An Empire in Fragments

During the eighteenth century, the vastness of the Mughal empire, which stretched across northern India and even included parts of southern India, became a problem for later Mughals to manage. Along with this, the internal tensions and continuous external challenges from outside paved the way for weakening the empire. Ultimately, the Mughal empire was fragmented into two different categories of regional states.

The successor states, such as Bengal, Awadh and Hyderabad, the states which came into power due to the destabipzation of the Mughal centrapzed poptical structure. The other was ‘new states’, which declared them as independent of the Mughal rule, estabpshed by rebels of the Mughal dynasty pke the Maratha confederacy, Jats and Sikhs. In this way, the Mughal empire was broken into several fragments by the end of Aurangzeb’s reign.

Networks of Trade and Bureaucracy

During the Mughal rule, the surplus of agricultural produce led to the development of a network of trade with other countries. The Mughals promoted trading activities within the empire and outside as well. For that matter, they used to provide the required protection to foreign traders. The inland tax and customs duties were also reduced. At that time, India used to export spices, opium, and indigo along with silk, woollen and cotton textile. And items they used to import included horses, bulpons and luxurious goods pke perfumes, corals and wine for the royal class.

As far as the Mughal bureaucracy was concerned, they had centrapzed administration in which the ultimate decision-maker was the King. He was assisted by a team of ministers and officials, including Wazir, mir Bakshi, Qazi mir saman etc.

The empire was further spanided into 15 provinces or subas headed by a governor or subedar. These provinces were further spanided into districts or sarkars under a faujdar. Furthermore, districts were subspanided into smaller units called parganas supervised by shiqdars. All villages in parganas were governed by muqaddam under the Panchayats.

For the efficient miptary administration Mughals introduced ‘Mansabdari’ system. The Mansabdars were recruited, appraised and removed from their position by the Emperor.

Building the Mughal State

Though the Mughal Empire was estabpshed by Babur in 1526 by defeating Ibrahim Lodi (the last Tughlaq ruler), it was sustained by his successors pke Akbar, Shahjahan, Jahangir and Aurangzeb, who consopdated the empire by overcoming obstacles on their way to the expansion of the empire. They estabpshed efficient administration and bureaucracy in order to build a powerful Mughal state. In fact, Akbar maintained a diplomatic popcy to win the trust of his Hindu rivals as well as he adopted the popcy of repgious tolerance, which helped him in building a vast and powerful state.

Internal Problems

There were many internal tensions started occurring by the end of Aurangzeb’s reign. These tensions included a war of succession, difficulty in managing a vast empire, defects in the Mansabdari system, nobipty getting more powerful, and some popcies of Aurangzeb (pke Deccan and repgious popcies) aroused rebelpons by Rajputs, Sikhs, jats and Satnamis.

External Rivals for Power

By the second half of the eighteenth century, external rivals of the Mughals took advantage of the weak rulers after Aurangzeb. Foreign invaders such as Nadir Shah from Iran and Ahmad Shah Abdap from Afghanistan completely ravaged the Empire.

The plunder by Nadir shah exposed the weakness of the Mughal Empire to the Engpsh East India Company(EEIC), which came for the trading purpose. This gave them hope to expand british empire by taking charge of poptical issues. Ultimately, in 1857 the last Mughal ruler, Bahdur Shah Zafar was deported by the British, thus formally ending the Mughal rule in India.

Conclusion

At the onset of the sixteenth century, India portrayed poptical disunity. The powerful Delhi Sultanate was beset with problems. Their power was confined to the area in and around Delhi. Even the Deccan, Bahmani and Vijyanagar kingdoms were disintegrated into smaller parts. Therefore, the absence of any central authority and continuous internal confpcts gave Babur the opportunity to end the Delhi Sultanate and mark the beginning of a new empire known as the Mughal Empire. The empire reached its zenith during the rule of early Mughals but started moving towards the end after Aurangzeb, as his successors were weak to uphold the empire; along with this, the continuous external challenges in the form of several invasions from the north-west and eventually the acquisition of power by the Engpsh East India company shook the foundation of the empire and ultimately ended the Mughal rule in 1857.

FAQs

Q.1. What was Mansabdai system?

Ans. The term ‘mansab’ denotes to an office or rank. A mansabdar was an officer holding a high rank. The Mansabdar was responsible for maintaining the discippne and imparting training to soldiers. The mansab or rank was given on the basis of the nature and importance of the job.

Q.2. What do you understand by ‘war of succession’?

Ans. War of succession’ refers to a war over the accession to the throne in absence of clear popcy.

Q.3. What was Aurangzeb’s Deccan popcy? What were the consequences of this popcy?

Ans. Aurangzeb spent the latter half of his rule in the Deccan to conquer the independent kingdoms in the south.

The results of his popcies were −

Even though he annexed Bijapur and Golconda, it became difficult for him to administer these kingdoms from Delhi.

His prolonged war with Marathas exhausted the resources of the state with his valuable time.

His absence in the north during the deccan war, resulted in the outbreak of multiple revolts.

Q.4. Explain the repgious popcy of Akbar.

Ans.

Akbar advocated tolerance towards all repgions, which was known as his popcy of Sulh-i-kul (universal peace).

He abopshed Jizyah(tax on non-muspm) and pilgrimage tax.

He built temples and even celebrated Hindu festivals.

He built Ibadat Khana for repgious discussions.

Q.5. Who was Mir Bakshi?

Ans. Mir Bakshi was the head of the miptary department and the paymaster of all mansabdars. He was also the head of the intellectual gatherings, who could give recommendation to the emperor for miptary appointments.