Shivaji and His Times c14.s8: §12. Domestic troubles of Shivaji
Shivaji and His Times c14.s8
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§12. Domestic troubles of Shivaji
c14.s8.1
Early in December, Shivaji was greatly relieved by the news that his rebel son Shambhuji had left the Mughals and come back to Panhala (about 4th Dec.) Here Shivaji arrived at the end of the month, to meet the returned prodigal and try to reform him by persuasion.
c14.s8.2
The recent rebellion of Shambhuji had revealed the serious danger that threatened the newly founded Maratha kingdom. The character of his eldest son filled Shiva with the gloomiest anticipations of the future. A profligate, capricious and cruel youth, devoid of every spark of honour, patriotism or religious fervour, could not be left sole master of Maharashtra. And yet, the only alternative to Shambhu was Rajaram, a boy of 10, whose accession would have meant a regency. But there was such mutual jealousy and discord among the old ministers of the State, especially between Moro Trimbak, the premier, and Annaji Datto, the viceroy of the West, that a council of regency would have broken up in civil war and the ruin of the State as surely as the Puna council of ministers did a century later. A division of the kingdom between the two princes was proposed, Shambhuji taking Maharashtra and Rajaram the Karnat country beyond the Tungabhadra; but the plan was not given effect to. (Sabh. 94, 102.)
c14.s8.3
Shivaji tried hard to conciliate and reason with Shambhu. He appealed to all the nobler instincts of the prince as well as to his self-interest, read him many a lecture, showed him his treasury, revenue returns, list of forts and muster-rolls of troops and horses, and urged him to be worthy of such a splendid heritage and to be true to all the high hopes which he own reign had raised in the Hindu world. (Sabh. 94.) But a born judge of character like Shivaji must have soon perceived that his sermons were falling on deaf ears, and hence his last days were clouded by despair. (Sabh. 102-103.)
c14.s8.4
After December, 1679, Shivaji's health seems to have declined, and he seems to have had a premonition of the approach of death. (Sabh. 101.) This fact made the choice of an heir a live issue, and the plots and counter-plots in his harem and cabinet thickened in consequence.