Question

Why was it important for the Mughals to recruit mansabdars from diverse backgrounds and just Turanis and Iranis?

Answer 1

Hint:
The concept of Mansabdars was first introduced under the Mughal Empire.
It was during the reign of the great emperor Akbar.
The word Mansabdar is derived from the Arabic word ‘Mansab’ which means rank or position or role.

Complete answer:
The concept of Mansabdars was first introduced under the Mughal Empire during the reign of the great emperor Akbar. This system divided military, government officials, provincial governors and commanders on the basis of ranks or position. According to the ranks assigned the salaries and allowances were decided. One thousand was taken as the reference to give the name of their posts such as mansabdars having rank one thousand or below was called Amir and those above one thousand was called Amir al Kabir and those mansabdars whose rank was above five thousand was called Amir al Umara. Some of the main features of the mansabdari system are as follows:-

> Mansabdars were appointed by the King. He has the power to increase or decrease their numbers.
> The functions to be performed by the mansabdars can be civil or military based.
> The salary of the mansabdars was given in cash.
> Out of their salary they also had to manage the expense of horses, elephants, camels etc.
> The number of horses, elephants, camels to be maintained by the mansabdars depends on their ranks. Higher ranks meant more maintenance as the soldiers under the control of them were also more.
> This system was not hereditary.
> The no soldiers which were given to each mansabdars was decided based on their ranks.

With the reigns of different Mughal emperors the mansabdari system differed in areas such as their salary, number of soldiers held by them under control, decrease in the number of categories, control over them by emperor.

As the territory under control of the Mughal empire was very vast and extended around most parts of the India and the people backgrounds differ very much and it was not possible for Mansabdars coming from single background to control all the areas which comes under the control of Mughal empire and hence Mansabdars which belongs to diverse backgrounds were started to be appointed. For example: - Rajputs, Marathas, Afghans and Indian Muslims.

Note:
The regions under the control of Mughals were Bengal, Bihar, Chittor, Deccan, Delhi, Gujarat, Kabul, Mewar, Marwar, Orissa and Sindh.
Uzbeks in the Mughal period were the largest Turkic ethnic group in Central Asia.
The capital of Mirza Hakim who was Akbar’s half-brother was Kabul.