A History of the Mahrattas v2.c55.20

v2.c55.20

About the year 1785, the petty states of Kolapoor and Sawuntwaree, always jealous of each other, went to war, because Luximee Bye, the wife of Kem Sawunt, Dessaye of Waree, and niece of Mahadajee Sindia, had obtained some privileges of royalty for her husband from the Moghul Emperor, through her uncle’s all-powerful influence at the court of Delhi.¹ With a few intermissions and with various success, this warfare had continued for twenty-three years; when at last the troops of Kolapoor gained a victory over those of Sawuntwaree in a pitched battle, fought at the village of Chowkul, and the fort of Waree was immediately besieged; Kem Sawunt had been dead some years²; he had left four widows, the eldest of whom, Luximee Bye, became regent, on account of the minority of Kem Sawunt’s only son, by Dawee Bye his third wife. Luximee Bye, when her capital was besieged, called in the aid of Wiswas Rao Ghatgay and Appa Dessaye. Wiswas Rao Ghatgay had been put in possession of two districts called Chickooree and Menowlee,³ belonging to Kolapoor, by Shirzee Rao Ghatgay. His pretended right to dispose of them originated in their having been conquered by the first Mahdoo Rao and bestowed on the family of Putwurdhun; and Sindia having authority for possessing himself of the sequestrated Jagheer of the Putwurdhuns, Shirzee Rao, who had seized those two districts, made them over to his brother, Wiswas Rao, when he was ordered by his son-in-law to join him in Malwa. Wiswas Rao would have been driven out of them by the Raja of Kolapoor, but he was supported by Appa Dessaye, who afterwards took them for himself. The Peishwa, on the plea of wishing to avoid disputes with Sindia, pretended to take no concern in those districts,¹ but it was on the authority of his secret orders that Appa Dessaye seized them, and Bajee Rao at a subsequent period, in 1812, asserted his own claim to them on grounds which were admitted by the British Government.