The Delhi Sultanate and the Mughals
Class 7 Social Science · History · 23 questions with answers
Class 7 History is not a longer list of kings than Class 6 - it is the year the questions start asking why. Why did a ruler make a change, what problem was it meant to solve, and did it work? These questions are built in that shape, because a date learned without a reason attached is a date that will not survive to the exam.
- Places the main dynasties of the Delhi Sultanate and the Mughals in order
- Explains an administrative measure by the problem it was meant to solve
- Says why a policy succeeded or failed rather than only naming it
- Uses a date to support an explanation rather than as the answer itself
Exercise 1 of 3 · 5 questions
Put these in chronological order, and give the century for each.
Put in order · Warm-up
Here’s one done for you
The two dates worth actually memorising are 1206 and 1526 - the beginning and the end of the Delhi Sultanate, with the Mughal Empire starting at the second. Everything else can be placed between them by reasoning rather than recall. A child who knows those two anchors can order almost anything in this syllabus.
- 1)A. The Lodi dynasty rules Delhi
- 2)B. Qutbuddin Aibak founds the Slave dynasty
- 3)C. Babur wins the First Battle of Panipat
- 4)D. Alauddin Khalji rules Delhi
- 5)E. Muhammad bin Tughlaq shifts the capital to Daulatabad
Answers
- 1) B (1206, thirteenth century), D (from 1296, turn of the fourteenth), E (1320s-30s, fourteenth century), A (1451-1526, fifteenth into sixteenth), C (1526, sixteenth century). The whole Delhi Sultanate runs from 1206 to 1526, and the Mughal Empire begins where it ends.
Exercise 2 of 3 · 10 questions
Name the measure, then say what problem it was meant to solve.
Write the answer · Guided
Here’s one done for you
The market control measures: Alauddin Khalji fixed prices so that he could pay a large standing army in cash, and he needed that army because of the Mongol invasions. Notice the chain - measure, purpose, and the situation behind the purpose. In Class 7, naming the measure is a mark; the chain is the answer.
- 1)Alauddin Khalji's control of market prices
- 2)Muhammad bin Tughlaq's shift of the capital to Daulatabad
- 3)The iqta system of the Delhi Sultanate
- 4)Akbar's abolition of the jizya
- 5)The mansabdari system under the Mughals
- 6)Sher Shah Suri's building of the Grand Trunk Road
- 7)Akbar's marriage alliances with Rajput houses
- 8)The building of stepwells and tanks by Sultanate rulers
- 9)Balban's insistence on elaborate court ceremony
- 10)Akbar's land revenue settlement, the zabt
Answers
- 1) He fixed the prices of grain, cloth and other goods so that he could pay a large standing army in cash without their wages being eaten by inflation. The army was needed against repeated Mongol invasions.
- 2) He wanted a capital nearer the centre of an empire that now stretched deep into the Deccan, so that the south could be governed and defended more easily. The move failed because of the enormous hardship of shifting an entire population that far.
- 3) Land revenue was assigned to a commander (a muqti) instead of a salary, so that soldiers could be maintained without moving cash across a large empire. It solved a payment problem and created a loyalty one, because assignees could grow independent.
- 4) The jizya was a tax on non-Muslims, and abolishing it was part of Akbar's policy of sulh-i kul - peace with all - meant to make an empire of many faiths governable by making its subjects feel less like subjects.
- 5) Every officer was given a rank, a mansab, that fixed both his position and the number of cavalry he had to maintain. It gave the empire one clear ladder of service instead of many local arrangements.
- 6) A long, maintained highway with rest houses. It let armies, officials and traders move quickly across the empire, which made both control and trade far easier.
- 7) Marriage alliances with Rajput houses. They turned powerful rivals into partners in the empire, which cost far less than defeating each of them in war.
- 8) Stepwells and tanks. They stored water through the dry months, which a growing town could not do without, and they also displayed the ruler's care for his people.
- 9) An elaborate and distant court ceremony. It was meant to make the Sultan appear far above his nobles, so that none of them thought of himself as an equal who might replace him.
- 10) The zabt, a revenue settlement based on measured land and average yields. It made the tax demand predictable for both the peasant and the state, instead of depending on a local official's guess.
Exercise 3 of 3 · 8 questions
Answer in three or four sentences.
Write the answer · Practice
Here’s one done for you
The token currency: he issued bronze and copper coins at the value of silver, the state could not stop forgeries, people paid taxes in fake coins, and the currency had to be withdrawn. Four sentences, four links in a chain. 'It failed because it was a bad idea' is not an answer - the mark is for the mechanism by which it failed.
- 1)Why is Razia Sultan remembered even though she ruled for less than four years?
- 2)Why did Muhammad bin Tughlaq's token currency fail?
- 3)What did Akbar mean by sulh-i kul, and why did it matter for an empire like his?
- 4)Why do historians rely on the Ain-i Akbari, and what should we be careful about when using it?
- 5)Why did the Delhi Sultanate find it so hard to control distant provinces?
- 6)Why were temples and mosques often built or repaired by rulers rather than by ordinary people?
- 7)How did the coming of the Turks change warfare in India?
- 8)Why did the Mughals keep detailed revenue records, and what did that allow them to do?
Answers
- 1) She was the only woman to rule the Delhi Sultanate, and she was chosen by Iltutmish over his sons because he judged her the abler ruler. Her reign was short because the nobles were unwilling to accept a woman as sultan, which is itself the point - her rule shows both what was possible and what the nobility would not tolerate.
- 2) He issued bronze and copper coins to be used at the value of silver ones. Because the coins were easy to imitate and the state could not control who minted them, forgeries spread and people paid their taxes in the fake coins. The state was left with worthless metal and had to withdraw the currency.
- 3) Sulh-i kul means peace with all - the idea that the state should not favour one religion over another. It mattered because Akbar ruled an empire of many faiths and communities, and a ruler seen as belonging to only one of them would have faced constant resistance from the rest.
- 4) It is a detailed official account of Akbar's administration - revenue, ranks, provinces - written by Abul Fazl, and there is little else with that much administrative detail. The care needed is that Abul Fazl was Akbar's own courtier writing for him, so the account presents the reign as the emperor wished it seen.
- 5) Because distances were huge and news travelled at the speed of a horse. A governor far from Delhi could raise his own army and declare independence long before the Sultan even heard of it.
- 6) Because only rulers commanded the revenue and the labour such buildings needed. A large temple or mosque also announced who held power in that region, so it served the ruler as well as the worshipper.
- 7) They brought fast cavalry, the iron stirrup and better mounted archery. That made speed and manoeuvre decisive, where Indian armies had relied heavily on elephants and infantry.
- 8) Because revenue was the empire's income and it had to be predictable. Detailed records let them fix a fair demand, compare provinces, spot a failing harvest and pay a very large army on time.
While your child works
- Ask 'why did they do that?' after every fact. A date with no reason attached will not survive to the exam.
- Two dates carry this whole syllabus - 1206 and 1526. Everything else can be reasoned into place between them.
- The last exercise is the one that predicts the paper. If time runs short, do those four rather than the ordering.