Mughal Bengal

Mughal Bengal covers the period from the Mughal conquest of Bengal in 1576 to the effective transfer of Bengal’s revenues to the East India Company in the eighteenth century. During it the province, the Subah Bangala, was administered by a subahdar or nazim, and Bengal’s subahdars held office for longer on average than those of other Mughal provinces. The period ends with the emergence of Murshid Quli Khan, whose career combined the offices of diwan and nazim and under whom the provincial capital moved from Dhaka to Murshidabad in 1717.

The Mughal conquest

The independent sultanate of Bengal had come to an end with the fall of Ghiyasuddin Mahmud Shah, the last Husain Shahi sultan, in 1538 ¹. Daud Khan Karrani, the last of the Karranis, was defeated at the battle of Tukaroi in 1575 by Munim Khan; the treaty of Katak of 12 April 1575 ceded practically the whole of Bengal and Bihar to the Mughals, with Daud retaining only Orissa ¹.

After Munim Khan’s death, Daud recaptured territory as far as Teliagarhi, while eastern Bengal was held by Isa Khan and his associates, who drove away the Mughal war-boat flotilla under Shah Bardi ¹. The battle of Rajmahal was fought on 12 July 1576 (15 Rabi II 984 AH); Daud posted three thousand select Afghans at Teliagarhi, was reinforced from Orissa, and was defeated; his horse stuck in quagmire, he was taken prisoner, and he was executed on the orders of Khan-i-Jahan Husain Quli Beg ¹. At Rajmahal the Afghans’ right was commanded by Kalapahad, the left by Junaid, the centre by Daud and the vanguard by Qutlu Khan; Junaid was killed by a cannon ball ¹.

The battle of Rajmahal ended Afghan rule in Bengal and began Mughal subjugation, but Afghan resistance continued for at least three decades under Isa Khan, Chief of the Bara-Bhuiyans ¹.

Provincial government

The governor of the Subah Bangala was called subahdar and was also often addressed as nazim; the head of a subah was variously called subahdar, nazim, sahib-i-subah or faujdar-i-subah ³. The subahdar was the civil and military head of the province and responsible for its defence and governance, while the provincial diwan was separately appointed by the emperor and had supreme powers over revenue administration ³.

The subahdar and the diwan were mutually independent: the diwan could remit revenue to the centre without consulting the nazim, and the conflict between Subahdar Azim-us-Shan and Diwan Murshid Quli Khan over direct remittance is cited as an instance of this duality of powers ³⁴.

Bengal subahdars enjoyed longer tenures than those of other provinces, on average staying in office uninterruptedly for more than six years against generally below four years elsewhere ³. Between 1704 and 1717 the centre appointed several subahdars of Bengal, but none came to Bengal to assume office; the virtual ruler of the subah during that period was Murshid Quli Khan ³. From Murshid Quli Khan to Sirajuddaula, all subahdars — commonly known in Bengal history as nawab — were self-proclaimed and only later confirmed in theory by the centre ³.

Murshid Quli Khan and the shift to Murshidabad

Murshid Quli Khan began his career in Bengal as provincial diwan and ended as nazim or governor of Bengal and Orissa, diwan of Bihar and faujdar of several districts, holding all posts simultaneously ². He was transferred to Bengal as diwan in 1701 and honoured with the title Kartalab Khan; on 23 December 1702 he was given the title Murshid Quli Khan, and the emperor allowed him to rename Makhsusabad as Murshidabad after his new title ².

He was formally appointed subahdar of Bengal in 1717 and transferred the capital of the province from Dhaka to Murshidabad in 1717 ². He died on 30 June 1727 ².

In 1722 he made a fresh revenue settlement improving on earlier settlements by Todar Mal and Shah Shuja; he converted officers’ jagirs in Bengal into khalsa, directly under Crown collectors, gave dispossessed officers jagirs in Orissa, collected land revenue through ijaradars on security bonds — his malzamini system — and divided the land into thirteen chaklas ². In his time, revenue contractors in the second or third generation came to be called zamindars, and many were dignified with the titles of Rajas and Maharajas, creating a new landed aristocracy in Bengal ².

Could not verify

No Banglapedia entry titled "Mughal Administration" was located in the retrieved index, so Mughal administrative content above is taken from the "Subahdar" and "Diwani" entries. No dedicated entry on Dhaka’s history as a Mughal capital was retrieved, so the Dhaka-related dates come only from the "Murshid Quli Khan" entry. No roll of the twelve Bhuyans is given in the retrieved "Rajmahal, The battle of" entry, which names only Isa Khan as Chief of the Bara-Bhuiyans.

Related articles

Bengal Sultanate · Battle of Plassey · Company Rule in Bengal · Bengal Presidency · History of Bangladesh

Disputed points

The positions below are reported as their holders state them. This reference does not take a position on the disagreement, and none of the positions is presented as the default.

The origin of Murshid Quli Khan. The retrieved entry states that he was by birth a Brahman, that Haji Shafi made him a Muslim with the name Muhammad Hadi, and that about his family and parenthood nothing is known for certain — an internally cautious attribution rather than a settled fact ². [disputed]

The dating of the capital’s transfer. The Banglapedia entry gives the transfer of Bengal’s capital from Dhaka to Murshidabad as 1717; some secondary works place it differently, and no competing date is offered on the retrieved pages ². [disputed]

The chronological list of subahdars. The subahdar list from 1575 to 1770 includes acting and absentee appointments — for example Prince Azimuddin, mostly in absentia, 1697–1712, and Farkhunda Siyar, an infant son of Farrukh Siyar, in absentia, 1713 — and the source itself flags that several appointments between 1704 and 1717 were more rhetorical than real. Tenures in the list should be read as appointments rather than effective rule ³. [disputed]

Sources

4 sources cited. Tiers: T1 official or primary, T2 scholarly or curated, T3 media of record.

1. Rajmahal, The battle of — Banglapedia, Asiatic Society of Bangladesh (via Internet Archive Wayback Machine) (T2, accessed 2026-09-19). https://web.archive.org/web/2023id_/https://en.banglapedia.org/index.php/Rajmahal,_The_battle_of
2. Murshid Quli Khan — Banglapedia, Asiatic Society of Bangladesh (via Internet Archive Wayback Machine) (T2, accessed 2026-09-19). https://web.archive.org/web/2023id_/https://en.banglapedia.org/index.php/Murshid_Quli_Khan
3. Subahdar — Banglapedia, Asiatic Society of Bangladesh (via Internet Archive Wayback Machine) (T2, accessed 2026-09-19). https://web.archive.org/web/2023id_/https://en.banglapedia.org/index.php/Subahdar
4. Diwani — Banglapedia, Asiatic Society of Bangladesh (via Internet Archive Wayback Machine) (T2, accessed 2026-09-19). https://web.archive.org/web/2023id_/https://en.banglapedia.org/index.php/Diwani

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Every factual claim above is attributed to a numbered source. Figures marked “as of” were retrieved on that date. Not affiliated with the Wikimedia Foundation.