New History of the Marathas v1.c19.8

v1.c19.8

1. Tarabai opposes the Emperor.—Rājārām died at Sinhagad on 2 March 1700, a little over a month before his newly established capital Satara followed the fate of Raigad ten years before. Since the return of Rājārām from Jinji the aged Emperor, sorely disappointed in his hope of overcoming the Marathas and feeling that his commandants did not exert themselves earnestly enough in the tasks assigned to them, had taken upon himself the work of personally leading his forces in the difficult region of the western Ghats. His officers and soldiers became wearied of this continuous camp life and its interminable hardships. Yet the Emperor would not flinch. With the greatest effort in 6 years (1699-1704), he was able to capture only four major forts with a few minor ones of no importance to his strategy. These were Satara (21 April 1700), Panhala (28 May 1701), Vishalgad (4 June 1702) and Sinhagad (8 Apr. 1703). Even these were only nominally secured mainly by payment of money and were quickly recaptured by the Marathas after a year or so, as soon as the Emperor had turned his back upon Maharashtra and proceeded to the Berad country in the south. It is noteworthy that during the siege of Vishalgad Sawai Jaisinh, the young ruler of Jaipur, played a conspicuous part both in the arduous task of fighting and in the subsequent negotiations for its surrender, whereby he established relations of amity with some of the Maratha leaders and the young Shahu, who was then living as a captive in the imperial camp. This early contact proved a prominent factor in the Mughal-Maratha relations as they afterwards developed in the hands of the first two Peshwas.¹