The victory over the sovereign of Delhi widened the limit of Sher Khan’s ambition and made him the de facto ruler of the territories extending from Kanauj in the west to the hills of Assam and Chittagong in the east and from the Himalayas in the north to the hills of Jharkhand (from Rohtas to Birbhum) and the Bay of Bengal in the south. To legalise what he had gained by the strength of arms and strategy, he now assumed the royal title of Sher Shah and ordered the Khutba to be read and the coins to be struck in his name. Next year Humayun made another attempt to recover his fortune, though he could not secure the co-operation of his brothers in spite of his best attempts. On the 17th May, 1540, the MughaIs and the Afghans met again opposite Kanauj. The army of Humayun, hopelessly demoralized, half-hearted and badly officered, was severely defeated by the Afghans at the battle of the Ganges or Bilgram, commonly known as the battle of Kanauj, and Humayun just managed to escape. Thus the work of Babur in India was undone, and the sovereignty of Hindustan once more passed to the Afghans. From this time Humayun had to lead the life of a wanderer for about fifteen years.
The sons of Babur failed to combine even at such a critical moment, though Humayun went to Lahore and did his beat to win them over. Their selfishness triumphed over common interests and Sher Shah was able to extend his authority to the Punjab also. The Afghan ruler marched, with his usual promptitude and vigour, to subdue the warlike hill tribes of the Gakkar country, situated between the upper courses of the Indus and the Jhelum. He ravaged this territory but could not thoroughly reduce the Gakkars, as he had to proceed hurriedly to Bengal in March, 1541, where his deputy had imprudently rebelled against his authority. He dismissed the rebel, ” changed the military character of the provincial administration and substituted a completely new mechanism, at once original in principle and efficient in working”. The province was divided into several districts, each of which was to be governed by an officer appointed directly by him and responsible to him alone.
Sher Shah next turned his attention against the Rajputs of the west, who had not yet recovered fully from the blow of Khanua. Having subjugated Malwa in A.D. 1542, he marched against Puran Mal of Raisin in Central India. After some resistance the garrison of the fort of Raisin capitulated, the Rajputs agreeing to evacuate the fort on condition that they were allowed to pass ” unmolested” beyond the frontier of Malwa. But the Afghans fell furiously on the people of the fort as soon as the latter had come outside the walls. To save their wives and children from disgrace, the Rajputs took their lives, and themselves died to a man, fighting bravely against their formidable foe, in 1543. The Raisin incident has been condemned by several writers as a great blot on the character of Sher Shah. Sind and Multan were annexed to the Afghan Empire by the governor of the Punjab. There remained only one more formidable enemy of Sher Shah to be subdued. He was Maldev, the Rajput ruler of Marwar, a consummate general and energetic ruler, whose territories extended over about 10,000 square miles. Instigated by some disaffected Rajput chiefs whose territories had been conquered by Maldev, Sher Khan led an expedition against the Rathor chief in A.D. 1544. Maldev, on his part, was not unprepared. Considering it inadvisable to risk an open battle with the Rathors in their own country, Sher Shah had recourse to a stratagem. He sent to MaIdev a few forged letters, said to have been written to him by the Rajput generals, promising him their help, and thus succeeded in frightening the Rathor ruler, who retreated from the field and took refuge in the fortress of Sivan. In spite of this, the generals of the Rajput army, like Jeta and Kama, with their followers, opposed Sher Shah’s army and fought with desperate valour, but only to meet a warrior’s death. Sher Shah won a victory, though at great cost, with the loss of several thousand Afghans on the battlefield and coming near to losing his empire. The Rajputs lost a chance of revival and the path was left open for undisputed Afghan supremacy over Northern India. After this success, Sher Shah reduced to submission the whole region from Ajmer to Abu and marched to besiege the fort of Kalinjar. He succeeded in capturing the fort, but died from an accidental explosion of gunpowder on the 22nd May, 1545. A brave warrior and a successful conqueror, Sher Shah was the architect of a brilliant administrative system, which elicited admiration even from eulogists of his enemies, the Mughuls. In fact, his qualities as a ruler were more remarkable than his victories on the field of battle. His brief reign of five years was marked by the introduction of wise and salutary chances in every conceivable branch of administration. Some of these were by way of revival and reformation of the traditional features of the old administrative systems of India, Hindu as well as Muslim, while others were entirely original in character, and form, indeed, a link between ancient and modern lndia. “No government—not even the British,” affirms Mr. Keene, “has shown so much wisdom as this Pathan.” Though Sher Shah’s government was a highly centralised system, crowned by a bureaucracy, with real power concentrated in the hands of the King, he was not an unbridled autocrat, regardless of the rights and interests of the people. In the spirit of an enlightened despot, he “attempted to found an empire broadly based upon the people’s will”.
For convenience of administration, the whole Empire was divided into forty-seven units (sarkars), each of which was again subdivided into several paraganas. The paragana had one Amin, one Shiqdar, one treasurer, one Hindu writer and one Persian writer to keep accounts. Over the next higher administrative unit, the sarkar, were placed a Shiqdar-i-Shiqdaran and a Munsif-i-Munsifan to supervise the work of the paragana officers. To check undue influence of the officers in their respective jurisdictions, the King devised the plan of transferring them every two or three years, which, however, could not be long enduring owing to the brief span of his rule. Every branch of the administration was subject to Sher Shah’s personal supervision. Like Asoka and Harsha, he acted up to the maxim that “it behoves the great to be always active.”
Sher Shah’s land revenue reforms, based on wise and humane principles, have unique importance in the administrative history of India; for they served as the model for future agrarian systems. After a careful and proper survey of the lands, he settled the land revenue direct with the cultivators, the State demand being fixed at one-fourth or one-third of the average produce, payable either in kind or in cash, the latter method being preferred. For actual collection of revenue the Government utilized the services of officers like the Amins, the Maqadams, the Shiqdaras, the Qanungos and the Patwaris. Punctual and full payment of the assessed amount was insisted on and enforced, if necessary, by Sher Shah. He instructed the revenue officials to show leniency at the time of assessment and to be strict at the time of collection of revenues.
