NDA (II) 2017 General Ability Test · Question 89 of 150

Correct — B, Saadat Khan. Born Mir Muhammad Amin at Nishapur in Iran about 1680, he came to India in search of service, rose under the Mughal emperor Muhammad Shah and was appointed governor of Awadh in 1722, taking the title Burhan-ul-Mulk. He ruled from 26 January 1722 until 19 March 1739 and turned what was a Mughal province into a hereditary principality — the classic pattern of an eighteenth-century successor state, where a governor stayed formally loyal to Delhi while making his office effectively his own. He was followed by his nephew and son-in-law Safdar Jung, and every later Nawab and King of Awadh down to Wajid Ali Shah descends from him through his daughter.

• (a)Murshid Quli Khan — Murshid Quli Khan founded the independent line of Nawabs of Bengal, not of Awadh. He was made diwan of Bengal by Aurangzeb, later became its subahdar, moved the capital from Dhaka to Murshidabad, which is named after him, and died in 1727.
• (c)Alivardi Khan — Alivardi Khan was also a Nawab of Bengal. He seized power there in 1740 and ruled until 1756, spending much of his reign resisting Maratha raids into Bengal, and was succeeded by his grandson Siraj-ud-Daula.
• (d)Sarfaraz Khan — Sarfaraz Khan was the grandson of Murshid Quli Khan and briefly Nawab of Bengal in 1739 and 1740, until Alivardi Khan defeated and killed him at the battle of Giria. Like the other two wrong names, he belongs to Bengal — the trap in this question is that three of the four options are Bengal Nawabs.

As Mughal central authority weakened after Aurangzeb's death in 1707, several provincial governors converted their charge into hereditary rule while continuing to acknowledge the emperor in name, coinage and prayer. Awadh under Saadat Khan, Bengal under Murshid Quli Khan and Hyderabad under Nizam-ul-Mulk Asaf Jah are the three standard examples of these successor states. Awadh's later capitals were Faizabad and then Lucknow, and its court became a great patron of architecture, music, dance and the Urdu language.

When an option list groups several rulers of a single region against one from another, sorting the names by region is usually faster than recalling dates. Here Murshid Quli Khan, Alivardi Khan and Sarfaraz Khan are all Bengal, leaving Saadat Khan as the only Awadh name. Keep the end of the story in view as well — Awadh lost half its territory to the Company by the treaty of 1801, and Wajid Ali Shah was deposed and the kingdom annexed in February 1856 on the alleged ground of misgovernance, a grievance that fed directly into the revolt of 1857.

• Saadat Khan, titled Burhan-ul-Mulk, was appointed governor of Awadh in 1722 and ruled until 1739.
• He was succeeded by his nephew and son-in-law Safdar Jung, and all later rulers of Awadh descend from him through his daughter.
• Murshid Quli Khan founded the independent Nawabi of Bengal and gave his name to Murshidabad.
• Alivardi Khan ruled Bengal from 1740 to 1756 and was succeeded by Siraj-ud-Daula.
• Awadh was annexed by Lord Dalhousie in February 1856, when Wajid Ali Shah was deposed on the ground of alleged misgovernance.

• Mixing up the Awadh and Bengal lines; three of the four options here are Bengal Nawabs.
• Confusing Saadat Khan of Awadh with the later Saadat Ali Khan II, who signed away half the kingdom in 1801.
• Assuming the successor states declared independence; they kept up the formal fiction of Mughal sovereignty.

NDA asks founders of successor states and their capitals, and UPSC prefers to test Awadh through its annexation and the events of 1856.

• practice — not a real PYQ

  The founder of the independent Nawabi of Bengal in the eighteenth century was

  • (a)Saadat Khan
  • (b)Murshid Quli Khan
  • (c)Nizam-ul-Mulk Asaf Jah
  • (d)Safdar Jung

  Answer(b) Murshid Quli Khan — he moved the capital to Murshidabad and made the office hereditary.

• practice — not a real PYQ

  Awadh was annexed by the East India Company in 1856 on the ground of

  • (a)the Doctrine of Lapse
  • (b)failure to pay the subsidy
  • (c)alleged misgovernance
  • (d)refusal to accept a subsidiary alliance

  Answer(c) alleged misgovernance — Wajid Ali Shah was deposed by Lord Dalhousie on that plea.