Discuss the Iqta system of the Sultanate
period.
Answers
Explanation:
IQTA :
Iqta‘ (Arabic: اقطاع) was an Islamic practice of tax farming that became common in Muslim Asia during the Buyid dynasty. The prominent Orientalist Claude Cahen described the Iqta‘ as follows:
a form of administrative grant, often (wrongly) translated by the European word "fief". The nature of the iḳṭāʿ varied according to time and place, and a translation borrowed from other systems of institutions and conceptions has served only too often to mislead Western historians, and following them, even those of the East.[1]
Unlike European systems, the Muqtis had no right to interfere with the personal life of a paying person if the person stayed on the Muqti's land. Also, Iqtas were not hereditary by law and had to be confirmed by a higher authority (like the sultan or the king). Individual iqta holders in Middle Eastern societies had little incentive to provide public goods to the localities assigned to them. The overarching theme was state power where the iqta was revocable and uninheritable. Though not an investment in a particular holding of land, the iqta—as a fiscal device—gave soldiers a vested interest in the regime.