The Cambridge History of India, Vol. III: Turks and Afghans v3.c27.13

v3.c27.13

After the suppression of this revolt he devoted himself to the adornment of his capital with suitable buildings and to the establishment of a system of provincial government in his kingdom, which he divided into four provinces, each of which was known as a *taraf*. The first, Gulbarga, extended on the west to the Ghāts, and later to the sea, on the north to the eighteenth parallel of latitude, on the south to the Tungabhadra, and on the east to the Banāthorā and a line drawn from its confluence with the Bhīma to the confluence of the Krishna and the Tungabhadra. To the north of Gulbarga lay the province of Daulatābād, bounded on the north and north-east by the petty state of Baglāna, Khāndesh, and the southern Pūrna river; and north-east of this lay Berar, which, east of Burhānpur, was bounded on the north by the Tāpti and on the east by the Wardha and Pranhitā rivers, and extended on the south to the southern Pūrna and Godāvarī rivers, and on the west approximately to its present limits. The fourth province was Bīdar, or Muhammadan Telingāna, which included the towns and districts of Bīdar, Kandhār, Indūr, Kaulās, Kotāgīr, Medak, and as much of Telingāna as was comprised in the Bahmanī kingdom, extending eastward, at the end of Bahman’s reign, as far as Bhongīr; but the eastern border of this province, like the southern border of Gulbarga, where the Hindus of Vijayanagar often occupied the Rāichūr Doāb, varied with the power of the Muslim kings to resist the encroachments or overcome the defence of the Hindus of Telingāna. The governors first appointed to these provinces were Saif-ud-dīn Ghūrī to Gulbarga; the king’s nephew Muhammad, entitled Bahrām Khān, to Daulatābād; Safdar Khān Sīstānī, to Berar; and Saif-ud-dīn’s son, who bore the title of A‘zam-i-Humāyūn, to Bīdar. Muhammad, the king’s eldest son, received his father’s former title of Zafar Khān, and the districts of Hūkeri, Belgaum, and Mīraj, which Bahman had formerly held of Muhammad Tughluq.