Mughal Empire: previous-year questions

Answer: (B) MirJumla

Mir Jumla (Mir Muhammad Said), a Persian merchant who had risen to be wazir of Golconda and controlled its diamond mines, went over to the Mughals and presented the Kohinoor to Shah Jahan in 1656. He later became Aurangzeb's governor of Bengal and died in 1663 after his Assam campaign. Journey of the diamond: Mughals, then Nadir Shah (1739, who gave it the name Koh-i-Noor, 'Mountain of Light'), Ahmad Shah Abdali, Shah Shuja, Maharaja Ranjit Singh (1813), and the British after the annexation of Punjab (1849). Murad, Aurangzeb and Dara Shikoh were Shah Jahan's sons (the fourth being Shuja), who fought the war of succession of 1657-58.

Answer: (B) Sher Shah

Sher Shah Suri (1540-45) built or restored the Sadak-e-Azam from Sonargaon in Bengal to the Indus near Peshawar, with shade trees and about 1,700 sarais (rest houses, set roughly two kos apart) that also served as dak-chaukis (postal stations); the British later renamed it the Grand Trunk Road. His other roads ran from Agra to Burhanpur, Agra to Jodhpur and Chittor, and Lahore to Multan. Also remember his silver rupiya and copper dam, land measurement with patta and qabuliyat, and his tomb at Sasaram. He defeated Humayun at Chausa (1539) and Kannauj (1540) and died at the siege of Kalinjar (1545). Humayun, Akbar and Jahangir used and maintained the road but did not lay it out.

Answer: (C) Akbar

Akbar abolished the pilgrim tax on Hindu pilgrims in 1563 and the jizya (poll tax on non-Muslims) in 1564, early steps in his policy of sulh-i-kul (peace with all). Timeline of his religious policy: 1562, ban on enslaving prisoners of war; 1575, Ibadat Khana at Fatehpur Sikri; 1579, the Mahzar (so-called infallibility decree); 1582, Tauhid-i-Ilahi (Din-i-Ilahi). Jizya was reimposed by Aurangzeb in 1679. Of the other options, Humayun and Sher Shah made no such change, and Jahangir is remembered for his chain of justice and twelve ordinances rather than tax reform.

Answer: (A) Abdur Rahim Khan-I-Khanan

Babur wrote his memoirs, the Tuzuk-i-Baburi or Baburnama, in Chagatai Turki, his mother tongue. They were translated into Persian in 1589-90 on Akbar's orders by Abdur Rahim Khan-i-Khanan, son of Bairam Khan, one of Akbar's 'nine gems' and himself a famous Hindi poet (Rahim's dohas). The distractors and their works: Badauni wrote Muntakhab-ut-Tawarikh and translated the Ramayana into Persian; Faizi, Abul Fazl's brother, translated Lilavati and wrote Nal-Daman; Gulbadan Begum, Babur's daughter, wrote the Humayun-nama. Abul Fazl wrote the Akbarnama and Ain-i-Akbari, and the Mahabharata was translated into Persian as the Razmnama.

Answer: (D) Aurangzeb

Aurangzeb took the title Alamgir (‘conqueror of the world’) on his accession in 1658. Jahangir's own name means ‘conqueror of the world’ too, which makes it the tempting option, but the title Alamgir belongs to Aurangzeb.

Answer: (A) Aurangzeb

Akbar abolished the jizya in 1564, and Aurangzeb reimposed it on non-Muslims in 1679. Jahangir and Shah Jahan did not reimpose it, and Bahadur Shah came after Aurangzeb.

Answer: (B) Abul Fazal.

The Akbarnama, the official history of Akbar's reign whose third volume is the Ain-i-Akbari, was written by Abul Fazl. Faizi was his brother and a court poet, Bairam Khan was Akbar's regent, and Akbar himself did not write it.

Answer: (A) Sir Thomas Roe

Sir Thomas Roe was James I's ambassador at Jahangir's court from 1615 to 1619 and obtained trading rights for the English. Ibn Battuta visited Muhammad bin Tughlaq, while Nuniz and Paes were Portuguese visitors to Vijayanagara.

Answer: (A) 1526

The First Battle of Panipat was fought on 21 April 1526, when Babur defeated Ibrahim Lodi and founded the Mughal Empire. 1528 is the year of the Battle of Chanderi, and the other years are unrelated.

Answer: (A) Akbar

Akbar built the Ibadat Khana (House of Worship) at Fatehpur Sikri in 1575 to hold debates among scholars of different faiths. These discussions led to his Din-i-Ilahi; the later emperors did not found it.

Answer: (C) Aurangzed

Textbooks list the Yusufzai revolt among the risings of Aurangzeb's reign: the Yusufzai Afghans of the north-west rose in 1667 under their leader Bhagu and were put down, and the Afridi and Khattak risings followed in the 1670s. Akbar also fought the Yusufzais in 1586, the campaign in which Birbal was killed, which makes (B) the tempting option, but the ‘Yusufzai revolt’ of the textbooks is the 1667 rising. Shah Jahan and Jahangir faced no Yusufzai rising of note.

Answer: (C) Sher Shah

Sher Shah Suri's revenue system gave each cultivator a patta (title deed stating his land and dues), and the cultivator signed a kabuliyat (deed of acceptance). Akbar's Todar Mal system built on these reforms, but they were introduced by Sher Shah.

Answer: (D) Badauni

Abdul Qadir Badauni wrote the Muntakhab-ut-Tawarikh, a history critical of Akbar's religious policy. Nizamuddin Ahmad wrote the Tabaqat-i-Akbari, Faizi was a court poet, and Amir Khusrau belongs to the Sultanate period.

Answer: (C) Todarmal

Raja Todar Mal, Akbar's finance minister, introduced the Zabti or Dahsala system based on measured land and average produce. Man Singh was a general, Birbal a courtier, and Jai Singh served Aurangzeb.

Answer: (C) 1739

Nadir Shah of Persia invaded India in 1739, defeated Muhammad Shah at Karnal and sacked Delhi, carrying away the Peacock Throne and the Koh-i-Noor. The other years are not linked to his invasion.

Answer: (B) Akbar

Akbar promulgated Din-i-Ilahi (also called Tauhid-i-Ilahi, "divine monotheism") in 1582. It grew out of the religious debates in the Ibadat Khana at Fatehpur Sikri (built 1575), the Mahzar of 1579 and his policy of Sulh-i-kul (peace with all). It had no scripture, priesthood or place of worship, and Birbal was the only prominent Hindu to join. Babur founded the Mughal empire and wrote the Baburnama; Jahangir wrote the Tuzuk-i-Jahangiri and installed the chain of justice; Shah Jahan built the Taj Mahal, Red Fort and Jama Masjid.

Answer: (C) Aurangzeb

Aurangzeb (reigned 1658–1707) took the title Alamgir ("seizer of the world") at his coronation; he is called Alamgir I because a later Mughal, Alamgir II, ruled from 1754 to 1759. Aurangzeb reimposed the jizya (1679), had Guru Tegh Bahadur executed (1675), annexed Bijapur (1686) and Golconda (1687), and died at Ahmednagar. Titles of the others: Akbar was Jalaluddin Muhammad, Jahangir was Nuruddin Muhammad (Salim), and Bahadur Shah II "Zafar" was the last Mughal emperor, exiled to Rangoon after 1857. Bahadur Shah I was also known as Shah Alam I.

Answer: (C) Farrukhshiyar

Farrukhsiyar (1713–19) issued the farman of 1717, often called the "Magna Carta of the Company". It allowed the English East India Company to trade in Bengal free of duties for an annual payment of ₹3,000, to issue dastaks (passes) for its goods and to rent more villages around Calcutta. It was obtained by the Surman embassy, helped by the surgeon William Hamilton, who had cured the emperor. Misuse of dastaks later caused friction with the Nawabs of Bengal and led towards Plassey. Shah Alam II granted the Diwani in 1765; Muhammad Shah "Rangeela" faced Nadir Shah's invasion in 1739; Bahadur Shah II was the emperor of 1857.

Answer: (C) Amarkot

Akbar was born in 1542 at Amarkot (Umerkot) in Sindh, where his father Humayun had taken refuge with a local Rajput ruler after being driven out by Sher Shah. Akbar was later crowned in 1556 at Kalanaur in the Gurdaspur district of Punjab. Nagarkot is the old name of the Kangra fort area, plundered by Mahmud of Ghazni in 1009. Pathankot and Sialkot are towns of the Punjab region with no link to Akbar's birth.

Answer: (C) Babur Namah

Babur wrote his memoirs, the Baburnama or Tuzuk-i-Baburi, in his mother tongue Chaghatai Turkish. It was translated into Persian in Akbar's reign by Abdur Rahim Khan-i-Khanan. The Chach Nama is a history of Sindh describing the Arab conquest by Muhammad bin Qasim in 712. The Shah Nama is Firdausi's Persian epic, written at the court of Mahmud of Ghazni.