UPPSC 2019 Prelims GS Paper-I · Question 130 of 150

Correct — C, 'Revenue from Iqta was directly deposited in Sultan's account'. That is exactly what the iqta was designed to avoid. The whole point of the institution was that the Sultan, short of cash and short of an empire-wide collecting bureaucracy, assigned the revenue of a defined territory to an officer instead of paying him a salary from the treasury. The holder — called the muqti or wali — collected the land revenue of his iqta himself, retained his own pay and the cost of the cavalry contingent he was obliged to maintain, and sent only the balance to the centre. That balance had a name of its own, fawazil, and the fact that a separate term existed for the surplus is itself proof that the gross revenue never went straight to the Sultan's treasury. Only the khalisa lands, reserved directly under the crown, were collected for the central exchequer in that way. Later Sultans tightened the accounting: officers of the diwan-i-wizarat estimated what an iqta ought to yield and audited the holder's figures so that the fawazil was actually remitted — but even then the money passed through the muqti's hands first. So (c) states the opposite of how the system worked and is the exception the question asks for.

• (a)Iqta was a revenue collection system — This is a true characteristic. The iqta was an assignment of the land revenue of a tract in lieu of cash salary, and collecting that revenue was the assignee's central duty — so it functioned as the Sultanate's principal machinery for realising and distributing land revenue.
• (b)Siyasatnama was the source of information for Iqta System — This is true. The Siyasatnama (Siyar al-Muluk), the manual of statecraft written by the Seljuq vizier Nizam al-Mulk Tusi in the eleventh century, sets out the theory of the iqta — the assignee's duties, the peasants' protection and the state's ultimate ownership — and remains a standard source historians use to reconstruct the institution the Turks brought to India.
• (d)Muqti was supported to maintain troops out of the revenue collected from Iqta — This is true and is the military logic of the whole arrangement. The muqti was bound to maintain and produce a fixed contingent of horsemen, paid for out of the revenue of his iqta; the iqta was in effect a device for keeping an army without a cash payroll.

The iqta was not a European-style fief and not private property. It was a transferable, in principle non-hereditary assignment of revenue: the state retained ownership, the muqti held the right to collect for as long as the Sultan pleased, and he could be moved from one iqta to another — Balban and Alauddin Khalji used exactly that power to prevent assignees from striking roots. In return the holder discharged administrative and military duties in his tract and remitted the fawazil. The institution came into India with the Turks — Iltutmish is credited with organising it systematically — and its later history is a running contest between central control and local entrenchment: Alauddin Khalji resumed many assignments and expanded the khalisa, while Firoz Shah Tughlaq moved the other way and allowed iqtas to become effectively hereditary.

For a NOT-question, test each option against the definition rather than reading for the one that 'sounds odd'. Options (a), (b) and (d) are the three things every textbook says about the iqta — what it was, where we learn about it, and what the holder had to do with the money. Option (c) contradicts (d) directly: if the revenue went straight into the Sultan's account, the muqti would have nothing to pay his troops with. Spotting that internal contradiction between two options is the fastest route to the answer, and the term fawazil — the surplus remitted after the muqti's own claims were met — is the one word that settles it.

• Iqta: assignment of the land revenue of a territory to an officer in place of a cash salary; the holder was the muqti or wali.
• The muqti kept his own pay and the cost of his troop contingent from the collection and remitted only the surplus, called fawazil, to the centre.
• Khalisa were the lands kept directly under the crown, whose revenue did go to the central treasury.
• The iqta was a West Asian institution brought to India by the Turks; Iltutmish is credited with organising it in the Delhi Sultanate.
• The Siyasatnama (Siyar al-Muluk) of Nizam al-Mulk Tusi, the Seljuq vizier, is the classic source for the theory of the iqta.
• Alauddin Khalji tightened central control and enlarged the khalisa; under Firoz Shah Tughlaq iqtas tended to become hereditary.

• Equating the iqta with land ownership or with a European fief. It was an assignment of revenue, transferable at the Sultan's will, not a grant of the soil.
• Forgetting fawazil. Candidates who remember only 'the muqti sent revenue to the Sultan' will read option (c) as true; what he sent was the surplus after his own salary and troop costs.
• Confusing the iqta with the khalisa. Khalisa revenue did go directly to the central treasury — which is precisely why an iqta was a different thing.

UPPSC tests Sultanate administration through NOT-questions and 'correctly matched' pairs on technical terms; UPSC asks the same ground through statement sets on the origin of the iqta and the meaning of terms such as fawazil and amil.

• practice — not a real PYQ

  In the administration of the Delhi Sultanate, the term 'fawazil' referred to

  • (a)the land kept directly under the Sultan's control
  • (b)the surplus revenue remitted by an iqta holder to the central exchequer
  • (c)the tax levied on non-Muslims
  • (d)the salary paid in cash to soldiers

  Answer(b) The surplus revenue remitted by an iqta holder to the central exchequer, after he had met his own salary and the cost of his contingent; the crown lands were the khalisa and the tax on non-Muslims was the jizya.

• practice — not a real PYQ

  Which Sultan of Delhi is generally credited with systematically organising the iqta system in India?

  • (a)Qutbuddin Aibak
  • (b)Iltutmish
  • (c)Alauddin Khalji
  • (d)Firoz Shah Tughlaq

  Answer(b) Iltutmish — he organised the assignment of iqtas to his Turkish commanders; Alauddin Khalji later resumed many assignments to strengthen central control, and Firoz Shah Tughlaq allowed them to become effectively hereditary.