THE SAYYID AND AFGHAN DYNASTIES 69 
would necessarily be hampered. At this time Delhi had 
been cut off from the coast for a century or more, and the 
cumulative effect of reduced supplies of treasure must have 
been important. How long the order remained in force 
is uncertain; we know, as will be seen in the next chapter, 
that cash collections were the rule in the beginning of 
Akbar’s reign, but I have found no indication of the date 
when they were reintroduced. 
In assessment, as distinguished from collection, the 
assignees appear to have had at this time a perfectly free 
hand, at least in practice; on no other theory is it possible 
to understand the proceedings of Farid Khan, the young 
Afghan who, some years later, was to drive the Moguls out 
of India, and ascend the throne with the title of Sher Shah. 
In the reign of one of the Lodi kings, that is, some time before 
the year 1526, Farid Khan was appointed to manage two 
parganas held by his father in Assignment, and he set to 
work to increase the prosperity of the holding by means of 
just administration! He found the land held partly by 
peasants and partly by Chiefs; the former he regarded as 
the true source of prosperity, the latter as dangerous 
nuisances. 
His first step was to give the peasants their choice as to 
the system on which the Demand should be assessed. 
It is significant that they were not unanimous on this 
question; some wished to pay by Measurement, others by 
Sharing, and Farid let them do as they chose. Having 
decided this, his next step was to protect the peasants from 
extortion on the part of the chaudhri, or pargana-headman, 
and the mugaddam, a term which had now become definitely 
specialised to denote the headman of a village. We have 
seen in the last chapter that Alauddin had aimed at 
1 Farid’s proceedings are described in the Tarikh-i Sher Shahi (Elliot, 
iv. 312). The text of this chronicle is fluid, as explained by Dowson; 
the MSS. I have seen are an inferior lot, but they support Elliot's version 
of this passage. The precise date is uncertain: Farid lost the management 
in the reign of Ibrahim (1517-1526), but it is not clear how long he held it, 
and his initial proceedings may belong to the time of Sikandar. 
2 We now meet new names for the different methods of assessment. 
Measurement is denoted by jarib, Sharing by ¢ismat-1 ghalla. The account 
in the text differs in some points from that given in Professor Qanungo’s 
Sher Shah (Calcutta, 1921); the differences are explained in J.R.A.S. 
1926, p. 447 ff.