History of Aurangzib, Based on Original Sources v5.c75.s7.1

v5.c75.s7.1

He finally returned to the homeland in March 1697. Here an internecine war now raged between him and Dhana, all the other captains being ranged on the two sides. They fought together in the Satara district in March 1697. But fortune now deserted Santaji; his severity and insolence had disgusted his officers and most of them were secretly corrupted by the agents of Dhana. Hanumant Rao Nimbalkar, in concert with Dhana's troops, fell on Santa's baggage train, and most of the latter's officers deserted to Dhana, while the rest were killed or wounded. Santa, despoiled of all and deserted by his army, fled from the field with only a few followers to Mhaswad, the home of Nagoji Mané whose wife's brother Amrit Rao he had killed. With Nagoji, however, the sacred rights of hospitality to a refugee rose higher than the claims of blood-feud; he gave Santa shelter and food for some days, and then dismissed him in safety. But his wife Radha Bai followed her brother's murderer with a woman's unquenchable vindictiveness. She had urged her husband to slay their guest, but in vain. And now when she saw him escaping unscathed, she sent her surviving brother after him. Of the many diverse accounts* of his death the one accepted by Khafi Khan is that the pursuer (wrongly called Nagoji Mane by both Khafi Khan and Z. S.) came upon Santaji when, exhausted by fast travel, he was bathing in a *nala* near the Shambhu Mahadev hill, in the Satara district. The party from Mhaswad surprised him in this helpless situation and cut off his head, (June, 1697.) "Mane [i.e., Nimbalkar] threw it into the saddlebag fastened behind his seat...On the way the bag got loose and fell down. Firuz Jang's spies, who had spread in that hilly region, in pursuit of Santa, picked it up, recognised it as that general's head, and sent it to Firuz Jang, who......sent it on to the Emperor. The severed head was paraded through the imperial encampment and some cities of the Deccan." [M. A. 401-402, Z. S., K. K. ii. 447-448, Dilkasha 112a.]