The Cambridge History of India, Vol. III: Turks and Afghans v3.c20.482

v3.c20.482

On August 25, 1351, Fīrūz entered Delhi without opposition and ascended the throne. He conciliated his subjects by remitting all debts due to the state and by abstaining from any endeavour to recover the treasure which had been lavished by Khvāja Jahān in his attempt to establish his nominee. For the first year of his reign he was fully employed in restoring peace and order in the kingdom, which had been harried and distracted by the freaks and exactions of his predecessor. Bengal and the Deccan were lost, and he made no serious attempt to recover either, but in the extensive territory still subject to Delhi he did his best to repair Muhammad's errors. He appointed Khvāja Hisām-ud-dīn Junaid assessor of the revenue, and within a period of six years the assessor completed a tour of inspection of the kingdom and submitted his report. Fīrūz reduced the demand on account of land revenue so as to leave ample provision for the cultivator and further lightened his burdens by abolishing the pernicious custom of levying benevolences from provincial governors, both on first appointment and annually. The result of these wise measures was an enormous expansion of the cultivated area, though the statement that no village lay waste and no culturable land remained untilled is certainly an exaggeration. In fertile tracts thriving villages inhabited by a contented peasantry dotted the country at intervals of two miles or less, and in the neighbourhood of Delhi alone there were 1200 garden villages in which fruit was grown and which paid yearly to the treasury 180,000