Muslim Slave System in Medieval India c8.21

c8.21

No king could rule by himself; he had to govern through the nobles or Umara. They used to be appointed as Walis, Muqtis or Iqtadars to administer their assignments. W.H. Moreland enumerates the services rendered by some slave nobles like Tughan Khan, Saifuddin Aibak, Tughril Khan and Ulugh Khan Balban.³¹ But they had to be kept under control and there were many levers in the administrative machinery through which the Sultan kept a control over them. The lives of nobles, their titles and grants, were all dependent on the pleasure and mercy of the monarch. The absolute powers of the king regarding appointment and dismissal made the nobles completely dependent on him. The Sultan took extreme care in selecting them, and appointed to this cadre either his relatives or the most trusted persons. As a further safeguard some sort of a spoil system was resorted to. On accession a new monarch removed all nobles of his predecessor and appointed his own loyal slave supporters to important offices. Hence the Muizzi, Qutbi, Shamsi and Balbani slave Amirs (*Ghulams*) or nobles of Muizzudin bin Sam, Qutbuddin Aibak, Shamsuddin Iltutmish and Ghiyasuddin Balban.