Firuz Shah Tughluq as a Ruler

This miscellany assesses the administration of Firuz Shah Tughluq, who ascended the Delhi throne in 732 H./1331–32 CE. On his coronation he forbade capital and severe punishments and pledged never to oppress anyone; he ordered his amirs to cease molesting the populace. As a result, executioners and cut‑throats lost their livelihoods, and justice was administered publicly by qadis. Firuz reformed fiscal practices: he banned illegal gratifications that officials exacted from vendors and gamblers and decreed that taxes be levied only according to Islamic law—kharaj, jizya, ushr, zakat, khums and lagat—and appointed agents to collect them. Revenues were spent on public works and extortionate officers were publicly humiliated. He restored the proper division of khums, ensuring that only one‑fifth went to the state and the remainder to soldiers and religious causes. Firuz enforced Sunni orthodoxy: he ended the practice of reciting only the sovereign’s name in the Friday khutba, persecuted Shia practices such as making effigies of the first three caliphs, held public polemics in which Shia leaders were silenced and exiled, and suppressed heretical sects. To prevent injustice, he investigated land titles and restored property to rightful owners. Firuz was also a patron of learning. He established madrassas teaching law, grammar, logic, theology, medicine, mathematics and calligraphy; stipends were provided to scholars and khankahs were endowed for Sufi mystics and the poor. He visited his mother’s tomb, gave alms to the poor, and treated nobles and their families kindly—allowing them to inherit titles and providing education for their heirs. He restored mutilated criminals, compensated them, and preserved their petitions in the late emperor’s tomb. Firuz repaired and rebuilt mosques, bridges, reservoirs and other public structures, including the Hauz-i‑Sultani built by Shamsuddin Altamish he confiscated and renovated public buildings that had fallen into private hands. The article portrays Firuz as a benevolent yet orthodox ruler whose reforms combined mercy, religious zeal, fiscal probity and public welfare.

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