Social and Political Life in the Vijayanagara Empire (A.D. 1346 – A.D. 1646) v1.c10.s8.12

v1.c10.s8.12

Mr. Moreland gives the following about Ghiyās-ud-dīn Tuglaq: "A third element in the policy of Ghiyāsuddin was his insistence on the dignity of provincial Governors, and a correspondingly high standard of conduct on their part. It is clear that, at his accession, speculative farming of the revenue was common; and the Ministry was crowded with touts and pests of various kinds, whose functions have to be guessed from the designation applied to them: 'spies', 'farmers', 'enchancement-mongers,' and 'wreckers'. The King put a stop to the activities of these pests, and chose his Governors from the nobility; he ordered that they were to receive all due consideraion from the audit-staff of the Ministry; but he made it clear that their position and dignity would depend on their own conduct".¹ While the prevalence of the farming system in pre-Muhammadan times is implied in the statement that "speculative farming of the revenue was common" at the accession of Ghiyās-ud-dīn, the fact of the existence of the contractors is proved by the following in the *Ta'rīkh-i-Fīrūz Shāhī* written by Ziā-ul-Dīn Barani. "He (Ghiyās-ud-dīn Tuglaq) fixed the land tax on principles of moderation, on the actual produce, and he took away innovations and levying of tax based on estimated crop. And he did not listen to the words of the speculators and the offers of those who out-bade others, and the applications of the contractors (*muqālia-garam*) about the Iqtas (revenue assignments) and the domains of the kingdom".² In connection with the rebellion of Nizām Mayin of Karra, Barani tells us the following: "For sheer vanity and recklessness he (Nizām Mayin) took the contract (*muqātia-girift*) for a couple of lacs, and became disconcerted when he found that he could get nothing out of it, and he could not get one-tenth of what he had undertaken to pay," and, therefore, he rebelled against Muhammad Tuglaq.³ Barani further informs us about the contractors, while writing about Firūz Shāh: "He (the King) would not permit any contractors and the spoilers and prospectors to go about his Iqtas and domains".¹ The fact that the early Sultans put an end to these contractors proves that the latter could never have belonged to "a new system" introduced by the Muhammadan rulers.