Correct Answer - Option 1 : A rank or office
The correct answer is A rank or office.
- The term mansabdar refers to an individual who holds a mansab, meaning a position or rank.
- It was a grading system used by the Mughals to fix rank,
-
salary and
- military responsibilities.
- The mansabdar’s military responsibilities required him to maintain a specified number of sawar or cavalrymen.
- The mansabdar brought his cavalrymen for review, got them registered, their horses branded and then received money to pay them as salary.
- Mansabdars received their salaries as revenue assignments called jagirs which were somewhat like iqtas.
- But unlike muqtis, most mansabdars did not actually reside in or administer their jagirs.
- They only had rights to the revenue of their assignments which was collected for them by their servants while the mansabdars themselves served in some other part of the country.
- Rank and salary were determined by a numerical value called zat.
- The higher the zat, the more prestigious was the noble’s position in court and the larger his salary.
