To promote agriculture, Muhammad Tughlaq founded which of the following new ministries?

Correct — A. Diwan-i Amir-i Kohi was the new department of agriculture set up by Muhammad bin Tughlaq.

Its remit was the expansion of cultivation: bringing waste land under the plough and advancing state loans to peasants for seed and cattle.

The three rejected names are older Sultanate departments with settled remits — military, correspondence and religious business. Only option (a) is an agrarian office.

Why the others are wrong

• (b)
  Diwan-i-Risalat — Diwan-i-Risalat handled religious affairs and appeals. It was an ecclesiastical and appellate office with no authority over land, crops or cultivators.
• (c)
  Diwan-i-Arz — Diwan-i-Arz is the military department, headed by the Ariz-i-Mumalik and reorganised by Balban. Its business was soldiers and horses, not seed and soil.
• (d)
  Diwan-i-Insha — Diwan-i-Insha is the chancery — the department of royal correspondence and drafting, run under the Dabir-i-Khas.

The Delhi Sultanate ran through named diwans, and SSC tests the mapping from name to function.

The ones worth holding: Diwan-i-Wizarat for finance under the Wazir, Diwan-i-Arz for the military, Diwan-i-Insha for correspondence and Diwan-i-Risalat for religious affairs and appeals.

Muhammad bin Tughlaq added the Diwan-i Amir-i Kohi for agriculture.

It belongs with his other interventions — the tax increase in the Doab, the transfer of the capital to Daulatabad, the token currency — a reign of large administrative experiments, several of them abandoned.

Key facts

• Muhammad bin Tughlaq created the Diwan-i Amir-i Kohi as a separate department of agriculture.
• Diwan-i-Arz was the Sultanate's military department, headed by the Ariz-i-Mumalik.
• Diwan-i-Insha was the department of royal correspondence.
• Muhammad bin Tughlaq's other measures include raising taxation in the Doab, moving the capital to Daulatabad and issuing token currency.

Common traps

• Assuming any diwan with an unfamiliar name must be the revenue office. Finance sat with the Diwan-i-Wizarat.
• Attaching Diwan-i-Arz to Muhammad bin Tughlaq because Balban and Alauddin Khalji both reworked it.

No directly related past PYQ was found.