With reference to the reign of Muhammad Bin Tughlaq, explain the following:

(a) His attempts to transfer the capital from Delhi to Daulatabad.

(b) Introduction of token currency.

(c) Increased taxation in Doab and its consequences.

(a) Muhammad Bin Tughlaq shifted his capital from Delhi to Devagiri near Aurangabad and renamed it Daulatabad. He did this for following reasons:

1. His intention was to control Deccan from there as Daulatabad was centrally located.
2. Delhi was in grip of severe famine.
3. Delhi was constantly threatened by the Mongol invasions.

He ordered the people of Delhi including the religious heads to shift to Daulatabad. On realising the gravity of threat from north west, he decided to shift the capital back to Delhi. This caused lots of hardships to the people.

(b) Introduction of token currency was one of the controversial steps taken by Muhammad Bin Tughlaq. There was shortage of silver, so Muhammad Bin Tughlaq introduced bronze Tankas in place of silver Tankas. But this experiment failed due to the circulation of counterfeit or fake coins on a very large scale, which caused a chaos in trade and commerce. Consequently, he withdrew the token currency.

(c) Muhammad Bin Tughlaq wanted to conquer territories not only in India but also in Central Asia. For this he needed more money to maintain a big army, so he increased taxes in fertile regions of Ganga-Yamuna Doab. At the same time, a severe famine broke out in the area and people refused to pay the extra taxes and rose in rebellion. But the tax collectors showed no mercy and took stern measures to collect the taxes. This made some of the peasants to abandon their lands and flee to jungles. Though Muhammad Bin Tughlaq took effective actions to fight the famine but it was too late and many people were starved to death as agriculture suffered a heavy setback in the doab area.