Iqta'

An iqta () and occasionally iqtaʿa () was an Islamic practice of farming out tax revenues yielded by land granted temporarily to army officials in place of a regular wage; it became common in the Muslim empire of the Caliphate. Iqta has been defined in Nizam-al-Mulk's Siyasatnama. Administrators of an Iqta were known as muqti or wali. They collected land revenue and looked after general administration. Muqtis (, "holder of an iqtaʿ") had no right to interfere with the personal life of a paying person if the person stayed on the muqtiʿ's land. They were expected to send the collected revenue (after deducting collection and administration charges) to the central treasury. Such an amount to be sent was called Fawazil. Theoretically, iqtas were not hereditary by law and had to be confirmed by a higher authority like a sultan or king. However, it was made hereditary in Islamic India by Firoz Tughlaq.

Individual iqtaʿ holders in Middle Eastern societies had little incentive to provide public goods to the localities assigned to them. The overarching theme was state power where the iqtaʿ was revocable and uninheritable. Though not an investment in a particular holding of land, the iqtaʿ, as a fiscal device, gave soldiers a vested interest in the regime.