Q. Examine the working of the Iqta system during the sultanate period?

The institution of iqta was the most talked about institution in the Delhi sultanate.
Through Moreland’s close reading of the sources, he argues that when the Ghurid
invasions took place in North India, the word iqta was applied to any revenue
charge. The iqta was a territorial assignment and its holder was designated as the
muqti. The muqti only had the responsibility of collecting the tax from the peasant
and he wasn’t allowed to charge anything else from the peasants, otherwise the
sultan would take away his powers. According to Nizamu’l Mulk Tusi, the muqti’s
right to collect and appropriate taxes especially land revenue was all due to the
king’s pleasure. A sultan could increase or decrease the size of the iqta. But the
muqti had also had to fulfill certain obligations, the major one being the
maintenance of troops and to present it before the sultan whenever he needed it.
The revenues he appropriated from the iqta were thus meant to provide him with
resources wherewith to fulfill his obligation. So the muqti in a way was both a tax
collector and army paymaster (commander). The areas that weren’t given by the
Sultan as iqtas were the areas known as the khalisa where the sultan’s officials i.e.
amils directly collected the taxes for the royal treasury.

Iqta was basically a mechanism by which land revenue was re-distributed. Iqta
could turn into an administrative charge under the wishes of sultan. The system of
iqta remained an institution created and sustained by the state. The sultan could at
any time enfranchise the iqtadar. The iqtadar from the point of view of the peasant
was the representative of the state and whatever right he enjoyed was because he
claimed to have delegation of authority from the centre. The institution of iqta is
heard from the very time of Qutub-ud-din Aibak. Although one keeps coming across
the institution of iqta in various sources but it is quite essential to testify these
sources. This institution of iqta as a system of assessing and collecting taxes was a
pre-condition. There was no such elaborate machinery of defining the territory for
the iqtadar.

According to Moreland, argued that iqta according to texts like Tariq-i-Shahi means
a particular area assigned to the noble. In such cases the person wasn’t called an
iqtadar but a muqti. These people could be constantly transferred. The muqtis were
basically governors enjoying administrative powers by the grace of sultan. Muqti
was seen as the ideal revenue collector and if he was the governor of a particular
area, it meant that he had to maintain a large number of officers to guard over the
local iqtas. He could pay them in cash or sub-delegate his own iqta. Even the muqti
could assign iqta but this was different from the iqta assigned by the sultan. Another

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historian Andre Wink takes a closer look at the institution of iqta. His basic interest
in iqta lies in the fact that it was able to integrate the political and fiscal space
between the frontier mode of organization and the sedentary mode of organization.

As far as the time period for which an iqtadar could hold an iqta is concerned, Juzani
typically says that a particular amir held such an iqta for sometime. It varied from
periods of two, three or four years. Changes in the distributive system of iqta
commonly occurred with the accession of a new ruler to the throne. The length of
tenure varied a great deal and even more variable was their size, ranging from
rights over large provinces like Awadh or Bengal to a small number of villages.

After the establishment of the Delhi sultanate, all the autonomous principalities
were converted into real iqtas. From Illtutmish’s time, one could see the practice of
transferring muqti’s from one iqta to another. The muqti’s of course had had to
maintain a set of troops, but there is no real evidence to suggest that the muqti was
required to maintain a fixed number of troops or to send every year a particular
amount to the sultan’s treasury. But Barani does tell us that each brantee aws
expected to raise from one to three horsemen. The muqti was free to sub- assign
small iqtas to everyone he chose from within his larger iqta. By this means he could
also pay his troops. According to Juzani’s Tabaqat, Illtutmish had at one time held
the iqta of the town of Baran with its dependencies and Baran was frequently
granted out as iqta during his reign and those of his Shamsid successors. Tabaqat
also gives us evidence of grants described in different language at two different
points, especially in the case of Kabir Khan who is said to have been granted the city
and fortress of Multan, its townships and its districts near and far and appointed to
the governorship, elsewhere he is duly termed wali of Multan.

The sultans also enlarged their own khalisa. Especially in the case of Delhi which
together with its surrounding district including parts of the doab was in the sultan’s
khalisa. The practice of the khalisa also continued under Balban, who reduced or
resumed those iqta’s from which full or proper service was not forthcoming. But the
excess amount that was collected from the iqtas was to be remitted to the imperial
treasury. Balban in order to ensure this he had appointed a khwaja (accountant)
alongwith the muqti, the sultan had done this to discover what was actually
collected and spent within the iqta. It is quite possible that in the latter half of the
13th century the relative wealth and importance of an iqta might have been
expressed in terms of horsemen the grantee maintained. According to Barani,
Balban’s slave malik Buqubuq (muqta of Badaun) had 4000 horsemen in his service.

During the reign of Alauddin Khalji, the more distant areas became subject to the
empire and were assigned in iqta and the areas nearer the capital were annexed to

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the khalisa. The system of paying the sultan’s own cavalry troops by assignment of
villages as iqtas was abolished. The entire revenue of the khalisa went into the
treasury and the soldiers were paid in cash. Khalji maintained the practice of
assigning the iqtas to his commanders (muqtis, walis). But under Khalji, the
assessment and collection of taxes was done over a larger region which according to
Barani were under the muqti’s.

The tax income from each iqta was estimated at a particular figure by the Finance
department. Out of the estimated income of the iqta, a certain amount was allowed
for the payment of the troops placed under the muqti or wali. The area expected to
yield this amount was set apart by the diwan. The remainder was treated as the
muqti’s own personal i.e. for his own salary and the expense of his personal
establishment of officials. The muqti’s had to pay into the treasury all the income
that was above the amount allowed for the salary of the army and for his own
income. Sometimes the muqti’s tended to conceal the true receipts and so under the
excess was to be payed to the sultan. But the sultan had imposed harsh measures,
including imprisonment and physical torture as part of audit at both the levels. In
this period one can also see that the local revenue outside the khalisa were
delivered to the muqta’s appointees rather than to the central government in Delhi.

Under Ghiyasuddin Tughlaq, this finance department was instructed not to increase
the estimate of income by over 1/10th or 1/11th annually, since the burden of any
such enhancement would be passed on by the muqti to the peasantry. Although
there wasn’t much strictness and harshness shown if the muqti took anything from
1/10th to 1/20th of the kharaj (produce) in excess of their sanctioned income and the
muqti were also warned not to ill treat their officials for small amounts (0.5 or 1%)
taken over and above their salaries. But the muqti wasn’t allowed to take anything
from the portion of the iqta reserved for the payment of troops.

Under Muhammad Tughlaq, the twin functions of the collection of taxes and
maintenance of troops began to be separated, the one reason being that the sultan
must have wanted to obtain a larger income. An Arabic work, Masalik al-Absar says
that all the army commanders were assigned iqtas in lieu of their salaries. But the
estimated income of the iqta, against which the salary was adjusted, was always less
than the actual. The troops were paid by the treasury in cash and the iqtas were
given only in lieu of the commander’s personal salaries.

Under Firuz Tughlaq, there was an increase in the salaries of the nobles. He also re-
established the system of paying soldiers by assigning them the revenue of villages
as wajh in lieu of their salaries. Soldiers, who were not assigned wajh, were paid

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their salaries in cash from the treasury or by way of drafts on the iqta’s of the nobles
which was to be adjusted against the payment of excess due from them to the
treasury. He also followed the hereditary principle wherein the iqtas would
automatically pass on to the sons.

Under the Lodhis, the term iqta was replaced by sarkars and parganas. Both of these
were territorial divisions where each sarkar comprised a number of parganas. This
sarkar was under a noble and each sarkar was assigned a jama or estimated revenue
whose purpose must have been to lay down the military and other obligations of the
noble. The principal assignees under Sikandar Lodhi used to sub-assign some
portion of their territories or parganas to their sub-ordinates who again paid the
soldiers by same means.

Bibliography:

Cambridge economic history of India - Irfan Habib

Al-Hind (Volume II) - Andre Wink

The Delhi Sutanate – Peter Jackson

Class notes