The Administration of the Sultanate of Dehli c14: Chapter X

The Administration of the Sultanate of Dehlī c14

Language: English

c14.1 — 4 parts

Chapter X

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MUSLIM jurists classify governorships into two broad divisions: *imārat-i-‘āmma* or *tafwīḍ* and *imārat-i-khāṣṣah*. The former carries limited and the latter unlimited authority. If unlimited governorship has been acquired by force as the result of successful rebellion, it is called *imārat-i-istīlā*. The *amīr*, as the jurists call the governor, exercised, if his powers were unlimited, all the authority of a semi-independent monarch within his dominions. He organized and posted the army; he appointed the judicial officers, raised the taxes, managed the finances and enforced the *shar‘*; he was the protector and defender of the Faith. The governor with limited powers was entrusted only with the supervision of the troops, the punishment of criminals and rebels, and home defence. He was not allowed to intervene in the administration of justice or the levy of taxes. Nor was he given the right to lead prayers or act as the spiritual head of the people. The *qāḍīs* and the revenue officials were appointed by the sovereign.¹ The sultanate of Dehlī possessed governors of all three types in the course of its history. Lakhnautī, because of its inaccessibility and distance, was for a long time in the hands of an almost independent governor, and then became the capital of independent Bengal.

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Balban after suppressing Tughril’s rebellion could have brought the province under direct control, but he appointed his son Bughrā Khān the new governor with the authority of a semi-independent monarch.¹ 'Alā-u'd-dīn Khaljī, in spite of his strength, contented himself with obtaining a recognition of suzerainty and a considerable tribute from Laddar Deva of Warangal. This was the result of policy; when the sultan sent Malik Kāfūr to the Deccan, he instructed him not to push matters to extremes.² It is true that there is considerable legal difference between a Muslim governor with unlimited powers and a non-Muslim tributary, yet their political status is identical. When Nāṣir-u'd-dīn Maḥmūd of the Qarāwinah dynasty gave Khwājah Jahān the supreme power over the Sharqī provinces, the sultan only acquiesced in what he could not prevent; this was an illustration of an involuntary appointment.³ When 'Alā-u'd-dīn Khaljī was satisfied with formal recognition of his suzerainty by Kaikā'ūs of Bengal, in appointing whom he had had no voice, he was only accepting the legal fiction of governorship by usurpation.⁴ The relations between the central government and the provinces did not depend so much on legal definitions as on political reality; nevertheless legal and political thinkers had provided patterns of behaviour which could be applied to particular needs.

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The grant of extraordinary power was the recognition of an exceptional situation involving peculiar difficulties or it was an attempt to save the legal vestige of authority. Such grants were naturally more frequently made by weak or preoccupied sultans, and they often paved the way to the establishment of independent provincial dynasties. Numerous governorships of this nature arose in the troubled days of the later Tughluqids, and facilitated the growth of minor kingdoms on the ruins of the empire. It would, however, be wrong to think that the bestowal of unlimited power always implied weakness on the part of the central government; sometimes it was a useful device to keep a distant possession under control by entrusting it to a good and reliable administrator. When there was anarchy at the centre, it mattered little whether a governor possessed limited or unlimited powers if he had the will and the resources to rebel; it needed great vigilance and effort to combat the centrifugal tendencies. The internal administration of a province was everywhere the same in structure, except, of course, in Hindu tributary states which mostly maintained their traditional institutions. The difference between the provincial governments did not lie in their organization but in the sources of control and supervision. There can be little doubt that there was a natural desire on the part of the sultans to increase their power even in the outlying provinces;

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in spite of the setbacks received owing to the weakness of the successors of Īltutmish and to dynastic revolutions, centralization steadily increased until it reached its climax in the earlier part of Muḥammad bin Tughluq's reign.¹ This monarch, however, was a stranger to the saving grace of moderation; his eccentric severity demolished the edifice his own ability and the foresight of his predecessors had built.² Fīrūz could stem the ebbing tide only for a while; power was swept away through the incapacity of his successors and because of Tīmūr's invasion, and the Lodīs had to start afresh. The inexperienced and impatient Ibrāhīm lost his throne in the endeavour to gain respect for his ideal of a centralized monarchy; even the capable Sher Shāh and the impetuous Islām did not reach the level attained by Muḥammad bin Tughluq, though they inspired widespread and wholesome respect for the central government. The tribal principle introduced by the Lodīs of reliance upon hereditary chiefs and heads of clans for the maintenance of peace in provincial areas survived even under the Sūrs whose civil administration was mostly centralized.³ Sher Shāh and Islām Shāh curbed Afghān tribalism by maintaining large standing armies and supervising the relations between the soldiers and their commanders.¹

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¹ J. Z., pp. 109-111; *Sulūk-u’l-mulūk*, f. 18b; V. K., pp. 227, 274, 285; *Aḥkām-u’s-sulṭāniyah*, pp. 28-32.

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¹ Baranī, p. 96. Balban's advice to Bughrā Khān implies this. It is true that Barani says that Balban himself appointed Bughrā Khān's first officials but this was obviously an act of paternal solicitude, (p. 92).

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² Baranī, pp. 327, 330.

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³ Tārīkh-i-Mubārakshāhī, p. 156.

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⁴ C. H. I., iii, p. 261.

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¹ Baranī, pp. 468-470.

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² Idem, p. 471.

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³ E.g., the Niyāzīs in the Panjāb, C. H. I., iv, pp. 59, 60.

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¹ Vide Chapter VII.

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The chronicles employ various terms for a governor. A broad survey leaves the impression that a wālī is higher than a muqṭiʿ in status: for whereas the latter appellation is used for any governor, the former is seldom applied to a minor provincial chief.² In all probability the term wālī was reserved for governors with extraordinary powers. The number of such governors was small; the major part of the sultanate was administered by governors with limited authority. Their legal powers have already been defined; in the sultanate practice agreed with theory. The jurists had allowed them to help the revenue authorities in collecting the taxes though they were not to interfere with the working of the revenue machinery.³ In view of the special circumstances in India, greater authority was exercised by the governors in levying revenue. The Ghaznavids soon realized that their Indian dominions required a military governor to make an impression on the recalcitrant Hindu chiefs; the ordinary administration of revenue was left in the hands of the old civil head, and Aḥmad Niyāltigīn was given the military governor.

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² It is significant that Ḥasan Niẓāmī generally uses ayālat or wilāyat dārī for governorship; in the earlier days probably the governors had to be given greater powers, Tāj, e.g., ff. 48b, 124b. Baranī uses wālī for the governors of Lakhnautī, e.g., for Tughril, p. 82; for any governor, p. 82 for governors, p. 95, etc.

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³ Moreland thinks that "the terms were at least, practically, synonymous. The possibility is not excluded that there were minor differences in position, for instance, in regard to the accounts procedure of the Revenue Ministry..." (Agrarian System of Moslem India, p. 222). The difficulty arises from lack of precise information. One reason seems to be that the word muqṭiʿ was being replaced by amīr even in the days of Muḥammad bin Tughluq. The Lodīs introduced shiqqdār-i-shiqqdārān.

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³ This was a corollary to the right to punish rebels; for withholding revenue or tribute was an act of rebellion.

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ship.¹ Ḥasan Niẓāmī in speaking of the appointment of a governor says that ‘a famous and exalted servant was chosen so that he might look after the soldiers, servants, warriors and clerks and save them from the treachery of the unbelievers, and the designs of the polytheists ;...he should take pains to fulfil the expectations of the people ; he should exercise the greatest circumspection in military and revenue matters ; and he should maintain the traditions of benevolence and charity so as to leave a name for eternity ’.²

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¹ Baihaqi, pp. 325-327. The term used is sālār.

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² Tāj, f. 191b. The translation of this passage is free and leaves out much of the writer's rhetoric, but the sense has been scrupulously preserved.

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The Tāj-u'l-ma'āthir has preserved the instructions given to another wālī by Quṭb-u'd-dīn Aibak which can be summarized as follows :—

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(i) to protect and enforce the laws, customs and regulations ;

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(ii) to look after the ‘ulamā, the warriors and civil officials ;

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(iii) to reconcile the people by reducing their dues and introducing measures of prosperity ;

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(iv) to increase the produce by extending cultivation ;

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(v) to maintain justice and protect the weak from the rapacity and tyranny of the strong ;

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(vi) to see that the decisions of the courts were enforced;

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(vii) to desist from capital punishment ;

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(viii) to guard the highways, encourage trade and protect traders.³

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³ Idem, ff. 144b-148b.

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These two passages very well show what was expected of a provincial governor when the Sultanate was young ; even in those days he was the head only of the military and revenue departments. He was not given authority over religious and judicial affairs, nor is there mention of any control over the news-agency. These departments were kept under the supervision of the centre.⁴ In broad outline the governor's sphere of authority remained the same in later times with an increase of central control owing to better communications and greater tranquillity. For instance, when Fatḥ Khān was appointed the governor of Sind by Fīrūz Shāh, his instructions were:

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⁴ Compare Tāj, ff. 192b-193a.

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(i) to act as the chief executive officer;
(ii) to protect the people and guard their interests;
(iii) to help the learned and the holy;
(iv) to maintain the army in a happy and contented condition;
(v) to supervise the work of the dīwān-i-wizārat;
(vi) to protect the peasants from undue exactions and tyranny;
(vii) to supervise the work of public officers.¹

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¹ Inshā-i-Mahrū, Letter I.

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Fīrūz Shāh also instructed his governors and officers to encourage trade and to foster prosperity.²

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² Idem, Letter CXXI.

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The military power of the governors was limited by the presence of provincial ‘āriḍs, who were responsible for the recruitment and supervision of the army. They were under the ‘āriḍ-i-mumālik and had to submit regular reports to headquarters.³ ‘Alā-u’d-dīn further tightened the reins by discouraging assignments and introducing dāgh and ḥuliyah. The system of paying soldiers in cash increased the hold of the state on the army.⁴ The Muslim rulers had inherited a large number of recalcitrant chiefs whose authority was embedded in hereditary tradition.⁵ Their power was not easy to break; the Muslims at first lacked the men to deal with them. Only gradually could the sultans reduce these chiefs to peaceful submission and reconcile them to the sultanate. In the earlier days the realization of tribute and revenue was a veiled or an open military affair; hence the revenue authorities had to work in close co-operation with the military governor.¹ Gradually as the native chiefs were reconciled or reduced, the civil officers gained in power and authority. Baranī's description shows that by the time of 'Alā-u'd-dīn, the civil authorities possessed sufficient strength to enforce the sultan's drastic reforms.² The revenue officials, though under the immediate control of the governor, were supervised by the ministry of finance at the centre which received and examined regular and detailed statements regarding income and expenditure in every province.³ If a governor failed to satisfy the wazīr's officers he was harshly treated and handed over to torture till he restored the misappropriated amount.⁴ Muḥammad bin Tughluq, with characteristic thoroughness, established a dīwān-i-mustakhrij for this purpose.⁵ Even the mild Fīrūz Shāh's wazīr showed the utmost strictness in keeping the governors on the path of rectitude in financial affairs.⁶ The governors were "officers posted to their charges by the king, and transferred, removed or punished at his pleasure, administering their charges under his orders, and subjected to the strict financial control of the Revenue Ministry."⁷ Moreland rightly argues that such officers could in no sense be feudal; they were bureaucrats pure and simple.

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³ & 4 Vide Chapter VII.

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⁵ Agrarian System of the Hindus, pp. 53, 54; Moreland, pp. 25, 26.

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¹ Moreland, pp. 25, 26.

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² Baranī, pp. 288, 289.

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³ Vide Chapter VI.

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⁴ Baranī, e.g., pp. 431, 556.

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⁵ I. B., ii, p. 54.

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⁶ 'Afif, p. 397; D. A., p. 33 mentions mustakhrij and defines it.

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⁷ Moreland, p. 221.

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The staff for supervising the collection of revenue and auditing the accounts with its local nāẓirs and waqūfs, in so far as the central government is concerned, has already been discussed.⁸ In every province there was a ṣāḥib-i-dīwān, conveniently called khwājah who was appointed by the sultan on the recommendation of the wazīr.⁹ He was generally an expert accountant; his duty was to keep the account books and submit detailed statements to headquarters.¹ It was on the basis of these sheets that the wazīr's department settled the account with the muqṭiʿ. Officially the Khwājah was subordinate to the governor, but in actual practice, owing to his direct appointment by the monarch and his contact with the wazīr, he was a power to reckon with, and his presence provided a check on the governor's authority. When Masʿūd of Ghaznah appointed Aḥmad Niyāltigin to the governorship of Lāhor, the royal wazīr, Aḥmad Ḥasan, impressed upon the new governor that Qāḍi-i-Shīrāz, the ṣāḥib-i-dīwān, was his subordinate; yet it was on the reports of this subordinate that measures were taken to depose the governor.² Ibn Baṭṭūṭah mentions a wāli-u'l-kharāj together with an amīr in a province; there can be little doubt that the former is the khwājah and the latter the governor.³ The fact that the traveller uses the word wāli for the revenue officer shows that he possessed high authority. Sometimes the governor had a deputy who was appointed by the sulṭān.⁴

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⁸ Vide Chapter VI.

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⁹ Baranī, p. 38; Da'udi, ff. 19a-20.

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¹ The term ṣāḥib-i-dīwān implies book-keeping; ṣāḥib=master; dīwān=book, or even, an office. In large provinces he was sometimes styled wazīr, (Baranī, p. 502).

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² Baihaqī, pp 496-498.

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³ I. B., ii, p. 90.

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⁴ Baranī, p. 38; V. K., p. 215; ʿUtbī, p. 255.

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Were the provinces sub-divided into shiqqs? Moreland writes: "My impression is that during the fourteenth century the word shiqq was coming into use as a synonym for the terms which I have rendered 'province'."⁵ It seems, however, more probable that with the suppression of the authority of the Hindu chieftains and the growth of direct administration, the original provinces proved too extensive, and some of them at least were split into smaller administrative areas. For instance, Muḥammad bin Tughluq divided the viceroyalty of the Deccan into four shiqqs.⁶ Again, in speaking of the same sultan's suppression of the rebellion in the province of the Doāb, Baranī says that 'the shiqqdārs and the faujdārs' were ordered to plunder and seize the rebels.⁷

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⁵ Moreland, p. 25.

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⁶ Baranī, p. 501; Firishtah, i, p. 250.

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⁷ Baranī, p. 479.

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It is obvious that there were several *shiqqdārs* in the province, and, if they were administrative officials at all, there must have been several *shiqqs*. The Doāb, like the province of Dehlī, was directly under the ministry; hence the *shiqqdārs* were probably the highest executive officers who could be ordered to deal with the insurrection. Baranī, in the history of the same reign, has used the word *shiqq* for an administrative unit. Besides, the larger *wilāyats* had been divided into smaller units called *ṭarfs* since the days of Quṭb-u’d-dīn Aibak.¹ The old and new divisions of provinces emerge as *shiqqs* during the fourteenth century. The *shiqq* seems to have disappeared during the anarchy following that sultan’s death. The word *shiqq* appears on a few coins struck at Bakkar under Sher Shāh and his son; it is rather curious that the term should precede the name of a mint town. If it is not an engraver’s mistake, probably the *shiqq* survived the anarchy in distant Sind.² When Buhlūl Lodī conquered the *parganahs* of Kampil, Patiālī, Shamsābād, Sakīt, Koil, Marahrā and Jalālī from Sulṭān Ḥusain Sharqī, he appointed a *shiqqdār* to each of these.³ Did the *shiqq* come to be identified with the *parganah*, or, as is more likely, did the *shiqqdār* sink to the level of the *parganah* officer? It seems that the institution of the *shiqq* was never universal and only the unwieldy provinces were divided into these units. In the course of time, the smaller provinces and the *shiqqs* of larger *wilāyats* and provinces emerged as *sarkārs*; the *shiqqdār* being the administrator of a part of a province came to be the head of a *parganah* under the new order. The *wālī* and the *muqṭi‘* disappeared naturally, for the rulers of the new kingdoms which rose on the ruins of the sultanate of Dehlī had, in fact, themselves been governors of provinces. Jaunpūr, Mālwah, Deccan and Gujrāt had all started as provinces. Khiḍr Khān, the first Sayyid ruler of Dehlī, did not assume the royal title and was legally a governor¹ Important provinces reappeared as the result of a new growth of power at the centre. When Buhlūl Lodī conquered the Sharqī Kingdom, he put his son Bārbek on the throne of Jaunpūr as his viceroy.² The Panjāb was in the hands of strong governors under the Lodīs as well as the Sūrs.³ Mālwah, so long as it owned Sūr supremacy, remained a province.⁴ Thus the larger governorships again appeared, and, finally, under Akbar's reorganization, emerged as ṣūbahs.⁵

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¹ *Idem*, p. 587; also Tāj, ff. 192b, 254; *Inshā-i-Mahrū* (Letter II) uses the term *ṭarf*. I.B., ii, p. 90 uses the term *hazār* under an *amīr* assisted by a *wālī-u’l-kharāj*. This unit does not seem to correspond to *shiqq* and seems to be a small province under a governor assisted by a *ṣāḥib-i-dīwān*.

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² N. Wright, p. 273.

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³ *Ṭabaqāt-i-Akbarī*, i. p. 310.

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¹ Tārīkh-i-Mubārakshāhī, p. 181, where he is styled only as rāyāt-i-a‘lā.

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² C. H. I., iii, p. 234. Bārbek was given the right to coin money and use the royal title.

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³ Idem, iii, pp. 240, 241; iv, p. 59.

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⁴ Idem, iii, p. 370.

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⁵ Ā’īn-i-Akbarī, Book iii, I.

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The next smaller unit after the shiqq or the sarkār was the parganah which has rightly been identified by Moreland with the qaṣbah in its older meaning of an aggregate of villages.⁶ The next division was the ultimate unit, the village.⁷ Ibn Baṭṭūṭah mentions a ṣadī, which he defines in these words, "These people give the name of ṣadī to the collection of a hundred villages." He names the ṣadī of Hindpat, which can easily be recognized as the parganah of Indrapat in the suburbs of Dehlī.⁸ The grouping of villages into hundreds even in the directly administered province of Dehlī involves too theoretical an outlook on administration to fit in the practical nature of the Sultanate administration. Nor is the ṣadī mentioned by any other contemporary authority. Ibn Baṭṭūṭah, however, finds strange confirmation in the *Shukranīti* which mentions units of a hundred villages and defines a village as an area covering just a little over two square miles.¹ The decimal aggregation of villages is also mentioned in the *Viṣṇu-smṛti* as well as in *Manū*, in both of which the unit of a hundred villages is explicitly included.² Even the practical-minded Kautilya has groups of ten, two hundred and eight hundred villages.³ The Rājpūt dynasties, in this area as well as in Rājpūtānah, had their *chaurāsīs*, or groups of eighty-four villages.⁴ These names are obviously too precise and covered, in all probability, an area only approximately corresponding to the description; and, of course, with the growth of the population this area would be sub-divided into smaller divisions bearing the same name. Probably what was officially termed a *chaurāsī* under the Rājpūts was, in popular parlance, known by the old name for a group of a hundred villages. In Ibn Baṭṭūṭah’s time, the appellation seems to have stuck to the *parganah*. The term *ṣadī* does not seem to have been officially adopted which would explain its absence from contemporary chronicles.

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⁶ Moreland, pp. 18, 19. The Sarban inscription (Epigraphia Indica, January, 1889, vol. i, pp. 93-95) use the word pratigana for parganah. The inscription is in Sanskrit.

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⁷ D. A., p. 36, gives interesting definitions of certain terms: qariyah was used for a village, qaṣbah was an unfortified town smaller than a city or shahr; khiṭṭah was a fortified qaṣbah; nāḥiyat was used for the suburbs of a city; a village or a town used as a halting station was called a marḥalah.

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⁸ I. B., ii, p. 78.

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¹ *Shukranīti*, p 25 A village (*grāma*)=25,000,000 sq. cubits=6,250,000 sq. yds =2·017 sq. miles.

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² *Viṣṇu*, iii, pp 7-15 ; *Manū*, vii, pp. 115-119.

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³ *Arthashāstra*, p. 49.

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⁴ *Agrarian System in Ancient India*, pp. 55, 56.

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The entire system lived on the efforts of the *mazārī* or peasant. Writers like Jayaswal and Ghoshal hold that in pre-Muslim India the cultivator was the owner; F. W. Thomas thinks that ‘the ultimate property in the land appertained, in the sense which has since prevailed, to the king; that is to say, the king was entitled to revenue therefrom, and in default could replace the cultivator in his holding.’⁵ Whatever may have been the peasant's position in Hindu states, he was certainly recognized to be the owner under Muslim law.¹ Land paying kharāj or 'ushr is the property of the tax-payer and he is allowed to sell it. The right of sale and purchase was recognized in the Sultanate; for there are references in Fiqh-i-Fīrūzshāhī and other law books of the period to the transfer of land by sale from one tax-payer to another.² It has been suggested that the relations between the state and the peasantry were governed by the conception that the cultivator had only duties and no rights. Such an idea is foreign to Muslim law. It seems to have arisen from the fact that if a peasant does not cultivate his holding without any excuse, the state may demand the kharāj from him. This has been taken to mean that a peasant is forced to cultivate his land. The shar' gives no such authority to the state: it has been permitted only to demand the kharāj if the peasant leaves his land untilled without any excuse.³ When the owner of the land had sufficiently valid reasons for not cultivating his holding, the state very often had it cultivated through its agents and paid any surplus to the owner after deducting the cost of cultivation and the kharāj. There could be no greater proof of the fact that the peasant was recognized to be the owner of his land.⁴ Even if it be conceded that the state could force the peasant to cultivate the land, the peasant did not lose his proprietary rights; he was only saddled with the public obligation of keeping up the produce.⁵ Some authors are led away by certain incidents involving confiscation of land by the state; such confiscations, however, fall into an entirely different legal category. Confiscation of property was a well-known punishment for high treason and rebellion; so if a man rebelled, his land, like his other property, was confiscated. A peasant was seldom, if ever, accused of rebellion; the whole agrarian policy of the Sultanate was directed towards increasing the cultivation; peasants were a precious possession who could, if oppressed, find new homes in neighbouring territories or tributary states where they would be welcome. There was a genuine competition for peasants who would bring more land under cultivation; since, as a Muslim writer puts it, "treasure comes from the abundance of peasants and the cultivation of the soil."¹ The peasants were, therefore, treated with consideration, and the sultans were anxious to protect them from the oppression of petty officials and Hindu middlemen.² It was also a well established tradition to advance money called *sondhār*, in times of drought or scarcity. So large were the amounts advanced by Muḥammad bin Tughluq that they could not be recovered; Fīrūz, on the advice of his ministers, wrote off these loans.³

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⁵ For this controversy vide *Early History of India*, pp. 137, 138 ; *Mauryan Public Finance*, pp. 52, 53, 57-63 ; *Evolution of Indian Polity*, pp. 172-176 ; *Agrarian System in Ancient India*, pp. 81-103, etc. Also, C. H. I., i, p. 475.

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¹ Inshā-i-Mahrū. Letter XXVIII enunciates this principle most clearly. ² Fiqh-i-Fīrūzshāhī, ff. 410b, 411b, 414b; D. A., p. 64. ³ Inshā-i-Mahrū, Letter XXVIII, D. A., p. 64. ⁴ D. A., p. 66. ⁵ For a fuller discussion vide the author's article on 'The ownership of Agricultural land during Muslim Rule in India'—Journal of Indian History, December, 1942

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¹ *Siyāsat-nāmah*, p. 18; Barani, e.g., p. 432; *Tāj*, ff. 84b, 256a, etc.; *Inshā-i-Māhrū*, Letters I, IV, XXX; *Diwalrānī Khiḍr Khān*, p. 31.

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² *Siyāsat-nāmah*, p. 18; *‘Afif*, p. 92; I. B., ii, p. 55.

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³ *‘Afif*, pp. 92-94; *Sirat-i-Fīrūzshāhī*, p. 124.

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The most marked traces of Hindu influence are found in the administration of the villages and the *parganahs*, where Hindu officials, sometimes with their ancient designations, continued to function with little change in their duties. When Muḥammad bin Qāsim conquered Sind, "the citizens and villagers were allowed to furnish the tax-collectors themselves; the Brahmans were protected and entrusted with high offices, for which their education made them indispensable; and the conqueror's instructions were wise and conciliatory."⁴ The administration of the smaller areas and revenue was left entirely in the hands of the Hindus.⁵ This example must have been followed by Sulṭān Maḥmud of Ghaznah when he annexed the Panjāb; for he could not dispense with the technical knowledge possessed by the Hindu officials. Quṭb-u'd-dīn Aibak continued this tradition, which was maintained by all the sultans of Dehlī. The government dealt with the peasant through the headman of the village who was called a muqaddam or a mukhiyā. The former term was loosely applied to men of note as well as to village headmen; the latter is a Hindu title and does not find mention in the Persian chronicles, but it is used even to-day in the United Provinces and dates back to the pre-Muslim times.¹ The village accountant or patwārī kept the revenue records.² He dates back to time immemorial and is mentioned in the Arthaśāstra where he is styled gopa.³ The term khuṭ has caused considerable difficulty; it is used by Baranī who does not explain its meaning.⁴ The chronicler, however, uses it antithetically to balāhar; the latter has been identified as a low-caste menial by Blochmann, who argues that the khuṭ and the balāhar stand for the two extremes in rural society, but his rendering of 'khuṭ wa balāhar' as 'landowners and tenants' involves, in Moreland's words, "both a logical non-sequitur and an historical anachronism." Moreland correctly concludes that a khuṭ was a Hindu chief subject to the sultan.⁵ One question still remains: how did he differ from the rā'is and the rānahs? The context seems to imply that the latter were tributaries who ruled over autonomous territories and paid a fixed tribute to the sultan, whereas the former were merely agents who helped the government in assessment and realization of revenue from administered territories. Later the word zamīndār came into use; but it is used indiscriminately for all kinds of chiefs.⁶ The muqaddams and khuṭs enjoyed great concessions from the beginning of Muslim rule and lived a life of ease and comfort.¹ As they used their wealth to pile up resources for rebellion, ‘Alā-u’d-dīn Khaljī, who had to defend the state against great odds, took away all their privileges.² This naturally caused them considerable hardship, though Baranī’s glowing description should be treated with caution.³ After the death of the sultan, the extraordinary measures were withdrawn, and these Hindu officials and agents regained their lost position. Sulṭān Ghiyāth-u’d-dīn Tughluq directed his officers not to demand charā’ī or kharāj from the khūts and muqaddams in view of their great responsibility.⁴ By the reign of Muḥammad bin Tughluq the Hindu gentry had again attained a status which excited jealousy.⁵

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⁴ Medieval India (Lane-Poole), pp. 10, 11.

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⁵ *Chach-nāmah*, p. 210; *Tuḥfat-u’l-kirām*, f. 259b.

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¹ For muqaddam, e.g., Baranī, pp. 288, 291.

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² Baranī, p. 288

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³ Arthaśāstra, pp. 50, 173.

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⁴ Baranī, e.g., p. 291.

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⁵ Moreland, pp. 225, 226. Vide Appendix L.

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⁶ Khusraw uses the word zamīndārī in Diwalrānī Khiḍr Khān, p. 70.

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¹ Baranī, p. 291.

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² Idem, p. 288.

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³ Idem, p. 287.

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⁴ Idem, pp. 429-430.

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⁵ Fatāwā-i-jahāndārī, f. 82.

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Ibn Baṭṭūṭah says that there were, in each ṣadī, a chaudharī who was the head of the Parganah officials. Hindus and a mutaṣarrif who collected the revenue.⁶ The statement implies that the chaudharī was selected, in some manner, to represent the peasants; probably the notables were consulted before the appointment was made. In many instances, the post would be hereditary; but the idea of some kind of an election should not be dismissed entirely, for certain professional and caste brotherhoods elect their chaudharīs even now. We read of the qānūngū under the Afghāns; this officer was the keeper of previous schedules of assessment.⁷ Ibn Baṭṭūṭah does not mention the subordinate staff without whom the mutaṣarrif could not work. Baranī mentions the staff, but does not go into details.⁸ To the mutaṣarrif, whom he also calls the ‘āmil, Baranī adds the mushrif, the muḥaṣṣil, gumāshtahs, sarhangs and “the staff in the offices.”⁹ The mushrif was the inspector who actually saw the crops and determined the government share; it was his duty to adjudicate impartially between the state and the peasant. The muḥaṣṣil received the payment made in cash or kind by the peasants.¹ A gumashtah is an agent; the sarhangs, like the modern chaprāsīs, served peasants or muqaddams with official orders or summonses.² Baranī also uses the word kārkunān, which could hardly have been employed in a non-technical sense, for the chronicler knew the administrative jargon of the day too well. In view of later evidence, they would be the clerks who kept the accounts. Under the Afghāns, the shiqq disappeared from at least the major portion of the Sultanate, and the ‘āmil or the mutaṣarrif came to be known as the shiqqdār.³ Under Sher Shāh Sūr one finds practically the same administrative machinery for a parganah; there is the shiqqdār, the head of the local administration, the mushrif, now also called the amīn or the munṣif, the treasurer and the kārkuns. The fact that the mushrif was now known as the amīn, the holder of a trust, or the munṣif, a judge, throws a favourable light on the ideals of the administration. He was not a publican to extract the uttermost for Cæsar, but was regarded as an impartial adjudicator between the state and the peasant. The muḥaṣṣil now becomes the foṭaḥdār, khazānchī or khazānahdār, all synonyms for ‘treasurer.’ The kārkuns still remain, keeping the books both in Hindī and in Persian, so that the peasant and the state could know where they stood regarding their financial transactions.⁴

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⁶ I. B., ii, p. 78.

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⁷ D. A., p. 34, defines qānūn as a schedule of assessment which has been in use for at least three years. A qānūngū, therefore, is a keeper of such schedules.

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⁸ Baranī, pp. 288, 289, 431.

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⁹ Idem, pp. 288, 289. The ‘āmil is found under the Abbasids as well, Mez, p. 81. I. B., ii, p. 14, also mentions the ‘āmil.

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¹ In determining their duties I have been guided bythe etymology of their titles and the description of the administration under the Afghāns. The muḥaṣṣil's duties have been defined in D. A., p. 36

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² Baranī, p. 288.

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³ Vide Appendix M.

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⁴ Vide Appendix M.

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The chronicles do not contain sufficient material for reconstructing a description of the administration in a shiqq; we glean a little more about the sarkār which replaced it. It seems that the head officials were the shiqqdār-i-shiqqdārān or the chief Sarkārs.

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shiqqdār, the munṣif-i-munṣifān or the chief assessment officer and a treasurer.¹

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¹ Vide Appendix M. ² Agrarian System in Ancient India, p. 54. ³ Local Self-government in Ancient India, p. 10. ⁴ Rise and Fall of the Muhammadan Power in India, IV, p. 18 (footnote). ⁵ E.g., in Sind: Tuhfat-u’l-kirām, f. 260b. ⁶ For ‘Alā-u’d-dīn Khaljī, Baranī, pp. 287, 288; for Muḥammad bin Tughluq, Fatāwā-i-jahāndārī, f. 120b; for Fīrūzshāh, Ethé, 120b, f. 492.

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No description of local government would be complete without a discussion of the position and powers of Hindu tributary chiefs. A large number of powerful hereditary lords existed under the Gurjāra-Pratīhāras of Kanauj whose sway extended from the Himalayas to the Narbada.² These chiefs really date back to an earlier era. “The administration of the Mauryan Empire,” says a modern writer, “was possible because it . . . aimed only at an elastic system of federalism or confederation.”³ Indeed the local chieftains had been left much to themselves by the various dynasties of Hindu India. The tributaries had never been particularly amenable to control; their intransigeance had, in places, been sanctified by tradition and a strange sense of honour, for instance, the Mowāssī and Grassī chiefs in Gujrāt “felt themselves bound in honour to withhold tribute till a body of soldiers appeared against them even under the British government.”⁴ The chiefs were mostly left in possession of their estates by Muslim conquerors.⁵ They were, however, always ready to withhold tribute and to create trouble: the slightest weakening of the government was a signal for revolt. ‘Alā-u’d-dīn broke their power; Muḥammad bin Tughluq advanced them to honour and position; Fīrūz pacified the chiefs by subduing them and then restoring their possessions and adding to their dignity: but all was in vain.⁶ The only conclusive argument in statecraft is force; the weakening of central control offered them an irresistible temptation. Even the khūts and muqaddams were not always docile; ‘Alā-u’d-dīn Khaljī reduced their power; when Sher Shāh took charge of his father's parganah, he had first to deal with the insubordination of the muqaddams and the zamīndārs. Some governors appointed Muslim headmen in a few places; this policy could only succeed where Muslim peasantry existed in substantial numbers.¹ A Muslim headman in a Hindu village would be useless. The Hindu chief played such an important rôle in the rural life of the period that, to many, he was the government, whereas the sultan was almost a mythical figure.

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¹ I. B., ii, p. 13. ² Idem, pp. 3, 4 ³ I. B., (ii, pp. 3, 4) says ⅓ of a kroh, but Baranī (p. 332), who ought to know better, says ½. Tārīkh-i-Mubārakshāhī (pp. 98, 99) says that the posts were a kroh apart. This chronicle is not contemporary; besides, if the posts were a kroh apart, the service would not be so speedy. ⁴ I. B., ii, pp. 3, 4. ⁵ Baranī, p. 332; E. & D., iii, p. 581; Masālik-u'l-abṣār, pp. 53, 54. ⁶ I. B., ii, pp. 3, 4.

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A large empire cannot be well-governed without good means of communication. As regards the transmission of news, eloquent tributes have been paid by foreign travellers to the newsservice maintained by the sultans of Dehlī. Ibn Baṭṭūṭah says that the royal post took five days to carry letters from Sind to Dehlī, a distance covered by the ordinary travellers in fifty days. The transmission was of two kinds: one by horsemen, the other by runners.² For the first there were relay stations every four kroh; for the second there was a stage every quarter of a kroh.³ At each station there were three shelters where men waited all ready to take a letter and run hard to the next post. The approach of a runner was heralded by the sound of bells at the end of the stick which he carried.⁴ Ten of these runners, called dhāwahs, were kept at every station.⁵ This runner post was quicker than the ulāgh by which name the horse post was known; it was also used for the conveyance of Khurāsān fruit, and of drinking water from the Ganges which was carried to the sultan even as far as distant Daulatābād.⁶ Sometimes the post was used to transport men who were carried in litters.¹ The sultan's *barīds*, distributed all over the empire, furnished him with news by this means. They reported on the arrival of foreigners in the dominions, on matters of special interest, on the doings of the various officials, even on the gossip of the bazaars and the feelings of the people.² Special lines were established to keep in touch with expeditionary forces.³ In addition to the runner post, Muḥammad bin Tughluq organized a system by which signals could be speedily transmitted. Between the larger towns, chains of kettle-drums were established so that an alarm sounded in a far off frontier town could quickly reach the sultan.⁴ The system of a fast post was maintained with varying degrees of efficiency by all the dynasties; it is described in all the leading chronicles.⁵ It is doubtful if the post carried private letters: it is certain, however, that the soldiers on expeditions were able to communicate with their families.⁶ Closely allied with the post was the system of agents and spies who kept the central government informed of all happenings; this had a salutary effect on local officials who knew that their actions were unlikely to remain hidden from the sultan and his ministers.⁷ The news-writers can be broadly divided into two categories: the *barīds* who resembled modern newspaper reporters and sent regular letters, and the extraordinary agents and spies sent on special missions.

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¹ *Dā'ūdī*, f. 78a.

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² I. B., ii, pp 3, 4.

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³ Baranī, p. 331.

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⁴ E. & D., iii, p. 582; *Masālik-u'l-abṣār*, pp. 54, 55. The drums could not have been intended to inform the sultan of the closing and opening of the gates.

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⁵ *Tāj*, f. 183a; *Tabaqāt-i-Akbarī*, i, pp. 166, 337; ii, p. 106; *'Afīf*, pp. 182 183, 211; *Dā'ūdī*, ff. 25a, 78a; Erskine, i, p. 350.

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⁶ *'Afīf*, pp. 182, 183. If the incident mentioned here be considered extraordinary, there is a casual mention on p. 211.

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⁷ E g., *Siyāsat-nāmah*, p. 57; *Dā'ūdī*, f. 25a; *vide* Chapter IV.

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The sultans realized very early that their hold on the country could never be strong without good roads. One of the main duties of governors appointed by Quṭb-u'd-dīn Aibak was to protect the roads.¹ Īltutmish and Balban cut down forests and ran roads into the interior to open up the country and to make it difficult for the chieftains to rebel.² 'Alā-u'd-dīn Khaljī's success in maintaining peace should partially be attributed to his energetic measures for the safety of the roads.³ Ghiyāth-u'd-dīn Tughluq revived the policy; and, when, under Muḥammad bin Tughluq, Ibn Baṭṭūṭah came to India, he found a good system of long arterial roads.⁴ The road, for instance, between Dhār and Dehlī, a distance of twenty-four days' journey, was marked by kroh mīnārs all along the route.⁵ Sher Shāh is credited with much road construction; he is said to have built the road from Rohtās on the north-west frontier to Sonārgāon on the sea in Bengal.⁶ It is difficult to believe that Dehlī had no road connections either with Lāhor or Bengal before his reign; Bābur could not have posted relays of horses from Kābul to Dehlī without the existence of a road.⁷ However, Sher Shāh put the road communications of the Sultanate on a sound basis. Along with the roads, there was a network of khānqāhs and sarā'is where the traveller, Hindu or Muslim, could find free food and shelter.⁸ Indeed, we are told that every ulāgh post had mosques, reservoirs full of good water and shops where the traveller could buy food for himself and his mount.⁹ The great builder of sarā'is was Sher Shāh; he built one at every kroh of his famous roads. Each sarā'i had a mosque, a well, and food and drinking water for Hindus as well as Muslims. The travellers were provided with hot water and bedsteads, also with fodder for their horses.¹ Islām Shāh built more sarā'is, so that now there was a sarā'i at every half kroh.² In those days a cheaper method of communication was provided by the great natural waterways, the big rivers, which are such a feature of India; river traffic was guarded by a river police under the mīr bahr.

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¹ Tāj, f. 129.

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² Barani, pp. 57, 58.

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³ Idem, p. 340.

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⁴ Idem, p. 443; I. B., e.g., ii, p. 103.

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⁵ I. B., ii, p. 103.

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⁶ Sarwānī, f. 71b; Dā'ūdī, f. 78a.

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⁷ Erskine, i, p. 530

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⁸ E. & D., iii, p. 581; Sujān Rāi says that food was provided by the state for the Hindus as well as Muslims.

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⁹ E. & D., iii, p. 581; I. B., ii, p. 28; Masālik-u'l-abṣār, p. 54.

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¹ Tabaqāt-i-Akbarī, ii, p. 106; Sarwānī, f. 71; Dā'ūdī, f. 78; Ma'dan-i-akhbār-i-Ahmadī, f. 114.

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² Dā'ūdī, f. 103a. This seems to be an exaggeration; but the chronicles are unanimous. Probably these extra sarā'is were built in densely populated areas.

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All these communications had to be protected against robbers. The worst offenders were the Hindu chieftains who waylaid travellers and traders. Whenever these chieftains were in a state of rebellion, they took refuge in the thick jungle; some of them possessed fortresses which had to be reduced by siege or carried by assault.³ The worst area was that now forming the United Provinces; in certain parts the descendants of the chieftains are still notorious dacoits. The provincial governors and, later, the chief shiqqdārs in the sarkārs were responsible for maintaining order.⁴ Forts were built at strategic points where kotwāls were stationed to keep the roads open and punish thieves; later these kotwāls came to be known as faujdārs.⁵ At other places, thānahs were established, which contained bodies of troops.⁶ A more effective method of keeping peace in the country was to plant colonies of warlike Muslims in the midst of rebellious tribes. Balban, for instance, built towns for Muslims with fortresses and mosques in the old Hindu strongholds of Kampil, Patiālī and Bhojpūr.¹ So successful was this method that it kept the road to eastern Hindustān open until the reign of Fīrūz Shāh.² The cutting down and opening up of the dense forests also made robbery more difficult.³

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³ I. B., ii, p. 78. The same authority says that the bamboo jungles could not even be set on fire.

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⁴ E.g., Pilgrimage and Teachings of Chaitanya, pp. 225-229.

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⁵ Baranī, e.g., pp. 58, 302; for faujdārs, Baranī, p. 480.

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⁶ Idem, e.g., pp. 57, 330, 331.

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¹ Baranī, e.g., p. 58

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² Ibid.

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³ Idem, p. 57.

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A more direct plan was to make the areas concerned collectively responsible for the maintenance of peace and order. Sher Shāh was acting on an old custom when he made the muqaddam pay the amount robbed from a wayfarer within or near his jurisdiction; similarly the muqaddam remained under arrest for any murder committed within his area until his people found the culprit.⁴ This may appear unjust and harsh, but it was based on a true understanding of the reality of the situation.⁵ Sher Shāh's method was so successful that all authorities bear striking testimony to the security in his dominions.⁶ The view that Sher Shāh was not the first to adopt a system of collective security finds strong corroboration in two stone inscriptions found at Tirukkolakkūdi and Kandadevi in South India which date back to 761 and 771 A.H. (1360 and 1369 A.C.). The villages belonged to the sultanate of Madurā, and the inscriptions record the villagers' undertaking to keep the peace in their neighbourhood and to protect the weak.⁷ Khusraw says about ‘Alā-u’d-dīn’s reign that "the very thieves who, before this, set villages on fire, now lit the lamps and guarded the highways; if a traveller lost a piece of thread, the people of the vicinity either found it or paid its price."⁸ The result of such measures was that, in the poet's own words, "from the mouth of the Indus to the seashore, no one even heard the name of a thief, a thug or a robber."⁹ This tranquillity continued, without any effort on his part, under Qutb-u’d-dīn Mubārak Shāh.¹⁰ Ibn Baṭṭūṭah found the Doāb in a state of rebellion because the good work begun by Quṭb-u'd-dīn Aibak and carried on by other sultans crumbled under Muḥammad bin Tughluq ; Fīrūz once again restored peace ; then anarchy stalked abroad.¹ Sikandar Lodī and Sher Shāh are the outstanding later sultans who gave peace to the land to such an extent that, in the words of the panegyrist, ‘if an old woman carried a trayful of gold and slept in forests, she did not require a watchman.’²

Linked texts (8)

Kauṭilīya Arthaśāstra — Kauṭilya, Sanskrit
Vaiṣṇava Dharmaśāstra — Viṣṇu, Sanskrit
Mānava Dharmaśāstra — Manu & Bhṛgu, Sanskrit
تحفة النظار في غرائب الأمصار وعجائب الأسفار — Ibn Baṭṭūṭa, Arabic
Tāj al-maʾāthir — Ḥasan Niẓāmī, Persian
Chachnāma — ʿAlī b. Ḥāmid al-Kūfī
Tārīkh-i Fīrūzshāhī — Shams-i Sirāj ʿAfīf
Tārīkh-i Mubārakshāhī — Yaḥyā b. Aḥmad Sirhindī

The Administration of the Sultanate of Dehli c14: Chapter X

Contents

Chapter X

Linked texts (8)