New History of the Marathas v2.c24.64

v2.c24.64

Shahu was at a loss how to curb Angre’s aggression. He asked the Sena-Karte Balaji to proceed against him and promised him the Peshwaship if he succeeded. Balaji thereupon urged that he was quite willing to execute the king’s commands, provided he went out as the accredited Peshwa possessing powers to decide delicate issues of war and peace. “Here is an enemy,” he added, “who has dared to capture and confine your Peshwa, and insinuates thereby that he would deal similarly with the Chhatrapati himself. Is it not then necessary to impress upon Kanhoji that another Peshwa has already taken the place of the one that is gone and that the king's government goes on without interruption? This is the only way to put him down." This argument was irrefutable. Balaji gained his object, Shahu immediately conferred upon him the office of the Peshwa with due ceremonies of investiture on the field of Manjri, 8 miles south of Poona, where they were then camping. Thus the 17th of November 1713 was a proud and momentous day not only for Balaji and his family but for the Maratha nation as well, as it marked the beginning of the transfer of power from the Chhatrapati's to the Peshwa's hands. In due course the other ministerial posts were also filled up out of the new Peshwa's partizans whose loyalty and devotion had been found unshakable. Ambajipant Purandare was appointed the Peshwa's Mutalik or Vice-Peshwa, and Ramajipant Bhanu his Phadnis or purser, an office which later descended to another well-known member of the family named Nana Phadnis. Thus the Bhats, the Purandares, the Bhanus and several other families of future note, came to be locked together in a revolutionary change for weal or woe, jointly bearing the responsibilities of the Maratha State in future.