Pramāṇa · Search · About · API

Shivaji and His Times c5: Chapter II. Boyhood and Youth, 1627-1656

Shivaji and His Times c5

Language
English

Contents

Chapter II. Boyhood and Youth, 1627-1656

§1. Shivaji's ancestors

c5.s1.1

The Bhonslé clan of the Maratha caste was made up of many families, scattered over various places in Western India. Unlike a Rajput or Scottish clan, they had no union under a common and generally-recognized chieftain nor even mutual intercourse, but merely bore the same surname and married into other Maratha families. Agriculture was their original occupation, as with most Marathas. But the break up of the large monarchies of Western India, (namely, the Bahmani at the end of the 15th century and the Nizam Shahi at the beginning of the 17th) opened to the ablest men among them the chance of rising to military power and lordship over land. The history of Shivaji's family illustrates this transformation of the tiller of the soil by successive stages into the bandit, the captain of mercenaries, the feudal baron, and the sovereign ruler, which was so frequent during the troubled times that followed the downfall of central powers like the Bahmani or the Delhi empire and ended only with the establishment of British paramountcy and British peace.

c5.s1.2

In the middle of the 16th century, a Bhonslé named Babaji was living peacefully on the humble gains of agriculture and the dues of his office as headman (patil) of the villages of Hingani Beradi and Diwalgaon in the Puna district (Patas sub-division.) His two sons, Maloji and Vitoji, quarrelled with the other people of the place and migrated with their wives to the village of Verul (Ellora) at the foot of the Daulatabad hills. The prospects of agriculture here were unpromising, and the two brothers went in search of employment to Jadav Rao of Sindhkher, a Nizam Shahi noble, and entered his service as common soldiers (bargirs.) The tradition runs that at a festive gathering in his house, Jadav Rao praised the beauty of Maloji's little boy Shahji and his own daughter Jija Bai, drew them together on his knees, and cried out that they would form an excellent match, and that Maloji immediately stood up and called upon the other guests to witness that his master had betrothed his daughter to his son,—for which presumptuous claim he was forthwith dismissed by Jadav Rao.

c5.s1.3

So, the two brothers came back to their home at Ellora and lived there by agriculture for the next few years. One night Maloji, while watching his crops in the field, noticed a big snake coming out of a hole, and following the popular belief that snakes guard buried treasure he dug the place up and discovered seven pots full of gold coins underground. Here at last were the means of gratifying their ambition. Lodging the treasure with an honest banker at Chamargunda, they bought horses, saddles, arms and tents and equipped a force of one thousand troopers, at whose head they offered their swords to any master that would pay them. Joining a leader of banditti named Nimbalkar (of Phaltan), they soon gained so much importance and power that the decadent Nizam-Shahi Government was glad to enrol them among its captains. This happened at the beginning of the 17th century, when Akbar's conquest of the capital Ahmadnagar had thrown that monarchy into confusion and disruption, which raised the value of able mercenary bands and offered unlimited opportunities of advancement to their captains. Jadav Rao had no objection now to giving his daughter in marriage to the son of the newly-exalted Bhonslé.

c5.s1.4

Maloji wisely spent a portion of his treasure trove in building temples, giving alms to Brahmans, and excavating a large tank on the Shambhu Mahadev hill, in the Satara district, which was a great boon to the tens of thousands of pilgrims who annually flocked to that shrine. These pious investments of his money brought him a good return by raising him immensely in social esteem When he died, the family contingent of troops,—now greatly increased in number from the original thousand men,—was commanded in the Nizam-Shahi service by his younger brother Vitoji, and after Vitoji's death (probably in 1623), by Shahji, the eldest son of Maloji.*

§2. The Rise of Shahji Bhonslé, 1625-36

c5.s2.1

Shahji's name first occurs in recorded history in 1628, two years after the death of Malik Ambar, when he was sent forth by Fath Khan, the son and successor of that Nizam Shahi wazir, to raid East Khandesh in the rear of a Mughal invading force. Soon afterwards, the plots of the Nizam Shah and his new wazir against each other, the imprisonment of Fath Khan by his king (c. April 1630), the murder of Lakhji Jadav Rao at Court (c. 1630), the treacherous surrender of the Mughal portion of Ahmadnagar territory by the viceroy Khan-i-Jahan Lodi, (1627), a fresh Mughal invasion of the country (1628), and the Bijapuri efforts to seize as much of the wrecks of the Ahmadnagar kingdom as possible,—all combined to throw the Nizam Shahi Government into unspeakable weakness and confusion. This was a golden opportunity for an able enterprising and ambitious man like Shahji. After the murder of his father-in-law Jadav Rao, he left the Nizam Shah, got a band of men together, and tried to seize the country from Junnar to Ahmadnagar, creating a great disturbance at that ill-defined and ill-guarded meeting point of three kingdoms. Then he entered the Mughal service with his eldest son and younger brother (end of 1630), but deserted after a year and a half (June 1632) and went over to the service of Bijapur, where he completely fascinated Murari Jagadev, the right-hand man of the wazir Khawas Khan.

c5.s2.2

∗ The accounts of the family given in the Persian histories of Delhi and Bijapur have been summarized in my paper on the "Rise of Shahji" published in the *Modern Review*, Sept. 1917, (some of the dates of which require correction in the light of information from other sources.) The Marathi accounts given in Malkaré (Persian version in *Tarikh-i-Shivaji*) and very briefly in Sabhasad, have been utilized here to some extent. The exaggerations of Marathi Court-poets, in Sanskrit, have been rejected. Of the eight sons of Vitoji (the younger brother of Maloji I.) four are found in the Mughal service at the beginning of Shah Jahan's reign, viz., Kheloji, Parsuji, Maloji II and Mambaji. [Abdul Hamid, i.A.]

c5.s2.3

The murder of Burhan Nizam Shah (c. Feb. 1632) by his wazir and the Mughal capture of Daulatabad (the new capital) with his successor Husain Nizam Shah in it (17th June 1633), were followed by the final dismemberment of the once glorious Ahmadnagar kingdom. Its local governors declared their independence. Shahji now seized all the Nizam-Shahi territory from Puna and Chakan to the environs of Ahmadnagar and Nasik, and plundered right and left. With Bijapuri assistance he crowned a boy Nizam Shah in Premgarh (renamed Shahgarh) in August 1633, and carried on the government in the name of this puppet for three years,—seizing districts (including North Konkan), enlisting soldiers (especially 12,000 Nizam-Shahi troopers who had been disbanded after the fall of Daulatabad), and raiding the country as far as Bidar and Daulatabad, to the great harassment of the Mughals.

c5.s2.4

But the imperialists launched huge forces against him in February 1636. The campaign, after much hard riding and fighting, ended next October in the completest defeat of Shahji, who was compelled to surrender to the victors his puppet Nizam Shah and seven of his forts, enter Bijapur service, and transfer his mischievous ambition and disturbing activity to regions far away from Maharashtra proper.

§3. Difficulty of reconstructing Shivaji's early history

c5.s3.1

The true history of the first thirty years of Shivaji's life (1627—1657) presents a puzzling and almost insoluble problem. From the nature of the materials available, it is hopeless to reconstruct the narrative of his early career with any degree of certainty.∗ Here the widest differences of opinion are possible as to the details, but happily the broad outlines are clear and generally accepted.

c5.s3.2

∗ It is impossible to come to any universal agreement on questions like,—Where did Shivaji spend the years 1637 and 1638, at Puna or at Bijapur? Was it Dadaji Kond-dev or Shivaji who subjugated the Mavals? When did Dadaji die? What was the first Bijapuri fort taken by Shivaji and in what year? In what year or years did he establish his own authority over those forts of his father, which had not been at first placed under him? What were the order and dates of his acquisition of the 40 forts of which he was admittedly in possession in 1659?

c5.s3.3

My own conclusions,—often formed only by balancing probabilities against one another, and in a few cases adopted as "working hypotheses,"—will be given in detail in the rest of this chapter; but they may be briefly summarized as follows:—

c5.s3.4

(i) Shivaji was born on Monday, 10th April, 1627, and lived in Shivner fort till 1637, when he was removed to Puna.

c5.s3.5

(ii) He first captured one or two obscure or out of repair forts in the western side of the Puna district, in the neglected and unsubdued new frontier of the Bijapur State, from 1646 to his father's arrest (25 July 1648); the arrest was due to a cause quite unconnected with the son's usurpations and was ended by other means than Shivaji's restoration of forts to Adil Shah.

c5.s3.6

(iii) From the release of Shahji (end of 1649) to the invasion of Javli (January 1656), Shivaji did nothing conspicuous or likely to give strong provocation to Bijapur; there were the usual small raids and (very doubtfully) conquests in the Kolaba district which did not then really own Bijapuri sovereignty. His military and financial resources* at this stage were very limited, and he could not have undertaken any extensive or distant conquest, though he was steadily and prudently increasing his power and placing it on a solid basis by building new and repairing old forts, increasing his army, and accumulating treasure by husbanding his revenue and gains from plunder. During these six years he took only a few forts (if any at all) subject to Bijapur, nor did he invade the Kalian district.

c5.s3.7

(iv) The forts in his father's Puna jagir were not taken by Shivaji immediately after Dadaji's death nor all at the same time. The forcible expulsion of Shambhuji Mohite from Supa fits in better with the year 1656 than with 1647 or 1648.

c5.s3.8

∗ His entire army consisted of 3,000 horsemen [besides a fluctuating number of Mavle infantry.] But two thousand of these troopers were the owners of their horses and arms, and could have left Shivaji any day for a higher bidder. He had remounts of his own for only 1,200 men. [Sabh. 8.] The income of the entire Puna jagir of Shahji was only a lakh and a half of Rupees, and some portions of it were not yet in Shivaji's hands. The building and repairing of forts consumed much of his small gains of treasure trove and booty.

c5.s3.9

(v) After the conquest of Javli (January 1656), came the rapid extension of his territory and forces. His striking power and material resources were at once more than doubled by this annexation, and soon afterwards he rounded off his possessions by completing the seizure of his father's entire western jagir and invaded Konkan. The four years 1656—1659 were for him crowded with conspicuous achievements, which made his ascent to an independent throne but a single and easy step.

§4. Shivaji's birth and infancy

c5.s4.1

Shahji Bhonsle's first wife Jija Bai bore him two sons, Shambhuji and Shivaji. As the elder one died in early youth, history is not concerned with him. Shivaji, their second son, was born in the hill-fort of Shivner, which towers over the city of Junnar, in the extreme north of the Puna district. His mother had prayed to the local goddess, Shivā Bhavāni, for the good of her expected child, and she therefore named him after that deity.

c5.s4.2

Of the exact date of his birth there is no reliable contemporary record. Even his courtier, Krishnaji Anant Sabhasad, writing in 1694, is silent on the point.

c5.s4.3

Of the two different dates of his birth given by two different groups of writers, I am inclined to prefer Monday, 10th April 1627, which is recorded by the descendants of his secretaries.

c5.s4.4

The stories told in the later Marathi bakhars about the history of his parents during the year preceding his birth and the events of his own life up to the age of twenty, are in many points contrary to authentic history.

c5.s4.5

and in others improbable, or at all events unsupported by any evidence. We know from the contemporary Persian histories that during much of the period from 1630 to 1636 Shahji led a roving life, subject to frequent contests with diverse enemies and change of residence. Under these circumstances, he would naturally have left his wife and infant son for safety in a stronghold like Shivner. But in reality they seem to have both fallen under his neglect. It is a fair inference from the known facts that by the year 1630 or thereabout Jija Bai lost her husband's love, probably with the loss of her youth, and Shahji forsook her and her little son Shivaji and took a younger and more beautiful wife, Tukā Bai Mohité, on whom and whose son Vyankoji he henceforth lavished his society and all his gains.

c5.s4.6

It is expressly stated in the contemporary Persian history *Padishahnamah* (i. B. 150) that in March 1636 Shahji's family was living at Shivner. As Shivner was one of the seven forts ceded by Shahji to the Mughals in the terms of the treaty of October 1636, Shivaji could not have continued to live in that fort much longer after the end of that year. Shahji himself immediately after his defeat went to Bijapur and entering the Adil Shahi service was sent on campaign further south. He secured from that Government a grant of the Puna district from Chakan to Indapur and Shirwal as his jagir, and appointed Dadaji Kond-dev to administer the tract, telling him, "My wife Jija Bai is living in the fort of Shivner and has brought forth a son named Shivaji. Bring her and her son away and keep them in your charge [at Puna] and supply them with money for their necessary expenses."

c5.s4.7

Thus Shivaji took up his residence at Puna, probably early in 1637. He was, therefore, practically a stranger to his father for several years after his birth (if we leave out of our account Shahji's visits to Shivner in the intervals of his campaigns), and he became totally so after this removal to Puna.*

c5.s4.8

Her husband's neglect drove the mind of Jija Bai inwards and deepened her natural religious spirit, which she imparted to her son. Shiva grew up in solitude, a mateless child, without brother sister or father. The isolation of their life drew mother and son very close together and intensified his love for her till it became almost an adoration for a deity. From a very early age, he was naturally thrown on his own resources, and learnt to carry out his own ideas unaided, and to take the initiative without any sense of subordination or responsibility to some higher authority. In the condition of the homes of their boyhood, their early life and training, and the development of their character,—even as in the steps by which they mounted to thrones,—the forsaken son of Shahji Bhonsle was the exact parallel of the forsaken son of Hasan Sur. Shivaji and Sher Shah were not only alike in character and genius, but also grew up amidst like circumstances.

c5.s4.9

§5. Condition of the Puna jagir, 1637.

c5.s4.10

Shahji's jagir of Puna and Supa, formerly held under Nizam Shah and henceforth under Adil Shah, included the Puna district from Chakan to Indapur, Supa, Shirwal, Wai (? Walti) and Jadgir, (T. S. 8a), or a tract bounded on the west by the Ghats, on the north by the Ghod river, on the east by the Bhima and on the south by the Nira river.

c5.s4.11

∗ In 1639 Jija Bai and Shivaji in the company of Dadaji paid a visit to Shahji at Bangalore, but were sent back to Puna with him. (Sabh. 7.)

c5.s4.12

The Puna district that Dadaji took over was in a sadly ruined condition. Six years of warfare had desolated the land, and the work of the invading soldiery had been completed after their departure by robber chiefs who tried to profit by the anarchy. Indeed, the province had so recently passed from the Nizam-Shahi ownership to that of Bijapur that the authority of the new Government had not yet taken root there. It was only the rule of a strong jagirdar that could have given peace and prosperity to the district; but during 1630-1636 Shahji had been forced to lead a life of constant movement, danger and warfare. The Puna and Thana districts at the extreme north-western corner of the kingdom of Bijapur, therefore, formed a No man's Land, with none to administer and defend them.

c5.s4.13

In 1630 Shahji had plundered and seized the Nizam-Shahi country round Puna. Soon afterwards a Bijapuri army had looted and burnt Puna, Indapur and other villages of Shahji and "totally desolated them." (B. S. 287.) Next he had recovered possession of them by force. Then had followed the famine of 1630-1631, the most terrible in the sad history of the Deccan (Pad. i. A. 362.) The Junnar or North Puna tract was the scene of repeated Mughal invasions in 1634-'36. Khan-i-Zaman in the course of his campaign against Shahji (July—October 1636) penetrated to Puna, but there was probably nothing left for him to plunder or burn there. During the dissolution of the Ahmadnagar sultanate, a revenue accountant (deshpande) named Moro Tandev Honap, "a proud rebel, well acquainted with the country round the Bhima, had raised a tumult and seized the neighbourhood of Puna. All these disorders had devastated the whole kingdom from Ahmadnagar to the boundary of Wai and Shirwal." (T. S. 8a.)

c5.s4.14

The desolation caused by man preying on his species favoured the growth of wild beasts. The Puna district, especially the Sahyadri hill-side forming its western border, was now infested by large numbers of wolves, which thinned the population and hindered cultivation. Dadaji Kond-dev offered rewards to the hillmen for killing the wolves and thus cleared the whole tract of these pests in a short time. He conciliated the hillmen and induced them to settle in the valleys and extend cultivation by offering very liberal terms. "Leases were granted to the effect that the new tenants should pay a rent of only Re. 1 per bigha* in the first year, Rs. 3 in the second, Rs. 6 in the third, Rs. 9 in the fourth, Rs. 10 in the fifth, Rs. 20 in the sixth and the same rate as the older tenants in the 7th year, and at the rate of Malik Ambar's land settlement from the 8th year onwards. Thus the whole country was brought under tillage." (T. S. 9a.) When Dadaji took charge of the Puna jagir, its revenue on paper was only 40,000 hun, or Rs. 1,60,000, according to the current rate of exchange. (Sabh. 102.) But only a fraction of this amount was actually collected.

c5.s4.15

The memory of his able and beneficent administration was long preserved, and a later chronicle tells us, "He did such strict justice that the very name of robbers and usurpers disappeared from the district." (T. S. 9a.) An anecdote illustrates his punctilious sense of justice:

c5.s4.16

∗ Does the Persian translator here use bigha in the sense of chawar (or 120 bighas)?

c5.s4.17

“He planted a garden of fruit trees, named it after Shahji, and gave strict orders that if any one plucked even a leaf from the trees, he would be punished. One day Dadaji with his own hand plucked a mango from a tree. For this offence he was about to cut off the hand when the other people prevented him. To show his respect for the rules, however, he wore an iron chain round his neck” (T. S. 9b), or according to another account, “kept the offending arm confined in a long glove!” (Malkare, 20.)

§6. Shivaji's education

c5.s5.1

On the subject of Shivaji's education, Sabhasad is silent. The *Tarikh-i-Shivaji* tells us that “Dadaji trained Shivaji and appointed an excellent teacher for him. In a short time Shiva became skilled in fighting, riding and other accomplishments.” (9a.) The weight of evidence is in favour of the view that Shivaji was unlettered, like three other heroes of mediæval India,—Akbar, Haidar Ali, and Ranjit Singh. The many Europeans who visited him never saw him write anything; when they presented any petition to him the Rajah always passed it on to his ministers to be read to him. No piece of writing in his own hand is known to exist.∗

c5.s5.2

∗ At the conclusion of a letter to Ramdas there are a few words which have been taken by the editor of Ramdasi Patravyavahar (Mr. Dev) as Shivaji's writing. But the evidence is unconvincing, and the survival of only a single specimen after a long reign is unaccountable.

c5.s5.3

But though he may not have been able to read books, he certainly mastered the contents of the two great Hindu epics by listening to recitations and story-tellings. The noble examples of doing and suffering, of action and sacrifice, of military skill and statecraft, which the stories of Rama and the Pandavas afford, the political lessons and moral maxims with which these epics are filled, deeply impressed his young mind. He loved to distraction religious readings and songs (*kirtan*) and sought the society of Hindu and Muslim saints wherever he went. The want of book-learning, therefore, did not leave his mind a dull and sterile soil, nor impair his efficiency as a man of action in a world that was mediæval.

§7. The Mavals occupied

c5.s6.1

The western belt of the Puna district, running along the Western Ghats for a length of 90 miles and a breadth of 12 to 24 miles, is known as *Maval* or the Sunset Land. "It is extremely rugged, a series of table-lands cut on every side by deep winding valleys......From the valleys, hills of various heights and forms rise, terrace above terrace, with steep sides often strewn with black basalt boulders......Where the trees have been spared, they clothe the hill-sides with a dense growth mixed with almost impassable brushwood. Here and there are patches of ancient evergreen forests......The people in the northern valleys are Kolis and in the southern valleys Marathas. They have a strong strain of hill-blood and are dark, wiry and sallow......The climate is dry and invigorating, the air is lighter, and the heat less oppressive than in most parts of Western or Southern India." (Bom. Gaz. xviii. pt. I, pp. 2, 13, 15.)

c5.s6.2

In popular speech, the valleys into which this western belt is divided are collectively known as the *twelve Mavals*, though their names end with the words *ner* and *khore* as well as *maval*, and their number exceeds twelve. A Marathi ballad speaks of 12 Mavals under Junnar and twelve others under Puna.

c5.s6.3

The Maval country is a purely agricultural region with no city and little trade. Its common people differed from the Marathas and Kunbis of the plains only by being stronger built, hardier, simpler, and less enervated by luxury or vice. Their social organization was neither tribal nor patriarchal (as with the hillmen of Scotland and Rajputana), but that of the ancient village community of the Deccan, in which each village formed a miniature self-complete republic of various castes and professions. Every sub-division of the province was under a *deshmukh*, who might be called a landed baron or, more correctly, the king's local agent. He took from the peasants through the headmen (*patils*) of the different villages the royal revenue and his own share of it, besides enjoying the produce of certain *de mesne* villages (or fields) which he owned free of rent.

c5.s6.4

These petty chieftains (*deshmukhs*) were mostly Marathas or members of the same caste as Shivaji. They entrusted the management of their affairs to Brahman stewards (*karbharis*) and the accounts and correspondence work to clerks of the Prabhu (Kayastha) caste, as elsewhere in Maharashtra. Each Maval *deshmukh* had to maintain an armed force, almost entirely recruited from his tenants, for the defence of his charge against the encroachments of his neighbours and the incursions of robber bands. In addition, he was often requested by his sovereign to raise troops for the royal service in times of need, and for this extra duty he was rewarded with cash bounties and grants of fresh villages.

c5.s6.5

Thus, the rise of Shivaji opened a wide field of employment all over the Deccan to the Mavle landlords and their sturdy tenantry as instruments of his raids and conquests, and brought them wealth, power and honour far beyond what the plough could have yielded them at home. Their ambition became inseparably linked with his, and the tie was strengthened by Shivaji’s frequent tours through this tract and good comraderie with its people,—till the Mavles came to regard him almost as their Little Corporal, for whom they would do and dare to the point of death. The Maval country was the cradle of Shivaji’s power and the Mavles formed the backbone of his army.

c5.s6.6

Dadaji established complete mastery over the Mavals. The local chiefs (deshpandes) were mostly won over by tactful handling and rewards. Those who defied his authority were attacked and forced to submit.* Thus peace and prosperity were established in that region and it became a source of wealth and strength to the owner of Puna, instead of being an unprofitable and even dangerous possession. (Sabh. 7.) From this region Shivaji drew his best soldiers, his earliest comrades, and his most devoted followers. Yesaji Kank and Baji Pasalkar were Mavle chieftains of his own age; they gathered round him very early and were enrolled as his first captains. So, also, were Tanaji Malusare and his brother Suryaji.

c5.s6.7

∗ Raj. xv. 316 and 393 records the story of one of his reverses: "Dadaji Kond-dev came to Shivapur. Among the 12 Mavals, Krishnaji Nayak Bandal, the deshmukh of Hirdas Maval, had seized another man's lands and refused to give them up. Dadaji marched against him, but was defeated and forced to retreat to Shivapur. He then sent Kanhoji Nayak Jedhe to persuade Krishnaji and other Maval deshmukhs to come for an interview." The Jedhe Karina gives an inner view of the state of affairs in one part of this tract.

c5.s6.8

§8. Shivaji's choice of a career.

c5.s6.9

In their company young Shivaji wandered over the hills and forests of the Sahyadri range, and along the mazes of the river valleys, thus hardening himself to a life of privation and strenuous exertion, as well as getting an intimate knowledge of the country and its people. During his residence at Puna his plastic mind was profoundly influenced by the readings from the Hindu epics and sacred books given by his guardian and other Brahmans, and still more by the teaching of his mother. The deeply religious, almost ascetic, life that Jija Bai led amidst neglect and solitude imparted by its example, even more than by her precepts, a stoical earnestness mingled with religious fervour to the character of Shiva. He began to love independence and loathe a life of servile luxury in the pay of some Muslim king. It is, however, extremely doubtful if at this time he conceived any general design of freeing his brother Hindus from the insults and outrages to which they were often subjected by the dominant Muslim sect.¹ An independent sovereignty for himself he certainly coveted; but he never posed as the liberator of the Hindus in general, at all events not till long afterwards.

c5.s6.10

¹ *Basatin-i-Salatin*, 350—355, frankly describes in detail how the Hindus were depressed as a deliberate policy of the State of Bijapur in the palmy days of Muhammad Adil Shah.

c5.s6.11

The inconstancy, intrigue and bloodshed which stained the Court of Bijapur in those days foreboded for it a downfall like that of Ahmadnagar. Mughal service was a no better alternative to Shivaji. The imperialists had killed Kheloji Bhonslé, his grand-uncle, and their superior resources and organization made it unlikely for the Hindus of the Deccan to enjoy greater toleration or power under them than under the weaker and smaller sultanates close at hand. Moreover, to the Deccanis, both Hindu and Muhammadan, Delhi was a far off city, with an alien speech and an alien ruling race, who would pitilessly discard their southern instruments after service had been taken from them. A career of independence was no doubt risky to Shivaji, but it had undreamt of advantages to compensate for the risks, if only he could succeed.

c5.s6.12

On the question of his future career he is held by one tradition to have come into conflict with his guardian. Dadaji Kond-dev was, no doubt, an able and honest land-steward, a man of methodical habits, leading a sober blameless and humdrum life, but quite incapable of lofty ideals, daring ambition or far off vision. Shivaji's love of adventure and independence appeared to his guardian as the sign of an untutored and wayward spirit, which would ruin his life's chances. He argued long with Shivaji, advised him to follow the footsteps of his ancestors and rise to wealth and position as an obedient vassal and captain of mercenaries under Adil Shah. The young lad's association with the hill brigands and his projects for robbery and the surprise of forts filled Dadaji with apprehensions about his future. He complained to Shahji, but without succeeding in effecting a reform. Worn out by anxiety and age, Dadaji died about the middle of 1647* and Shivaji became his own master at the age of twenty.

c5.s6.13

∗ *Letters and Sanads*, 111, gives 1647 as the year of Dadaji's death. A mahzar issued by him on 31 May 1646 is extant (Raj. iv. 80 ; cf. xvi. 36.)

c5.s6.14

§9. Shivaji's early conquest of forts.

c5.s6.15

The death of Dadaji Kond-dev found Shiva ready for his task. He had already been trained in martial exercises and civil administration; he had familiarized himself with the troops of his father's western jagir and the people he would have to govern. Initiative and power of command had been freely developed in him without check or interference from his guardian. Administrative orders had in some cases been issued in his name, as his father's representative. Shivaji had also taken part, with his mother or his guardian, in some judicial investigations and public decisions of legal disputes (mahzar.)*

c5.s6.16

The band of officers already gathered round him were men of tried ability and devotion to him. Shyamraj Nilkanth Ranjhekar (the correct form of the name is Rozekar, according to some modern Maratha scholars) was the Chancellor (peshwa); Balkrishna Dikshit was Accountant-General (majmuadar); Sonaji Pant was secretary (dabir) and Raghunath Ballal Korde was paymaster (sabnis.) These four officers had been sent by Shahji about 1639. To them Shivaji now added Tukoji Chor Maratha as Master of the Horse (sar-i-naubat) and Narayan Pant as divisional paymaster. (Sabh. 7 and 8; T. S. 10b.)

c5.s6.17

The year 1646 marks a crisis in the history of Bijapur. The king fell seriously ill, and for some time his life was despaired of. Though he lingered on for ten years more, these years were by popular belief held to be a portion of the life of the saint Shah Hashim Uluvi, given away by that holy man to the king. (B. S. 312.) During this time no serious business was attended to by Muhammad Adil Shah. The expansion of territory in the Karnatak went on under some of the nobles, but at the capital the king was inert, and the administration fell into the hands of the queen Bari Sahiba. The official history of Bijapur is significantly silent about Muhammad Adil Shah's doings from 1646 to his death in 1656.

c5.s6.18

∗ I have missed the reference, and cannot make the above statement with confidence. (Try Raj., xv-xviii.)

c5.s6.19

This was Shivaji's opportunity. Even before the death of Dadaji, he had begun his annexations. About 1646 he had taken Torna fort from its Bijapuri commandant by some cunning device without fighting. Here he found Government treasure amounting to 2 lakhs of hun. The captured fort was newly named Prachandgarh, a name which it soon lost. Five miles east of it, on the crest of the same spur of hills, he built a new fort named Rajgarh, with three walled redoubts (machi) on the successive terraces of the hill-side. (T. S. 12b; Sabh. 9.)

c5.s6.20

These acts of aggression were reported to Bijapur. But Shivaji secured friends at Court by bribing the ministers, and they sided with him against the local jagirdars whom he had dispossessed. (K. K. ii. 114.)

c5.s6.21

After the death of Dadaji Kond-dev it was naturally the aim of Shivaji to bring all parts of Shahji's western jagir under his own control, so as to form a compact State ruled by one authority. But this was effected gradually and took years to complete, as it was not wise for him then to employ force on all sides.

c5.s6.22

The fort of Chakan, guarding the road to Puna from the north, had been entrusted by Dadaji Kond-dev to Firangji Narsala. This officer was induced to profess obedience to Shivaji and was confirmed in his post.

c5.s6.23

(T. S. 12b.) The petty officers of the *thanahs* of Baramati and Indapur on the eastern margin of the jagir, peacefully submitted to Shiva’s authority. The fort of Kondana, 11 miles south-west of Puna, was next secured by bribing its Adil-Shahi governor.[*]

c5.s6.24

§10. Adil Shah imprisons Shahji, 1648.

c5.s6.25

Shivaji’s first small beginnings of territorial expansion were suddenly checked about the middle of 1648 by alarming news from the Karnatak. There on 25th July his father was arrested and all his property and contingent attached by the Bijapuri commander-in-chief, Mustafa Khan, then investing Jinji in the South Arcot district. Later historians have misunderstood the cause of this act. The contemporary Persian historian of Bijapur asserts that Shahji was imprisoned for displaying a spirit of insubordination and obstruction to the commander-in-chief.

c5.s6.26

Zahur, son of Zahuri, in his *Muhammad-namah* (pp. 371-372), written by order of Muhammad Adil Shah, gives the following earliest and most correct account of the incident:—"When the siege of Jinji was protracted and fighting continued long, the cunning Shahji sent an agent to Nawab Mustafa Khan begging leave to go to his own country and give repose to his troops. The Nawab replied that to retire then would be equivalent to disturbing [the work of the siege.] Then Shahji sent to say that grain was very dear in the camp, that his soldiers could not bear the privation and labour any longer, and that he would retire to his own country without waiting for permission [from the commander-in-chief.] The Nawab, being convinced that Shahji meant mischief and would show fight, had him arrested with such extreme cleverness and good arrangement that no part of his property was plundered, but the whole was confiscated to Government."

c5.s6.27

∗ Sabh. 9. The dates of the acquisition of Chakan and Kondana are not known. The *Shivapur Deshpande Bahi* gives the year 1647 for the latter event, and names Bapuji Pant as the agent who effected the transfer to Shivaji; but the *Jedhe S.*, from which most part of it is copied, is silent on this point.

c5.s6.28

A later but very reliable Persian history of Bijapur, viz., *Basatin-i-Salatin* (325-327), supplies some additional information:—"Shahji, withdrawing his head from obedience to the Nawab Mustafa Khan, began to oppose him, till at last the Nawab decided to arrest him. One day he made Baji Rao Ghorpade and Jaswant Rao Asad-Khani get their forces ready and sent them very early in the morning to Shahji's camp. Shahji, having passed the preceding night in mirth and revelry, was still sleeping in bed. As soon as the two Raos arrived and he learnt of their purpose, he in utter bewilderment took horse and galloped away from his house alone. Baji Ghorpade gave chase, caught him, and brought him before the Nawab, who threw him into confinement. His contingent of 3,000 cavalry was dispersed, and his camp was thoroughly looted...Adil Shah on hearing of it.....sent from his Court Afzal Khan to bring Shahji away and an eunuch to attach his property." Shahji was brought in chains to Bijapur and kept in prison along with his eldest son.

c5.s6.29

Shivaji was free but in a terrible dilemma. He could only resort to diplomacy for rescuing his father, and diplomacy pointed to only one path as open to a man in his position. The Mughal Emperor was the hereditary enemy of Adil Shah, and every rebel against Bijapur was sure to gain the Emperor's patronage if he could hold forth the chance of strengthening the imperial cause in the Deccan by the adhesion of his followers. The Mughal Emperor alone was strong enough to intimidate Adil Shah.

c5.s6.30

Shivaji first wrote to Prince Murad Bakhsh,* the Mughal viceroy of the Deccan, entreating him to secure the Emperor's pardon for Shahji's past conduct and protection for him and his sons in future, and offering to come and join the Mughal service if he was given a written assurance of safety (qaul.) To this Murad replied on 14th March 1649, telling him to send a trusty agent first to report his demands. This was evidently done, and Murad after reporting the case to the Emperor and getting his assent, wrote to Shiva on 14th August asking him to come to Court with his father and kinsmen, that he might be created a 5-hazari, while Shahji would get back the rank he had once held in the Mughal peerage. Still later, on 31st October, Murad wrote directly to Shahji to inform him that he had received Shivaji's appeal for his father's release and that as he was soon going back to the imperial Court, he would there report the prayers of Shahji to the Emperor and take his orders. He asked the Maratha chief to send his agent to Court to receive the Emperor's *farman* and assurance of safety, and on his own behalf presented him with a robe of honour. In this letter Shambhuji and other sons of Shahji are spoken of as sharing his captivity.

c5.s6.31

Shivaji then sent Raghunath Pant Korde as his envoy to the Prince to ask for the *deshmukhi* of the Junnar and Ahmadnagar parganas. Murad, on 30th November, 1649, promised to try to secure these rights for him after reaching the Emperor's presence. Whether Shah Jahan really consented to put pressure on Adil Shah to release Shahji is very doubtful. No historian mentions it. Indeed, active Mughal intervention on behalf of Shahji seems to me very improbable. For one thing, Shah Jahan always treated Muhammad Adil Shah with marked courtesy and kindness, while Shahji was bitterly hated at the Mughal Court for the trouble he had given them in 1633-1636. Then, again, the Mughal Emperor had definitely promised in his treaties with Bijapur not to take into his service or extend his protection to any officer of Adil Shah. It is, therefore, historically true that the release of Shahji was due to the friendly mediation of Sharza Khan and the bail of Randaula Khan, two leading nobles of Bijapur. Shahji after his release is said to have lived for some time in the Tungabhadra region subduing the rebellious chieftains of his jagir in Northern Mysore. Here his eldest son Shambhuji fell in an attack on Kanakgiri, but he himself afterwards carried the fort by assault.[*] (T. S. 8b.)

c5.s6.32

∗ Shivaji neither wrote nor sent any envoy to Shah Jahan. All his negotiations about his father were conducted with Murad, as the four original Persian letters of Murad in Parasnis's possession show. Rajwade, viii. 2-3, wrongly represents these letters as coming from Shah Jahan, but he is quite correct in ix, last section. The Emperor never interfered for the release of Shahji.

c5.s6.33

∗ The *Jedhe Shakavali* gives 16th May 1649 as the date of this release, but it is inconsistent with Murad's letters cited above, except on the suppositions that Shivaji never replied to Murad's repeated letters [as Rajwade imagines, ix. c. 4-5] and that the Mughal viceroy of the Deccan did not hear of Shahji's release at Bijapur for six months after the event, though Shahji was then the foremost Hindu noble of Bijapur! Therefore, either these Persian letters (preserved at Satara) were forgeries, or Jedhe's early dates are unreliable. I am inclined to place the event at the very end of the year 1649. The *Jedhe S.* says that the price of Shahji's freedom was the restoration of Kondana (*Shiva-bharat* adds, Bangalore also) to Adil Shah.

c5.s6.34

The wildest stories are told by later Marathi writers about the attack on Kanakgiri, especially to connect Afzal Khan with Shambhuji's death.

c5.s6.35

§11. Shivaji's doings from 1650 to 1655.

c5.s6.36

Shivaji seems to have kept comparatively quiet during the six years from his father's release to his conquest of Javli; at all events he did not make many or extensive annexations, nor give any strong provocation to the Bijapur Government. I am inclined to place the acquisition of Purandar in this period.

c5.s6.37

The strong fortress of Purandar, 18 miles s. s. e. of Puna, was held under the nominal sway of Bijapur by a Brahman chief, Niloji surnamed Nilkanth Nayak, whose family had been in hereditary charge of it and its adjacent lands ever since the days of the Ahmadnagar dynasty. Niloji was a stern grasping man who denied his younger brothers, Pilaji and Shankaraji, any share of his power or of the income of the estate. They resented this exclusion from their birthright and appealed to Shivaji to arbitrate between them. He was admitted into the fort at the Feast of Lamps (November) as a guest. On the third day of his stay, the two younger brothers surprised and fettered Niloji and brought him before Shiva, who imprisoned all the three and took possession of the fort for himself! The Nayak's retainers were expelled and a Mavle garrison was placed there by Shivaji. After a few days the three captives were set free and granted the village of Chamli, in perpetuity for their maintenance. (Sabh. 9; T. S. 11b-12a.) From the traditions and papers of the present Nilkanth family of Chamli, V. L. Bhave has given the following account of their loss of Purandar :

c5.s6.38

¹ Jedhe S. has an entry stating that a son was born to Shambhuji on 25th Nov. 1654.

c5.s6.39

² The Shiva-bharat gives the following account:—During Shahji's captivity, the Bijapuri commander Mustafa Khan [then before Jinji and stricken by a mortal illness] sent an army under Farhad Khan to wrest Bangalore from Shahji's agent (and eldest son) Shambhuji, but it was defeated. Another army was sent from Bijapur against Shivaji under Fath Khan. It reached Belsar and encamped there. A detachment from it, led by Balaji the son of Haibat Rao, advanced and laid siege to Shirwal, but was driven away by Shivaji's troops under Kavji. Then Fath Khan marched against Purandar, where Shivaji was living, and delivered a rash assault on the fort, which ended in the rout of his army, with heavy loss. Chitnis and the Shedgaonkar Bakhar tell two different tales about this 'attempt against Shivaji, and the Jedhe Karina merely supplies an embellishment to the Shiva-bharat, on its favourite subject of the bravery of the Jedhes and their devotion to Shivaji, but is silent about the rest of the campaign. All these sources are unreliable.

c5.s6.40

Shankaraji, the second of the three brothers, was able and clever, and used at first to manage the affairs of the fort, all the brothers living together. But Niloji, the eldest, urged by his designing and imperious wife, who had secretly corrupted the garrison, one day attacked and severely wounded Shankaraji and gained control of the fort. Shivaji, who had been coveting Purandar, came to its foot with his mother and army to spend the rainy season. On the occasion of the Dewali he was admitted as a guest. In the night of the third day he surprised and chained all the three brothers when fast asleep and seized the fort and all the property in it. After a time, at the entreaty of that holy man the Dev of Chinchvad (whose son had married Niloji's sister), he released the brothers, gave the village of Chamli to Shankaraji, restored the nayakship to Niloji, and employed their youngest brother Pilaji (alias Trimbakji) in his army. [Sahavichar.]

c5.s6.41

§12. Conquest of Javli, 1656.

c5.s6.42

At the extreme north-western corner of the Satara district lies the village of Javli, which was then the centre of a fairly large principality including nearly the whole of that district. The sub-division of Javli is "throughout hilly and thickly wooded with evergreen trees......The narrow rugged and steep crest of the Sahyadris, rising 4,000 feet or more above sea-level, forms its western wall; and in the valleys the tree growth is luxuriant, forming high forests." (Bom. Gaz. xix, 3.) Within a length of 60 miles as many as 8 passes cross the range, two of them being fit for carts and now transporting a large traffic from the Deccan plateau to Mahad in Kolaba and Chiplun in Ratnagiri. There are, besides, countless gorges and foot-tracks leading from Javli to Konkan.

c5.s6.43

A Maratha family named Moré had received a grant of the State of Javli from the first Sultan of Bijapur early in the 16th century, and made the claim good by their sword. For eight generations they had conquered the petty chieftains around and amassed a vast treasure by raising forced contributions. They kept 12,000 infantry, mostly sturdy hillmen of the southern Mavals, and succeeded in getting possession of the entire district of Satara and parts of Konkan. The head of the family bore the hereditary title of Chandra Rao, conferred by a Bijapur king in recognition of the founder's personal strength and courage. The younger sons enjoyed appanages in the neighbouring villages.

c5.s6.44

The State of Javli, by its situation, barred the path of Shivaji's ambition in the south and south-west. As he frankly said to Raghunath Ballal Korde, "Unless Chandra Rao is killed, the kingdom cannot be secured. None but you can do this deed. I send you to him as envoy." The Brahman entered into the conspiracy, and went to Javli, attended by an escort of 125 picked men, on the pretence of making important diplomatic proposals from Shiva to Chandra Rao. (Sabh. 10.)

c5.s6.45

On the first day the envoy held the usual ceremonial conversations. Finding out the ins and outs of the place and learning that Chandra Rao usually lived in a careless unguarded manner, Raghunath formed his plan of action. The second interview with Chandra Rao was held in a private chamber. Raghunath talked for some time, and then drew his dagger all of a sudden and stabbed Chandra Rao and his brother Surya Rao. The assassins promptly rushed out of the gate, cut their way through the alarmed and confused guards, beat back the small and hurriedly gathered band of pursuers and gained a chosen place of hiding in the forest.

c5.s6.46

Shivaji had kept himself ready to follow up his agent's crime. Immediately on hearing of the murder of the Mores, he arrived and assaulted Javli (15 Jan. 1656.) The leaderless garrison defended themselves for six hours and were then overcome. Chandra Rao's two sons and entire family were made prisoners. But his kinsman and manager, Hanumant Rao More, rallied the partisans of the house and held a neighbouring village in force, menacing Shivaji's new conquest. Shiva found that "unless he murdered Hanumant, the thorn would not be removed from Javli." (Sabh. 10.) So, he sent a Maratha officer of his household named Shambhuji Kavji with a pretended proposal of marriage to Hanumant Rao, who was then stabbed to death at a private interview. The whole kingdom of Javli now passed into Shivaji's possession and he was free to invade South Konkan with ease or extend his dominion southwards into the Kolhapur district.

§13. The fate of the Mores critically discussed

c5.s7.1

Such is the account of the gaining of Javli written by Shivaji's courtier, Krishnaji Anant Sabhasad, for the eyes of that king's son Rajaram, only 14 years after Shivaji's death. There is no reason to disbelieve such an authority in a matter like this, though the writer's order of events may be rather mixed up (as it often is elsewhere in his book.) Later writers tell the story somewhat differently as regards the details.

c5.s7.2

T. S., 13b-14a (also Malkaré, paras 28 and 29) says : "Shivaji sent Raghunath Ballal to Chandra Rao to ask for the hand of his fair daughter. On reaching the place, Raghunath first went to the diwan Hanumant Rao and stabbed him to death at the interview. He returned by a night-march to Shivaji (at Purandar), who was highly delighted and by quick marches arrived before Javli with a vast army and took it after six hours of fighting. The sardars Baji and Krishna Rao, aged 14 and 16 years respectively, were brought as prisoners to Puna and there beheaded. The women and children were set free."

c5.s7.3

The Jedhe Shakavali (repeated by the Karina) merely states that Shivaji took Javli and three months later captured Raigarh ; Chandra Rao (who was in it) was persuaded by two of Shivaji's Maval deshmukhs to evacuate the fort.

c5.s7.4

The Shiva-bharat (canto 18) is not more helpful. It says, "Shiva took Javli after slaying in battle Baji and Krishna Raj and their father Chandra Raj. Pratap Varma, a friend of Chandra Rao, fled to Bijapur. Coveting the position of C. R., he gratified Adil Shah by his [devoted] attendance, till that monarch promised to wrest Javli from Shiva and give it to him. Pratap helped Afzal during his campaign and brought him to Wai."

c5.s7.5

The most probable reconstruction of the history of the Javli affair, from a consideration of all the materials, seems to be this:—The then Chandra Rao, named Krishnaji and eight in succession from the founder, was a boy of sixteen and all his business was conducted by his kinsman, Hanumant Rao Moré, who was his *diwan*. Raghunath Ballal *Kordé* (and not *Atré*, as the latter was not *sabnis*), under Shivaji's orders visited Hanumant (the *diwan* or person who really ruled the estate) with a pretended offer of marriage between his master and the late Chandra Rao's daughter, and treacherously slew him at a private meeting. He escaped unscathed and quickly brought Shivaji to the scene with a vast army. Javli was captured after six hours' fighting, and several members of the More family were taken prisoner. But Chandra Rao himself was either absent from the place or had fled away before its fall. He took refuge in Raigarh (a fort belonging to him.) Shiva invested it and gained possession of it by negotiations. The two boys, Krishnaji Chandra Rao and his younger brother Baji Rao More, were carried away by Shivaji to Puna and there the elder one was beheaded. His offence is alleged by some modern theorists to have been the opening of correspondence with the Adil Shahi Government for recovering his heritage,—which would be a quite natural and legitimate desire.

c5.s7.6

The younger boy, Baji, escaped (on 28th August, according to the *Shivapur Daftar Yadi*), assumed the hereditary title of Chandra Rao, and in March 1665 joined Jai Singh for war against Shivaji. [*Haft Anjuman*, Paris MS. 113*a*, 123*a*.] With him came Ambaji Govind Rao More.

First 89 of 108 passages. Read on

Linked texts (1)