Mansab ranks of zat and sawar

Also called: Zat and sawar · Topic: The Mughal Empire: Babur to Aurangzeb · NCERT: Beyond NCERT

Meaning

Zat and sawar were the two numbers that made up every Mughal mansabdar's rank (mansab). The zat number fixed his personal rank at court and his own salary. The sawar number fixed how many cavalrymen (horsemen) he had to keep for the state. Rank was set by these two numbers together.

This split made Mughal rank more exact. One number covered the officer's status and pay. The other covered his military duty. So the emperor could raise a man's honour without raising his troop duty, or the other way round.

Explanation

Background: why one number was not enough

• Mansab means rank, and a mansabdar is the person who holds it. Akbar used mansabdari to rebuild his government for control and efficiency.
• Each mansab fixed three things at once:
• his personal standing at court,
• his salary,

• the number of troops he had to keep ready.

• With a single number, status and military duty were tied together. A noble who deserved more honour automatically had to keep more horsemen, even when the state did not need them.

• In the later years of Akbar's reign the rank became dual (two-part). Each mansabdar now held a zat rank and a sawar rank. Historians date this change to the later part of the reign, but not to one agreed year.

The two parts

• Zat (personal rank):
• It was a number. The higher the zat, the higher the noble's place at court.
• It fixed his personal salary.

• Ranks were granted only by the emperor. There were 33 grades, from 10 up to 5,000. 5,000 was the highest rank an ordinary subject could hold, as opposed to a prince [1].

• Sawar (cavalry rank):

• It fixed the number of horsemen the officer had to maintain.
• It also brought him an extra allowance to pay and equip those horsemen.

• As a rule, the sawar number could not be higher than the zat number.

• The three classes of mansabdars (the usual textbook account):

• First class: sawar equal to zat.
• Second class: sawar half of zat or more.

• Third class: sawar less than half of zat.

• Example: a "1,000 zat / 500 sawar" officer had the court status and pay of a 1,000-rank noble. He only had to keep 500 horsemen, so he was in the second class.

How it worked in practice

• Mansabdars had to keep exact numbers of elephants, horses, camels and troops for the state, as their rank required.
• Payment came through land, not cash:
• Mansabdars were generally paid through a jagir (a piece of land whose revenue the officer collected in place of a salary).
• So they were also called jagirdars.

• The officer did not own the jagir. He only took its revenue, and jagirs could be transferred.

• Inspections kept the sawar number honest:

• The Mir Bakhshi (the minister for military matters) kept the pay and muster rolls (attendance lists) of officers and troops.
• At regular inspections, officers had to bring the men and animals their rank required.

• Without these checks, the sawar rank would exist only on paper.

• Ranks could always change. Mansabs were neither hereditary nor permanent. A son did not automatically get his father's rank, and promotion or demotion depended on the emperor [1].

• The same ranks covered civil posts. Mansabdars held both military commands and civil posts [1]. So a revenue officer also had zat and sawar numbers.

Results and later strain

• An army without a standing army:
• The horsemen counted in the sawar rank stayed with mansabdars across the empire.
• When war came, the emperor called them up, and an army formed at short notice.

• The state did not have to pay a large army in peacetime.

• A mixed nobility: Akbar used the system to turn a loose group of Muslim war-chiefs into a bureaucratic service drawn from different communities, including Hindus [1]. Even so, non-Muslims rarely made up more than one-third of the higher administration.

• Strain by Aurangzeb's time:
• Every zat and sawar rank had to be paid for, mostly through jagirs.
• As the empire grew, more ranks were given out, but there was not enough good jagir land to pay them all.
• This put growing pressure on the system.

Time, place and evidence

• Period: the Mughal Empire (1526–1707). The dual zat–sawar form took shape in the later years of Akbar's reign and continued under his successors up to Aurangzeb.
• Where: across the Mughal empire, including its twelve subahs (provinces). Each subah had its own copy of the central ministers, including a provincial bakhshi who handled military records.
• Key people:
• Akbar, who reshaped mansabdari.
• The Mir Bakhshi, who kept rolls and inspection records.

• Abul Fazl, who recorded the system.

• Evidence:

• Abul Fazl describes the mansabdari system in detail in the Ain-i-Akbari.
• The Ain-i-Akbari is the third and final volume of his Akbarnama [3].
• The Ain survives as a rare book and in published English volumes held in national digital collections [4].

Don't confuse with

• Zat vs sawar: zat is the personal rank and salary, while sawar is the number of cavalrymen to be kept. A common trap is to swap the two.
• Mansab vs jagir: a mansab is a rank (the zat and sawar numbers). A jagir is the land revenue assignment that paid for that rank. The holder did not own the jagir.
• Mansabdari vs zabt: mansabdari is about rank, pay and troops. Zabt is a revenue system based on Todar Mal's survey of yields, prices and cultivated area over ten years [2].
• Mansabdar vs Mir Bakhshi: a mansabdar is any holder of a rank. The Mir Bakhshi is the central minister for military matters who kept the pay and muster rolls of mansabdars.

Prelims Hooks

• Zat = personal rank and salary; sawar = number of cavalrymen to be maintained.
• Mansab ranks ran in 33 grades from 10 to 5,000. 5,000 was the highest for a non-royal subject [1].
• The dual zat–sawar form came in the later years of Akbar's reign.
• Mansabs were granted only by the emperor and were not hereditary or permanent [1].
• Mansabdari is described in the Ain-i-Akbari by Abul Fazl, the third volume of the Akbarnama [3].
• Mansabdars were paid mainly through jagirs, so they were also called jagirdars. The Mir Bakhshi kept their pay and muster rolls.

Mains Points

• Two numbers, two jobs. By splitting rank into zat and sawar, the Mughal state could reward a noble's status separately from his military duty. This let the emperor build a graded, flexible nobility tied directly to the throne. Because ranks were emperor-granted and non-hereditary [1], this made nobles loyal.
• A cheap army, but a fragile one. The sawar rank put the cost of cavalry on mansabdars, who were paid through jagirs. This gave the state an army on call without peacetime cost. But it depended on two things:
• inspections had to work, so that sawar numbers were real,
• there had to be enough jagir land to pay every rank.

As ranks multiplied by Aurangzeb's time, the second condition weakened. This helps explain the later strain on Mughal administration.

• Inclusion with limits. Zat–sawar ranks drew Rajputs and other Hindus into imperial service and turned war-chiefs into a mixed-community bureaucracy [1]. Yet non-Muslims rarely crossed one-third of higher posts, and nobles of foreign origin were preferred. This is useful for a balanced answer on Akbar's "liberal" state.

Related concepts

• Diwan
• Mir Bakhshi
• Mir Saman
• Sadr-us-Sudur
• Qazi-ul-Quzat
• Muhtasib
• Subah
• Sarkar
• Pargana
• Faujdar

Read more

• Administering the empire