History of Aurangzib, Based on Original Sources v4.c64.s10.9

v4.c64.s10.9

On 7th December, 1681, the Siddis burnt the town of Apta, on the Patalganga, ten miles south of Panvel. (They had first sacked it in 1673.) "A few days afterwards their whole fleet went down to Chaul and . . . . ravaged a large tract of the adjacent country. On this provocation Shambhuji, accompanied by Sultan Akbar, came down from Raigarh, with 20,000 men and a vast train of cannon, to Danda, [18 Dec.] . . . . and from the hill opposite to Janjira" bombarded that island incessantly for 30 days, until all the fortifications were levelled to the ground. But the garrison under Siddi Carry (? Karim) clung to a rocky citadel in the centre of the island.* The success of the Marathas was illusory, because they did not command the sea and their vessels durst not transport their army across the bare half mile's breadth of the channel to the island in the teeth of Siddi Qasim's fleet stationed there.