Shivaji and His Times c14.s2: §3. Conquest of the north bank of the Tungabhadra
Shivaji and His Times c14.s2
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§3. Conquest of the north bank of the Tungabhadra
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Shivaji's return home (March, 1678), revived Maratha activity. The districts that he retained in Central and Eastern Mysore as the result of his Karnatak expedition, had to be connected with his old dominions by the conquest of the southern corner of the kingdom of Bijapur, which consisted of the Kopal region north of the Tungabhadra opposite the Bellary district, as well as part of the Dharwar and Belgaum districts intervening between Kopal and Panhala. The Kopal district was held by two Afghans, Husain Khan Miana of Kukanur and his brother Qasim Khan of Kopal. They were fellowclansmen of Bahlol Khan, and on the death of that chief and the ruin of his family, the defence of this frontier was entrusted to them.
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∗ F. R. Surat 89, Surat to Bomb., 26 May; Vol. 107, Rajapur to Surat 8 Dec., 1677; Bomb. to Surat, 21 Feb. 1678.
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Husain Khan is spoken of by Sabhasad as a high and powerful noble of the rank of Bahlol Khan, a brave general renowned for his martial spirit, and the leader of 5,000 Pathan archers, lancers, musketeers, and artillerymen. In January 1677, Bahir Rao invaded the Gadag district. Husain Khan Miana opposed him near Yelburga. After a long and bloody fight, the Pathans were defeated. Husain Khan, on account of his corpulence, could not ride on horseback. The elephant on which he was trying to escape was wounded in the trunk by Nagoji Jedhe and forced to turn back. Nagoji was shot dead, but the Khan was captured with 2,000 of his horses and some elephants. Shivaji offered to set him free if he gave up the fort of Kopal, but he declined and was kept a prisoner. Early in 1678, Shivaji conquered the Gadag district. At last after two years the Peshwa Moro Pant negotiated with Qasim Khan (the commandant of Kopal) through Husain's son and induced him to give up the fort for money (3rd March 1679.) Husain was now released and entered the Maratha service for a living.∗
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∗ I have here followed Jedhe with a few points from T. S., 33a. These two works call the victor Bahir Rao, while Sabhasad and Malkaré call him Hambir Rao. (In bad MSS. Hambir may be read as Bahir, but in January 1677 Hambir Rao was on the march to Haidarabad with Shivaji.) The place of battle is put by Jedhe 'near Yelgedla', which I emend into Yelburga (30 m. n. e. of Gadag, now in the Lingasagar district), and not into Yelagi (20 m. south of Belgaum.) T. S. says that Husain Khan was the "sardar of Kukanur",—a city 15 m. north of Kopal, and that Bahir Rao fell in the battle and Husain, out of wounded honour, took poison on being set free by Shivaji (which is not historically true.) Sabhasad, 80—81, places the battle in Sampgaon. B. S. 451 merely says that Shiva imprisoned Husain Khan by deception.
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Kopal is rightly called by Sabhasad "the gate of the south," and its possession enabled the Maratha dominion to be extended to the bank of the Tungabhadra river and even across it into the Bellary and Chittaldurg districts. Many of the local chieftains, who had long defied the Bijapur Government and withheld taxes in this ill-subdued border country, were now chastised by the Marathas and reduced to obedience,—among them being the poligars of Kanakgiri (25 miles n. e. of Kopal), Harpan-halli (40 miles s. of Kopal), Raydurg, Chittaldurg, Vidyanagar (? old Vijaynagar), and Bundikot (? Gudicota, 45 miles e. of Harpan-halli.) This country was now formed into a regular province of Shivaji's kingdom and placed under Janardan Narayan Hanumante as viceroy. (Sabh.)
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Late in April 1678, Shivaji's troops plundered Mungi-Pattan, on the Godavari, 30 miles south of Aurangabad. (M. A. 166.) It was probably next month that they made a second attempt to get possession of Shivner. They invested the village (of Junnar) at its foot, and at night tried to scale the fort. "Three hundred Marathas climbed the fort-walls at night by means of nooses and rope-ladders. But Abdul Aziz Khan was an expert qiladar. Though he had sent away his sons and followers to reinforce the faujdar Yahiya Khan in the village, he personally with a few men slew all the infantry of Shiva who had entered the fort. Next morning he hunted out the few who had concealed themselves in the hill [side] below the fort and among rocks and holes, and released them with presents, sending a message to Shivaji to the effect, 'So long as I am qiladar, you will never take this fort.'" (Dil. 157.)
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§4. The Mughals, Bijapur, and Shivaji, 1678.
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A rupture now took place between Shiva and Qutb Shah, and the diplomatic system so patiently built up by Madanna Pandit fell to the ground. Qutb Shah's indignation had been rising as he found himself made a mere cat's paw by Shiva in the Karnatak adventure. He had borne all the expenses of the expedition and supplied artillery and an auxiliary force for it. But not one of the conquered forts was given to him, not one pice of his contribution was repaid out of the fabulous booty carried away by Shiva from that land of gold. And now the Maratha plot to capture Bijapur by treachery destroyed the last trace of patience in the Golkonda king, especially as he had been playing for some years past the flattering role of a chivalrous friend and protector of the boy Adil Shah. So, Abul Hasan arranged for a peace between the new Bijapuri regent, Siddi Masaud, and his rivals (especially Sharza Khan), promised him money to pacify the unpaid mutinous soldiery, and bound him to wage war against Shiva and "confine him to Konkan." The Adil-Shahi nobles prepared to open the campaign in October next, with about 25,000 cavalry and numerous infantry. But Dilir Khan spoiled the whole plan. (O. C. 4266; F. R. Surat 107, Rajapur to Surat, 3 April, 1678; G. Robinson to Surat, 31 Aug.)
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Dilir Khan had exacted heavy and humiliating concessions from Siddi Masaud when he made peace with him at Kulbarga (Nov. 1677.) The odium of that treaty fell on the new regent, and all the disorders in the State and all the sufferings of the people were laid at his door. Distracted by domestic factions, daily insulted and threatened by the Afghan soldiers, and hopeless of preventing Shiva's boundless violence and encroachments with the resources of the ruined, divided and bankrupt State, Siddi Masaud wanted to come to terms with Shivaji; but Dilir Khan forbade it, assuring him that the imperial army was ready to help him in fighting the Marathas. Masaud was, however, too bewildered by the disturbances in all parts of the country to listen to this advice. He wrote to Shiva, "We are neighbours. We eat the same salt. You are as deeply concerned in [the welfare of] this State as I am. The enemy [i.e., Mughals] are day and night trying to ruin it. We two ought to unite and expel the foreigner." [B. S. 452-470.]