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CHAPTER XII.

THE MARATHA POWER (1634 TO 1818 A.D.).

not from

THE British won India, not from the Mughals, but from the British India won, Hindus. Before we appeared as conquerors, the Mughal Empire had broken up. Our conclusive wars were neither with the the Delhi King, nor with his revolted governors, but with the Mughals, two Hindu confederacies, the Maráthás and the Sikhs. Our the last Maráthá war dates as late as 1818, and the Sikh Confedera- Hindus. tion was not finally overcome until 1849.

but from

Bhonsla,

About the year 1634, a Maráthá soldier of fortune, SHAHJI Rise of the BнONSLA by name, began to play a conspicuous part in Maráthás. Southern India. He fought on the side of the two independent Sháhjí Muhammadan States, Ahmadnagar and Bijápur, against the 1634. Mughals; and left a band of followers, together with a military fief, to his son Sivají, born in 1627.2 Sivají formed a national Sivaji. 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 Deccan. There were thus, from 1650 onwards, three powers in the Deccan :

1 The original authorities for the Maráthá history are-(1) James Grant Duff's History of the Maráthás, 3 vols. (Bombay reprint, 1863); (2) Edward Scott Waring's History of the Maráthás (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 Maráthás which the scope of the present work allows, precludes an exhaustive use of these storehouses. But it should be mentioned that the later history of the Maráthás (since 1819) has yet to be written. The leading incidents of that history are described in separate articles in The Imperial Gazetteer of India. To save space, this chapter confines itself, 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 Maráthás, vol. i. p. 90 (ed. 1863).

Three

parties in

the Deccan, 1650.

or third

party.

first, the ever-invading troops of the Delhi Empire; second, the forces of the two remaining independent Muhammadan States of Southern India, namely, Ahmadnagar and Bijapur: third, the military organization of the local Hindu tribes, which ultimately grew into the Maráthá confederacy.

Strength of During the eighty years' war of Shah Jahan and Aurangzeb, the Hindu with a view to the conquest of Southern India (1627-1707), the third or Hindu party fought from time to time on either side, and obtained a constantly-increasing importance. The Mughal armies from the north, and the independent Muhammadan kingdoms of the south, gradually exterminated each other. Being foreigners, they had to recruit their exhausted forces chiefly from outside. The Hindu confederacy drew its inexhaustible native levies from the wide tract known as Maháráshtra, stretching from the Berars in Central India to Courted by near the south of the Bombay Presidency. The Maráthás

the other

two.

Sivaji,

died 1680.

His hill forts.

were therefore courted alike by the Imperial generals and by the independent Muhammadan sovereigns of the Deccan. With true Hindu statecraft, their leader, Sivají, from time to time aided the independent Musalmán kingdoms of the Deccan against the Mughal avalanche from the north. Those kingdoms, with the help of the Maráthás, long proved a match for the imperial troops. But no sooner were the Delhi armies driven back, than the Maráthás proceeded to despoil the independent Musalmán kingdoms. On the other hand, the Delhi generals, when allied with the Maráthás, could completely overpower the independent Muhammadan States.

SIVAJI Saw the strength of his position, and, by a course born 1627, of treachery, assassination, and hard fighting, won for the Maráthás the practical supremacy in Southern India.1 As a basis for his operations, he perched himself safe in a number of impregnable hill forts in the Bombay Presidency. His troops consisted of Hindu spearmen, mounted on hardy His army ponies. They were the peasant proprietors of Southern India, and could be dispersed or called together on a moment's notice, at the proper seasons of the agricultural year. Sivají had therefore the command of an unlimited body of troops, without the expense of a standing army. With these he swooped down upon his enemies, exacted tribute, or forced His tactics. them to come to terms. He then paid off his soldiery by a part of the plunder; and while they returned to the sowing or

of horse

men.

'The career of Sivají is traced in Grant Duff's History of the Maráthás, vol. i. pp. 90–220. The Bombay reprint of Grant Duff's History, in three volumes, 1863, is invariably referred to in this chapter.

reaping of their fields, he retreated with the lion's share to his hill forts. In 1659 he lured the Bijapur general into an ambush, stabbed him at a friendly conference, and exterminated his army. In 1662-64, Sivají raided as far as the extreme north of the Bombay Presidency, and sacked the Imperial city of Surat. In 1664 he assumed the title of king (Rájá), with the Coins royal prerogative of coining money in his own name.1

money.

The year 1665 found Sivají helping the Mughal armies. against the independent Musalmán State of Bijapur. In 1666 he was induced to visit Delhi. Being coldly received Visits Delhi, by the Emperor Aurangzeb, and placed under restraint, he 1666. escaped to the south, and raised the standard of revolt.2 In 1674, Sivají enthroned himself with great pomp at Ráigarh, Enthrones himself, weighing himself in a balance against gold, and distributing 1674. the precious counterpoise among his Bráhmans.3 After sending forth his hosts as far as the Karnátik in 1676, he died in 1680. Died,

1680.

The Emperor Aurangzeb would have done wisely to have left Aurangthe independent Musalmán Kings of the Deccan alone, until zeb's mis

he had crushed the rising Maráthá power. Indeed, a great taken policy, statesman would have buried the old quarrel between the 1688-1707. Muhammadans of the north and south, and united the whole forces of Islám against the Hindu confederacy which was rapidly organizing itself in the Deccan. But the fixed resolve of Aurangzeb's life was to annex to Delhi the Muhammadan kingdoms of Southern India. By the time he had carried out this scheme, he had wasted his armies, and left the Mughal Empire ready to break into pieces at the first touch of the Maráthás.

4

SAMBHAJI Succeeded his father, Sivají, in 1680, and reigned Sambhaji, till 1689. His life was entirely spent in wars with the Portu- 1680-89. guese and Mughals. In 1689, Aurangzeb captured him. The Emperor burnt out his eyes with a red-hot iron, cut out the tongue which had blasphemed the Prophet, and struck off his head.

His son, SAHU, then six years of age, was also captured and Sahu, kept a prisoner till the death of Aurangzeb. In 1707 he was 1707. restored, on acknowledging allegiance to Delhi.

But his long

captivity among the Mughals left him only half a Maráthá.5

1 Grant Duff's History of the Maráthás, vol. i. p. 146.

2 Idem, vol. i. chap. v. ad finem.

3 Idem, vol. i. pp. 191–193.

♦ For the career of Sambhají, see Grant Duff's History of the Maráthás, vol. i. pp. 220-261.

• The career of Sahu is traced in Grant Duff's History of the Maráthás, vol. i. pp. 297-306.

He wasted his life in his seraglio, and resigned the rule of his territories to his Bráhman minister Bálají Vishwanáth, with Rise of the the title of Peshwá.1 This office became hereditary, and the Peshwás. power of the Peshwá superseded that of the Maráthá kings. The family of Sivají only retained the little principalities of Sátára and Sátára and Kolhápur. Sátára lapsed, for want of a direct heir, Kolhapur; to the British in 1848. Kolhápur has survived through their Sivaji's clemency, and was ruled, under their control, by the last adopted representative of Sivaji's line 2 until 1883. On his death, in December 1883, another Maráthá youth of high family was placed by the British Government, in virtue of the adoption sanad, on the State cushion of Kolhápur.

the last of

line.

Progress

of the Peshwás,

1718.

Second Peshwá conquers

the Deccan, 1721-40.

Third Peshwá, 1740-61.

in the

Deccan.

Meanwhile the PESHWAS were building up at Poona the great Maráthá confederacy. In 1718, Bálají, the first Peshwá, marched an army to Delhi in support of the Sayyid 'kingmakers.' 3 In 1720 he extorted an Imperial grant of the chauth or 'one-fourth' of the revenues of the Deccan. The Maráthás were also confirmed in the sovereignty of the countries round Poona and Sátára. The second Peshwá, Bájí Ráo (1721-40), converted the tribute of the Deccan granted to his father into a practical sovereignty.

In fifteen years he wrested the Province of Málwá from the Empire (1736), together with the country on the north-west of the Vindhyas, from the Narbada to the Chambal.5 In 17396 he captured Bassein from the Portuguese.

The third Peshwá, Bálají Bájí Ráo, succeeded in 1740, and carried the Maráthá terror into the heart of the Mughal Empire.7 The Deccan became merely a starting-point for Conquests a vast series of their expeditions to the north and the east. Within the Deccan itself he augmented his sovereignty, at the expense of the Nizám, after two wars. The great centres of the Maráthá power were now fixed at Poona in Bombay and Nagpur in the Berars. In 1741-42, a general of the Berar branch of the Maráthás known as the Bhonslas, swept down upon Bengal; but, after plundering to the suburbs of the MuhamTo Bengal, madan capital Murshidábád, he was driven back through Orissa 1742-51 by the Viceroy Alí Vardí Khán. The Maráthá Ditch,' or

Expeditions

beyond it :

1 For Bálají's career, see Grant Duff's Hist. of the Maráthás, vol. i. pp. 307-339.

2 See articles KOLHAPUR and SATARA, Imperial Gazetteer of India.

3 Vide ante, p. 313.

* Grant Duff's History of the Maráthás, vol. i. pp. 324, 325.

5 Grant Duff's History of the Maráthás, vol. i. pp. 393-395.

For Bájí Ráo's career, see op. cit. vol. i. pp. 344-410.

7 His career is sketched in op. cit. vol. ii. pp. 1-115.

FIVE MARATHA BRANCHES.

321

semicircular moat around part of Calcutta, records to this day the panic which then spread throughout Bengal. Next year, 1743, the head of the Berar Maráthás, Raghují Bhonsla, himself invaded Bengal in force. From this date, in spite of quarrels between the Poona and Berar Maráthás over the spoil, the fertile Provinces of the Lower Ganges became a plundering ground of the Bhonslas. In 1751 they obtained a formal grant from the Viceroy Alí Vardí of the chauth or 'quarterrevenue' of Bengal, together with the cession of Orissa. In Northern India, the Poona Maráthás raided as far as the To the Punjab,

Punjab, and drew down upon them the wrath of Ahmad Shah, 1760. the Afghán, who had wrested that Province from Delhi. At the third battle of Pánípat, the Maráthás were overthrown, by Pánípat, the combined Muhammadan forces of the Afgháns and of 1761. the Provinces still nominally remaining to the Mughal Empire (1761).

The fourth Peshwá, Madhu Ráo, succeeded to the Maráthá Fourth Peshwá,

sovereignty in this moment of ruin.1 The Hindu confederacy 1761-72. seemed doomed to destruction, alike by internal treachery and by the superior force of the Afghán arms. As early as 1742, the Poona and Berar branches had taken the field against each other, in their quarrels over the plunder of Bengal. Before 1761, two other branches, under Holkar and Sindhia, had set up for themselves in the old Mughal Province of Málwá and the neighbouring tracts, now divided between the States of Indore and Gwalior. At Pánípat, Holkar, the head of the Indore branch, deserted the Hindu line of battle when he saw the tide turn, and his treachery rendered the Maráthá rout complete. The fourth Peshwá was little more than the nominal centre of the five great Maráthá branches, with their The five Maráthá respective head-quarters at Poona, the seat of the Peshwás; branches. at Nágpur, the capital of the Bhonslas, in Berar; at Gwalior, the residence of Sindhia; at Indore, the capital of Holkar; and at Baroda, the seat of the rising power of the Gáekwárs. Madhu Ráo, the fourth Peshwá, just managed to hold his own against the Muhammadan princes of Haidarábád and Mysore, and against the Bhonsla branch of the Maráthás in Berar. His younger brother, Náráyan Ráo, succeeded him as fifth Peshwá, Peshwá in 1772, but was quickly assassinated."

Fifth

1772.

From this time the Peshwa's power at Poona begins to Decline of the recede, as that of his nominal masters, the lineal descendants Peshwás,

For his career, see Grant Duff's Hist. of the Maráthás, vol. ii. pp. 1772-1818. 115-172.

2 Grant Duff's History of the Maráthás, vol. ii. pp. 174-178.

VOL. VI.

X