1 Tanka - Ghiyas-ud-din Balban

Ghiyas-ud-din Balban ruled the Delhi Sultanate with a calculated brutality aimed at dismantling the Forty — the powerful group of Turkish slave-nobles who had effectively controlled sultanate policy since Iltutmish. His monetary reforms were part of the same consolidation: coinage bearing his name was a political instrument, asserting a legitimacy he had spent decades maneuvering to claim before formally taking the throne in 1266. He had served as regent under three weak sultans before that.

Silver tankas of this reign are struck on broad, thin flans and frequently show partial legends due to flan preparation rather than die failure — a known characteristic of the Balban series.