History of Aurangzib, Based on Original Sources v1.c15.82

v1.c15.82

Only one episode of the war still remains to be recorded. While Aurangzib was busy conquering the north-eastern angle of the Bijapur kingdom, stirring events were occurring in its north-western corner, where the boundary of the Mughal district of Ahmadnagar adjoined the Northern Konkan. Here a young and obscure local chief of very small means and no high family influence, was just beginning to peep above the horizon of history and to start on that career of greatness whose noontide splendour was destined to dazzle the Indian world and to leave his name a byword for posterity. Shivaji, the son of Shahji Bhonsla, a Maratha captain in Bijapur service, had taken forcible possession of his father's western jagirs and seized hill-fort after hill-fort in the Ghats from the agents of Bijapur. When the Mughals were about to invade Adil Shah's territory, he had sent an envoy to Aurangzib's deputy at Ahmadnagar, offering to co-operate on condition of being guaranteed by the Mughals in the possession of the Adil Shahi Konkan. He had received in return vague promises of favour and protection.* Even a less astute man than he must have known that such promises would amount to nothing in practice when the need of the Imperialists would be over. So, on the outbreak of the war, he seized his opportunity, and in concert with the Bijapuri officers in the neighbourhood, he raided the Mughal territory from the west. One night he silently scaled the walls of Junnar with rope-ladders, and after slaughtering the defenders carried off 11,000 hun, 200 horses, and much costly clothing and jewels.* Bands of Maratha light horsemen spread in all directions, cutting off provision trains and foraging parties, plundering the smaller towns and flourishing villages, rendering the roads unsafe, and carrying devastation and alarm to the very gates of Ahmadnagar, the seat of the Mughal administration in that region. An attack on the town (pettah) which nestled under shelter of the fort of Ahmadnagar was frustrated by a timely sortie of the garrison. But so great was the alarm it caused that the Mughal governor made the citizens remove their property to within the fort as a precaution. Two other Marathas, Minaji Bhonsla and Kashi, where notably successful in their raids.