Page 42 - SST Class 07

The emperor could use the troops maintained by the merchants, so that no one could be cheated
the Mansabdar, any time or whenever he wished.
But, Akbar had a select body directly under his
control. The most important of these were the
wazir and the bakshi looked after military
organization. Thus they were both very
important but neither of them had total control
over the administration.
The emperor was the most powerful person of
the empire. There was the chief steward (Khan-i-
saman) who attended to the royal household.
The chief qazi held the highest position amongst
the judges. The wazir and the bakshi had a
number of officers working under them and the
central government knew what was going on in
the empire.
The emperor also took advice from others,
generally he would call them to Diwan-i-Khas or
his private apartments and consult them.
Akbar was available to his subjects in the large
audience hall called the Diwan-i-Aam. The
Mughal empire was divided into a number of
subas during the reign of Akbar. There were
fifteen subas. Every suba was divided into a
number of sarkars and each of these into a
number of parganas.
A group of villages made one paragana. The
governor of the province, the subedar, was the
most important person in the province. He
looked after the administration with the help of
other officers.
The diwan kept the records of the revenue from
the land. The bakshi sent regular news reports to
the capital and attended to the needs of the army
in suba.
There was another officer whose name is still
familiar in the towns and villages of northern
India. This was the Kotwal who was the officer in
charge of town administration. Police stations are
still sometimes called the Kotwali. The Kotwal
was responsible for investigating criminals. He
also inspected the weights and measures used by
Social Science-7
by them.
Another job which the Kotwal did was to keep a
register of all the persons living in the
neighbourhood including visiting foreigners.
The Income Sources
Akbar wanted that salaries be paid in cash, in
fact most of them had to be paid by grants of
land revenue called jagirs.
The officers collected revenue from the jagir
which was equivalent to their salaries. Because
these officers were paid their salaries in grant of
revenue, it was necessary to find out how much
revenue each village ought to provide. The state
took one-third of the produce and preferred the
revenue to be paid in money.
Raja Todarmal was asked to make an estimate of
the land revenue. When this had been done, a
careful record was kept. Akbar insisted on this
record being always up-to-date. This assessment
was also helpful to the peasants. Now, they
would know how much of their produce they
could keep and how much they had to give to
the state. Europeans visited the court of Akbar.
The Portuguese had already established their
trading settlements and were trading with
merchants on the west coast of India.
Literature and Art
Akbar was also very fond of poetry and could
quote from many poems. He was not, however,
very interested in the natural sciences. This was
unfortunate because if he had shown an interest
in the Renaissance or the new technology of the
Portuguese the progress of science in India would
have been more rapid.
Among his close friends with whom he had long
discussions were two brothers - Abul Fazl and
Faizi. Abul Fazl wrote a book, Akbarnama. The
official language of the Mughal empire was
Persian. Akbar and his friends encouraged the
translation into Persian of important works in
Sanskrit. The text of the Mahabharata and the
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