Fall of the Mughal Empire v1.c6.s1.4

v1.c6.s1.4

By the end of April 1739 the horrors of Nādir’s conquest came to a natural close in Delhi. Laden with the plundered treasure of the richest empire in Asia, the Persian conqueror left the Mughal capital on his homeward march on 5th May. Eight days later the Emperor Muhammad Shāh held his first public audience after his restoration and coins were once more stamped in his name, replacing those issued for Nādir Shāh in the interval. The Court chroniclers record that on this occasion the nobles offered their presents and the Emperor on his side conferred robes of honour and rewards on them. [D.C.] Thus the usual ceremonies of the imperial darbār were gone through as if no political disaster of the first magnitude had taken place in the meantime. But nobody present could forget that things were not as before the Persian invader's coming. The Emperor and his wazir were there as before, but the second officer of the realm—the Head of the Army, Khān-i-Daurān, had perished as well as Sādat Khan Burhān-ul-mulk, the most powerful of the provincial governors, and the Emperor's personal favourite Muzaffar Khān, besides a host of officers of lower rank but high connections. Ten to twelve thousands of the regular soldiery had fallen on the field of Karnāl and 20,000 people had been put to the sword within the city of Delhi itself. Sack and massacre had devastated lesser towns like Thāneshwar, Pānipat, Sonipat etc. The imperial treasury and the nobles' mansions had been drained dry to supply the indemnity exacted by the victor,—fifteen krores of rupees in cash besides jewellery rich clothing and furniture worth 50 krores more. The imperial regalia had been robbed of its two most famous and costly ornaments, the Koh-i-nur diamond and the Peacock Throne. The imperial family and the proudest peers had been forced to descend to a still lower depth of humiliation. The Khurāsāni leather-coat weaver's son had married his son to a princess of the family of the Pādishāh, and he had dragged to his bed all the handsome wives and maiden daughters of Muzaffar Khan, lately killed in battle. [Ashub, ii. 367 and 375.]