jahangir. He tried to ask him for permission to set up a factory to commence trading in Surat. But Jahangir refused to grant the permission.
The simple reason for this was the presence of Portuguese traders in Surat. The Portuguese traders had good relations with the Mughals. So Jahangir had no reason to enable their competitors, the English, British traders. Since EIC couldn’t get permission to trade in Mughal territory, the EIC traders decided to move to other areas in India. A territory not controlled by the Mughals. That was under another ruler.
