Fall of the Mughal Empire v1.c9.s2.7

v1.c9.s2.7

After seizing the Government of Patna, Shamshir Khān encamped outside in Jafar Khān's garden, leaving Murād Sher Khan in charge of the city. Knowing that Alivardi was sure to come and call him to account for his misdeeds, he prepared himself for the coming contest by increasing his army with feverish haste and lavish expenditure of money on Afghān recruits and summoning his tribesmen from all sides to his standard. ''This year Afghāns swarmed out of the ground like white ants. Every day the citizens of Patna were roused by the noise of kettle-drums five or six times, and on inquiry learnt that an Afghān captain named so-and-so had come from such and such a place with his contingent of so many men to enlist under Shamshir Khān or Sardār Khān'' and was marching through the town to the camp in full military pomp. (Siyar, ii. 162). In this way nearly 40,000 horse and a somewhat smaller number of infantry were gathered round the Afghān leaders in the course of three months,—the cavalry were almost entirely Pathāns and the foot consisted of a strong body of Bahelia musketeers under a *bakhshi* of their own. In addition to these, the Marāthas, then in Bengal, were repeatedly written to for coming to Patna and joining the Afghān army in an attack on Alivardi. When the news came that the Nawāb was advancing from his capital towards Bihār, Shamshir Khān and Murād Sher Khān had the Nawāb’s daughter, Amina Begam (the widow of Zainuddin), and her little daughter and son taken out of their palace in Patna, placed them in a bullock cart without a roof or awning over their heads, and thus carried them in public exposure and humiliation through the streets of the city to their camp outside it. It only made the citizens condemn and curse these shameless miscreants.