Fall of the Mughal Empire v2.c26.s2.1

v2.c26.s2.1

From the beginning of this campaign the Peshwa kept assuring Jayapa of his full confidence in his valour and wisdom, but urging him not to carry matters to an extreme, as the Marwar Rathors were a race of famous swordsmen, justly proud of their having never yet suffered defeat from the Marathas. He advised his general to conclude the Marwar business as quickly as possible by tact and compromise, giving to Bijay Singh his father Bakht Singh's appanage and to Ram Singh his paternal dominions, or even dividing the Marwar kingdom equally between the two. For, there was a far more important and lucrative undertaking before the Marathas in Hindustan than changing the succession in a poor and barren Rajput State. Safdar Jang had recently died, and his son Shuja-ud-daulah had succeeded him in the rich provinces of Oudh and Allahabad ; now was the time to get a large sum out of him and also to secure the transfer of the holy cities of Allahabad and Benares to the Peshwa. The force accompanying Raghunath near Delhi was too small to exact these gains and to enforce the payment of the vast tribute promised by the wazir Imad-ul-mulk. And money was sorely needed by the Peshwa ; he was helpless before his creditors and unpaid officers ; "my Government is eternally in the grip of that consumption, the malady of debt." Fifty lakhs of Rupees if realized from Hindustan would be most welcome to him now. For achieving this object it was fatal to disperse the Maratha troops over a vast area. Jayapa was again and again ordered to free himself from the Marwar entanglement by any means whatever, to satisfy Ram Singh somehow by placing four or five Rathor chieftains under him as his supporters, and to avoid the extremely hard task of crushing Bijay Singh altogether, which would have kept the Maratha army engaged in Marwar till eternity.*