Name - Medini Sriram

Date - 6th November 2016

Subject - History of India V

Topic - Mansabdari System

Roll Number - 142065

Akbar was one of the greatest Mughal rulers to have ever lived, and
after the death of his father Humayun, is believed to be responsible for
the expansion and reconsolidation of the Mughal domain in India. He
was born in Amarakot in 1542 to the Mughal emperor Humayun, and
took up the mantel of emperor at the age of 13.
One of the problems of the Mughal Empire that were present in the
early years of Akbar’s rule was the structure of administration. After
the death of Islam Shah, the system of administration which had been
elaborated by Sher Shah had fallen into degraded confusion. Therefore,
Akbar started from scratch in the renewal of the empire’s
administrative functions, and did so by further developing systems
which were put in place by Sher Shah, as well as by inculcating new
systems through personal attention and innovation.
The expansion and administration of such a vast empire would not have
been possible without the presence of a strong army. Acknowledging
this, Akbar realized that to maintain such an army he would need to
organize the existing nobility as well, and did so by initiating the
existence of the mansabdari system. In this system, every officer was to
be assigned a rank or a mansab, of which the lowest rank was 10 and
the highest, that was attainable for only a noble, was 5000. The highest
rank that a noble could attain was raised later from 5000 to 7000, but
only Princes of the blood could receive these higher mansabs. Only two
nobles of the entire empire achieved this rank of 7000, his foster
brother, Mirza Aziz Koka and the grandson of a Hindu raja, Raja Man
Singh. While marriages between Muslim rulers and the daughters of
Hindu rajas were relatively common during this period, the girls were
generally lost to their families and never came back home after
marriage to a Muslim ruler. In Akbar’s case however, he chose to give
complete religious freedom to his Hindu wives and even honoured their
parents and relations by including them in the nobility. It was in this
way that Bhara Mal was made his high grandee, his son Bhagwant Das
rose to the rank of 5000, and his grandson Man Singh attained the rank
of 7000.
This mansabdari system of Akbar’s was gradually developed over time.
Initially there was only one rank or mansab, but from around 1594, the
ranks began to be divided into two, known as zat and sawar. The first
category, zat, meant personal and determined the personal status of a
person as well as the salary that would be due to them. The sawar rank
indicated the number of cavalrymen that a person was required to
maintain. A person who was required to maintain as many sawars as his
zat rank was placed in the first category of that rank, and if he
maintained half or more of such sawars then he was put in the second
category. Furthermore, an additional category existed for a person who
maintained less than half as many sawars as his zat rank.
These sawars were well-experienced and well-mounted nobles, and
great care was taken to ensure their capabilities. To ensure this
standard of ability, there was a descriptive roll of the soldiers that was
maintained with the emperor, and the horses possessed by the sawars
were branded with the imperial marks as well, together forming what is
known as the dagh system. There was also periodic inspection that
every noble had to bring his contingent for, which would take place
before a person appointed by the emperor for that specific purpose.
Only horses of good quality that were of Arabic or Iraqi breed were
employed, and ideally, there would be twenty horses maintained for
every ten cavalrymen by the mansabdar. This ratio was maintained
because the horses had to be rested while on the march and there was
always a need for replacements during the time of war. If a sewar only
had one horse then he was considered to be only half a sawar.
It was established by Akbar that theses contingents under the
Mansabdari system, were of a mixed form, that is, drawing from
Mughal, Pathan, Hindustani, and Rajput groups. And furthermore, only
the Mughal and Rajput nobles were allowed to have contingents
exclusively of Mughals or Rajputs as, after some time, the general rule
became mixed contingents. Akbar followed a much broader policy of
religious toleration which proved mutually beneficial to both the
Rajputs as well as to Akbar’s empire. Through his policy of inducting the
Rajput rajas into Mughal service and treating them on par with the
Mughal nobility, as well as by allowing them broad religious toleration
and , his courteous behavior towards former opponents, Akbar
cemented his alliance with the Rajput leaders. This autonomy allowed
to the Rajput rajas reassured them that Akbar was establishing an
empire which was not harmful to their best interests. It was this
alliance that secured the services of the bravest warriors in India, to the
Mughal Empire, and ensured peace between Hindu and Muslim forces.
In these contingents of the Mughal army were bowmen, musketeers,
sappers, and miners, who along with the cavalrymen, were recruited to
defend the Mughal Empire. The average salary of a sawar was Rs 20 per
month, and Iranis and Turanis received a higher salary than the Rajputs
of the Indian Muslims. The average infantryman received about Rs 3
per month, and their salary was added to the salary of the mansabdar
who was in turn paid by assigning him to a jagir.
This system developed under the Mughals of mansabdari, was a
distinctive and unique system and thus lacked a comparable parallel
outside India. Some trace the origins of this mansabdari system to the
days of Genghis Khan. Genghis Khan had a system of organizing his
army on the basics of decimals, with the lowest unit of command being
ten and the highest rank, the position of a commander or a khan, being
ten thousand. To some extent, it is believed that the Mongol system
influenced the military system of the Delhi Sultanate, as seen from the
existence of commanders of hundred or sadis and that of one thousand
or hazaras.
In the mansabdar system, those persons who held ranks below 500 zat
were called mansabdars, whereas those who held zats from 500 to
2500 were called amirs, and those who held ranks of 2500 or above
were called amir-i-umda or umda-i-azam. The term mansabdar
however, is often used for all three categories. These classifications had
more of significance than just defining status. An amir or an amir-i-
umda could have another amir or mansabdar serve under him, but a
mansabdar could not do so. Therefore, a person with a rank of 5000,
for example, could have a mansabdar up to a rank of 500 zat, and one
with a rank of 4000, could have a mansabdar up to a rank of 400 zat.
However, the persons who were appointed at a low mansab were
gradually promoted, based on their merits and whether or not the
emperor favoured them, and thus these categories of the mansabdari
system were not rigid ones. Similarly, as a mark of punishment, a
person could be demoted from their service. In this way, the extent of a
persons’ career was, at least in the most basic sense, based on their
talents and abilities.
The mansabdar had to maintain a predetermined quota of horses,
elephants, camels, mules and carts, out of their own salary, in addition
to meeting their personal expenses. A mansabdar holding a zat rank of
5000, for example, would have had to maintain 340 horses, 100
elephants, 400 camels, 100 mules, and 160 carts. Initially these had to
be maintained by the mansabdar himself, but in later years these were
taken care of centrally, whilst still paid from the salary of the
mansabdar. These horses, that served in the army of the emperor,
were classified into 6 categories, while elephants were categorized into
5, all based on the number and quality of these animals. The reason for
such precision in the maintenance and care of these animals was that
horses and elephants of a high breed were considered indispensible for
an efficient military to function. The main basis of the army was
essentially comprised of cavalry and elephants in those days, though
slowly artillery became more and more important.
In order for the mansabdars to meet these expenses, they were paid
very well; in fact, it is believed that the Mughal mansabdars formed the
highest paid service in the entire world, at that time, with a mansabdar
rank of 5000 easily getting a salary of Rs 30,000 per month. Though
roughly a quarter of these salaries were spent on maintaining their
corps, it is still made them the highest paid.
As his personal bodyguards, Akbar kept a large number of cavalrymen,
as well as a large stable of horses. In addition to these bodyguards,
Akbar also maintained a body of ‘gentleman troopers’ who were
persons of noble lineage who did not have the means of raising a
contingent on their own, but had impressed the emperor in some way
to demonstrate their capabilities and talents. These persons or ahadis,
were allowed to keep about 10 horses, were given a salary of about Rs
800 a month, and were answerable only to the emperor. Some
historians even compare these noble persons of Akbar’s contingent to
the knights seen in medieval Europe.
Aside from the then conventional means of army artillery, such as
cavalrymen, bowmen, horses and elephants, Akbar was also very
interested in guns. He devised a system of detachable guns which could
be carried on an elephant or even a camel. There were also heavy siege
guns which were intended for breaching forts and required hundreds of
oxen or several elephants to move them around. The light artillery
however, was used to accompany the emperor when he moved around
the capital, for his protection.
 Bibliography

History of Medieval India

By Satish Chandra