Character zeb. taxation levied from British India, deducting the opium excise, which is paid by the Chinese consumer, averaged 35 millions sterling during the ten years ending 1879. The table on page 242, showing the growth of the revenues of the Mughal Empire from Akbar to Aurangzeb, may be contrasted with the taxation of British India, as given at p. 353. Aurangzeb tried to live the life of a model Muhammadan of Aurang- Emperor. Magnificent in his public appearances, simple in his private habits, diligent in business, exact in his religious observances, an elegant letter - writer, and ever ready with choice passages alike from the poets and the Kurán, his life would have been a blameless one, if he had had no father to depose, no brethren to murder, and no Hindu subjects to oppress. But his bigotry made an enemy of every one who did not share his own faith; and the slaughter of his kindred compelled him to entrust his whole government to strangers. The Hindus never forgave him, and the Sikhs, the Rájputs, and the Marhattás, immediately after his reign, began to close in upon the Empire. His Muhammadan generals and viceroys, as a rule, served him well during his vigorous life. But at his death, they usurped his children's inheritance. The succeeding Emperors were puppets in the hands of the too powerful soldiers or statesmen who raised them to the throne, controlled them while on it, and killed them when it suited their purposes to do so. The subsequent history of the Empire is a mere record of ruin. The chief events in its decline and fall are summarized below.1 Decline of the Mughal Empire. For a time, Mughal Emperors still ruled India from Delhi. 'THE DECLINE AND FALL OF THE MUGHAL EMPIRE, From death of Aurangzeb to that of Muhammad Bahádur Sháh, 1707-1862. 1707. Succession contest between Muázzim and Alam, two sons of Aurangzeb; victory of the former, and his accession under the title of Bahadur Sháh; controlled by the General Zul-fikar Khán. Revolt of Prince Kambaksh; his defeat and death. 1710. Expedition against the Sikhs. 1712. Death of Bahádur Sháh, and accession of his eldest son, Jahándar 1713. Accession of Farrukhsiyyar, under the auspices and control of Husáin But of the six successors of Aurangzeb, two were under the The six 'Puppet' control of an unscrupulous general, Zul-fikár Khán,1 while the kings. four others were the creatures of a couple of Sayyid adventurers Emperors, the first two of whom died within a few months after their accession. The third, Muhammad Sháh, commenced his reign in September 1719. 1720. Murder of Husáin Alí, and overthrow of the Sayyid 'kingmakers.' 1720-48. The Governor of the Deccan, or Nizám-ul-mulk, establishes his independence, and severs the Haidarábád Provinces from the Mughal Empire. 1732-43. The Governor of Oudh, who was also Wazir of the Empire, becomes practically independent of Delhi. 1735-51. General decline of the Empire; revolts within, and invasion of Nádír Sháh from Persia (1739). The Marhattás obtain Málwá (1743), followed by the cession of Southern Orissa and tribute from Bengal (1751). First invasion of India by Ahmad Shah Durání, who had obtained the throne of Kandahár (1747); his defeat in Sirhind (1748). 1748. Death of Muhammad Shah. 1748-50. Accession of Ahmad Shah, his son; disturbances by the Rohillá Afgháns in Oudh, and defeat of the Imperial troops. 1751. The Rohillá insurrection crushed with the aid of the Marhattás. 1751-52. Second invasion of India by Ahmad Sháh Durání, and cession of the Punjab to him. 1754. Deposition of the Emperor, and accession of Alamgir II. 1756. Third invasion of India by Ahmad Sháh Durání, and sack of 1759. Fourth invasion of India by Ahmad Sháh Durání, and murder of 1837-1862. Muhammad Bahádur Shah, the seventeenth Mughal Emperor, 1 Sir Henry Elliot's Indian Historians, vol. vii. pp. 348-558 (Trübner, 1877). dence of the who well earned their title of the 'king-makers.' From the year 1720, the breaking up of the Empire took a more open form. The Nizám ul Mulkh, or Governor of the Deccan,1 Indepen- established his independence, and severed the largest part of Southern India from the Delhi rule (1720-48). The Governor 1720-48; of Oudh,2 originally a Persian merchant, who had risen to of Oudh, the post of Wazir or Prime Minister of the Empire, practically established his own dynasty in the Provinces which had been committed to his care (1732-43). Deccan, 1732-43. Hindu risings. of the Sikhs, The Hindu subjects of the Empire were at the same time establishing their independence. The Sikh sect in the Oppression Punjab were driven by oppression into revolt, and mercilessly crushed (1710-16). The indelible memory of the 1710-16. cruelties then inflicted by the Mughal troops nerved the Sikh nation with that hatred to Delhi which served the British cause so well in 1857. Their leader, Banda, was carried about in an iron cage, tricked out in the mockery of imperial robes, with scarlet turban and cloth of gold. His son's heart was torn out before his eyes, and thrown in his face. He himself was then pulled to pieces with red-hot pincers, and the Sikhs were exterminated like mad dogs (1716). The Hindu princes of Rájputána were more fortunate. Ajít Sinh of indepen- Jodhpur asserted his independence, and Rájputána practically severed its connection with the Mughal Empire in 1715. The Marhattás having enforced their claim to black-mail (chauth) throughout Southern India, burst through the Vindhyás upon the north, obtained the cession of Málwá (1743) and Orissa (1751), with an Imperial grant for tribute from Bengal (1751). Rájput dence. 1715. The Mar hattá chauth, 1751. Invasions from the northwest, Nádir Sháh, 1739. While the Muhammadan governors and Hindu subjects of the Empire were thus asserting their independence, two new sets of external enemies appeared. The first of these con1739-61. sisted of invasions from the north-west. In 1739, Nádir Sháh, the Persian, swept down with his destroying host, and, after a massacre in the streets of Delhi and a fifty-eight days' sack, went off with a booty estimated at 32 millions sterling. Six times the Afgháns burst through the passes under Ahmad Sháh Durání, plundering, slaughtering, and then scornfully retiring to their homes with the plunder of the Empire. In 1738, Kábul, the last Afghán Province of the Mughals, was severed from Delhi; and in 1752, Ahmad Shah obtained the cession of the Punjab. Ahmad 1748-61. 1 Chin Kulich Khán or Azaf Sháh, a Túrkomán Sunni. * Saádat Alí Khán, a Persian Shiá. 3 Mill's History of British India, vol. ii. p. 456 (Wilson's edition, 1840). The cruelties inflicted upon Delhi and Northern India during Afghán invasions, these six invasions form an appalling tale of bloodshed and 1747-61. wanton cruelty. The miserable capital opened her gates, and was fain to receive the Afgháns as guests. Yet on one occasion it suffered for six weeks every enormity which a barbarian army can inflict upon a prostrate foe. Meanwhile the Afghán cavalry were scouring the country, slaying, burning, and mutilating in the meanest hamlet as in the greatest town. They took especial delight in sacking the holy places of the Hindus, and murdering the defenceless votaries at the shrines. the Pro vinces. A horde of 25,000 Afghán horsemen swooped down Misery of upon the sacred city of Muttra during a festival, while it was thronged with peaceful Hindu pilgrims engaged in their devotions. They burned the houses,' says the Tyrolese Jesuit Tieffenthaler, who was in India at that time, 'together with their inmates, slaughtering others with the sword and the lance; hauling off into captivity maidens and youths, men and women. In the temples they slaughtered cows,' the sacred animal of the Hindus, and smeared the images and pavement with the blood.' The border-land between Afghánistán and Afghán India lay silent and waste; indeed, districts far within the atrocities, 1747-61. frontier, which had once been densely inhabited, and which are now again thickly peopled, were swept bare of inhabitants. sea. The other set of invaders came from the sea. In the wars Invaders between the French and English in Southern India, the last from the vestiges of the Delhi authority in the Madras Presidency disappeared (1748-61). Bengal, Behar, and Orissa were handed over to the English by an imperial grant in 1765. We techni- Fall of the cally held these fertile Provinces as the nominee of the Emperor; empire. but the battle of Pánipat had already reduced the throne of Delhi to a shadow. This battle was fought in 1761, between Battle of the Afghán invader Ahmad Sháh and the Marhattá powers, on Panipat, 1761. the memorable plain on which Bábar and Akbar had twice won the sovereignty of India. That sovereignty was now, in 1761, lost for ever to their degenerate descendants. The Afgháns defeated the Marhattás; and during the anarchy which followed, the British patiently built up a new power out of the wreck of the Mughal Empire. Mughal pensioners and puppets reigned at Delhi over a numerous seraglio, under such lofty titles as Akbar II. or Alamgir (Aurangzeb) II. But their power Last of the was confined to the palace, while Marhattás, Sikhs, and Mughals, Englishmen struggled for the sovereignty of India. The last nominal Emperor emerged for a moment as a rebel during 1857, and died a State prisoner in Rangoon in 1862. 1862. British not from the CHAPTER XI. THE MARHATTA POWER (1634 TO 1818 A.D.). THE British won India, not from the Mughals, but from the India won, Hindus. Before we appeared as conquerors, the Mughal Empire had broken up. Our final wars were neither with the Mughals, Delhi King, nor with his revolted governors, but with the two Hindu confederacies, the Marhattás and the Sikhs. Our last Marhattá war dates as late as 1818, and the Sikh Confederation was overcome only in 1848. but from the Hindus Rise of the About the year 1634, a Marhattá soldier of fortune, SHAHJI Marhattás. BHONSLA by name, began to play a conspicuous part in Sháhjí Southern India. He fought on the side of the two indeBhonslá, pendent Muhammadan States, Ahmednagar and Bijapur, 1634. Sivají. against the Mughals; and left a band of followers, together with a military fief, to his son Sivají, born in 1627.2 Sivaji formed a national party out of the Hindu tribes of Southern India, as opposed alike to the imperial armies from the north, and to the independent Muhammadan kingdoms of the 1 The original authorities for the Marhattá history are-(1) James Grant Duff's History of the Mahrattas, 3 vols. (Bombay reprint, 1863); (2) Edward Scott Waring's History of the Mahrattas (quarto, 1810); (3) Major William Thorne's Memoir of the War in India conducted by General Lord Lake (quarto, 1818); (4) Sidney J. Owen's Selections from the Despatches of the Marquis of Wellesley (1877); (5) his Selections from the Indian Despatches of the Duke of Wellington (1880); and (6) Henry T. Prinsep's Narrative of Political and Military Transactions of British India under the Marquis of Hastings (quarto, 1820). The very brief notice of the Marhattás which my space permits of precludes anything like an exhaustive use of these storehouses. But it should be mentioned that the later history of the Marhattás (since 1819) has yet to be written. The leading incidents of that history are described in separate articles in the Imperial Gazetteer. To save space I confine myself, as far as practicable, to referring in footnotes to those articles. Ample materials will be found in the Gazetteers of the Bombay Districts and Central Provinces. 2 Grant Duff's History of the Mahrattas, vol. i. p. 90 (ed. 1863). |