The Cambridge History of India, Vol. IV: The Mughul Period v4.c20.312

v4.c20.312

The demoralisation of the army was one of the principal factors in the disintegration of the empire. It cannot be attributed to the puppets who during the first half of the eighteenth century disgraced the throne of Bābur and of Akbar, or even to Aurangzīb. The source of the weakness was the composition of the army, which consisted chiefly of contingents maintained by the great nobles from the revenues of assignments held by them for the purpose. The defects of this system had been clearly perceived both by 'Alā-ud-Dīn Khaljī and by Akbar, as later by Nādir Shāh, but neither had succeeded in permanently abolishing it. They were less apparent in the reign of a monarch who could command the affections and the obedience of the nobles, but the system was radically unsound, as every system must be which depends upon such an uncertain factor as the personal character of a monarch, and as the authority of the sovereign relaxed the general tendency among the great nobles was naturally to hold as their own those assignments which maintained their troops. Thus, the later emperors had no personal body of troops with which to assert authority.