Question

Token currency had been introduced for the first time in India by _____________.
A.Ghiyasuddin Tughlaq
B.Firuz shah Tughlaq
C.Alauddin Khilji
D.Muhammad-bin-Tughlaq

Answer 1

Hint: From 1325 to 1351, he was the Sultan of Delhi. He was the eldest son of the founder of the Tughlaq dynasty, Ghiyas-ud-Din-Tughlaq.

Complete answer:The token currency in India was introduced for the first time by Muhammad Bin Tughlaq. Muhammad Bin Tughlaq issued token money in 1330, after his unsuccessful expedition to Deogiri; that is, coins of brass and copper were minted whose worth was equivalent to that of coins of gold and silver. He decided to annex all the populated parts of the world for which the army needed a treasury to pay. Barani had also written that his act of offering prizes and presents in gold had depleted the sultan's treasury. Officials such as the muqaddams paid the income in brass and copper coins in the rural areas and even used the same coins to buy arms and horses.
The value of coins declined as a consequence, and the coins became as useless as shells. This affected trade and industry as well. In Persian and Arabic, the token money had inscriptions identifying the use of new coins instead of the royal seal, so that people were unable to differentiate between official and forged coins. Records indicate that the use of token currency ceased in 1333, as this currency was not mentioned by Ibn Battuta, who came to Delhi in 1334 and wrote a book.

Hence, the correct answer is option (D).

Note:But it was a drastically unfamiliar concept when Tughlaq brought representational money into his empire. It was only achieved by one sovereign outside China, the Persian King Gaykhatu of the 13th century. The experiment created so much confusion that in eight days, he had to delete it and shortly after, he was even murdered.
While the move by Tughlaq was successful in principle, he struggled to execute it. A sound idea is a representative currency, but it has one blind spot: forgery. Since representative cash is intrinsically worth very little and can potentially be exchanged for valuable assets such as gold or silver, making forgeries has a lot of appeal. The tanka of Tughlaq, made of brass or copper, may be traded by the government for precious gold or silver, a lucrative bargain for successful forgers.