SSC CGL 2024 Tier-I · 9 September 2024, Shift 3 · General Awareness · Question 17 of 100

Text as printed on a candidate's response sheet for this shift; answer per SSC's tentative key as marked on that sheet. Solution last reviewed 6 September 2026.

Where this paper and its answers come from

SSC does not publish CGL question papers or a public answer key. The questions and options here are reproduced as printed on a candidate's own response sheet for this shift — the Commission's text, unchanged. Each answer is SSC's tentative key as marked on that sheet; SSC allowed challenges to it and never publishes a final key. The solutions are written by UnlockIAS.

Who was the revenue minister during the reign of Akbar?

(a)Todar Mal
(b)Abdul Rahim
(c)Mulla Do-Piyaza
(d)Tansen

Answer

Why

Correct — A. Raja Todar Mal was Akbar's revenue minister, the diwan who put the empire's land revenue on a measured footing.

His dahsala settlement fixed a cash demand from the average produce and average prices of the previous ten years, on land measured by a standardised jarib. He had learned the work under Sher Shah Suri before entering Akbar's service.

Why the others are wrong

(b)
Abdul Rahim — Abdul Rahim, son of Bairam Khan, was a general and poet remembered for his Hindi dohas. He held high command, not the revenue department.
(c)
Mulla Do-Piyaza — Mulla Do-Piyaza belongs to the folk tales told about Akbar's court, the same cycle as the Birbal stories. He is not a documented revenue official of the reign.
(d)
Tansen — Tansen was the court musician. Picking him confuses a place among the navratnas with a place in the administration.

Concept

Akbar's revenue system is the standard SSC entry point into Mughal administration, and Todar Mal is the name attached to it.

The zabt system assessed land by measurement rather than by guess or by a share of the heap. Land was surveyed, classified by how continuously it was cultivated, and taxed in cash.

Dahsala, the ten-year settlement, took the average produce and average price over ten years and fixed the demand per bigha from it. That averaging is the point: it made the demand predictable for both the peasant and the treasury.

The stem asks for the revenue minister, so it wants the diwan. Both Todar Mal and Tansen appear on the usual navratna list, which is why that list alone cannot settle the question.

Key facts

Todar Mal was Akbar's revenue minister and is associated with the dahsala system of land revenue assessment.
Dahsala fixed the revenue demand in cash from the average produce and prices of the previous ten years.
Todar Mal served under Sher Shah Suri before joining Akbar's service.
Todar Mal and Tansen were both counted among Akbar's navratnas.

Study next

The zabt and dahsala revenue systems and the role of the amilSher Shah Suri's land revenue and administrative reformsThe mansabdari system and its zat and sawar ranks

Common traps

Picking Tansen because he is the most famous name on the navratna list.
Crediting dahsala to Sher Shah Suri, whose earlier measurement-based reforms Todar Mal built on.

Akbar's court is a standing source of one-line stems in this cycle — the navratnas were asked on 11 Sep 2024, 09:00, General Awareness Q.10, and the Vakil who held the title Khan-i-Khanan on 13 Sep 2024, 16:00, General Awareness Q.25.

Related PYQs

No directly related past PYQ was found.