THE SUR EMPIRE

Sher Shah Suri (AD 1540 - 1545) 

He was the founder of Sur empire. He began his career with the administration of his father Hasan's Iqta at Sasaram in Bihar. He moved to the court of the Afghan ruler of Bihar, Bahar Khan Lohani, who gave him the title Sher Khan  for his bravery. 

The Sur Administration

An idea of Sher Shah's administrative structure is provided by his historian Abbas Khan Sarwani in the book Tarikh-i-Sher Shahi. 

Local Administration

1. Provinces were divided into Sarkars headed by Shiqdar-i-Shiqdaran (incharge of law and order) and Munsif-i-mansifan (incharge of local revenue).

Sarkars divided into Paraganas headed by Shiqdars and Munsif or Amin. 

2. Paraganas further divided into villages under headmen.

Land Revenue Administration

1. Sher Shah's Land Revenue Policy is an important landmark in the history of Indian Agrarian System.

2. After a survey of the lands, Sher Shah settled the land revenue directly with the tillers of the soil. 

3. Peasants had to pay Jaribana (survey charge i.e. 25%) and Muhasilana (tax collection charge 5%). 

Some important features of Sher Shah's land revenue arrangement were as follows:

• Assessment of land revenue on the basis of measurement of land. For measurement of the land, Sikandari Gaja (32 inches) was made the base. 

• Drawing up of schedules of crop rates on the basis of the quality of land. 

• Classification of land into three categories on the basis of their yield (good, bad and middling).

• Computation of the produce of three kinds of land and fixing 1/3rd of their average as the land revenue, payable either in cash or kind. 

• The rights and liabilities of the tenants were clearly defined in documents known as pattas (title deeds) and qabooliyats (deed of agreement). Each peasant thus, knew what he had to pay. 

Military Administration

1. Dispensation of tribal levies and beginning of direct recruitment of soldiers. Payment of salaries to the soldiers in cash. 

2. Maintenance of chehra or descriptive rolls of soldiers and dagh or the branding of horses. 

3. Setting-up of cantonments in different places and posting a garrison in each of them.

The Sur Architecture

1. Sher Shah was also a great builder. He got build sarais  or rest-houses along the roads for the convenience of the traders and travellers. 

2. Sher Shah's Chief architect Aliwal Khan constructed the tomb of Hasan Khan, the father of Shah and the octagonal mausoleum which Sher Shah built for himself at Sasaram. It is made of Chunar sandstone. 

3. The old fort (Purana Quila) in Delhi, whose surviving monuments are Qilai-Kuhna Masjid and the Sher Mandal library, is another important architectural creation of Sher Shah. 

Infrastructure Development

Sher Shah improved communications by buildings roads. Four important roads constructed by him were as follows: 

• Grand Trunk road from Sunargaon in East Bengal to Peshawar. 

• Road from Agra to Multan via Burhanpur and Delhi. 

• Road from Multan to Lahore. 

• Road from Mandu to Agra. 

• Out of four roads, the first was the most important. The roads built by Sher Shah are called the arteries of the empire. 

• Sher Shah introduced a regular postal service and attempted the standardization of weights and measures.