Fall of the Mughal Empire v2.c27.s17.17

v2.c27.s17.17

Before advancing to the fatal field of Jalalabad, Govind Ballāl had at last performed one of the tasks so persistently laid on him by the Bhāu. He had safely transmitted to Nāro Shankar at Delhi Rs. 4,20,000 of collected revenue, (in addition to the two lakhs paid to the Bhāu in August.) The Bhāu had sent a party of horse under Krishna Rao Ballāl of Manaji Paygudé's contingent, to fetch this treasure to his camp. But like a wise man, Nāro Shankar did not risk it all in one consignment. On 21st December he remitted Rs. 1,10,000 with Krishna Rao, and this amount seems to have reached the Bhāu's camp in safety. But when, on 1st January 1761, a second instalment of one and a half lakhs was despatched in charge of 300 troopers under Parāshar Dādāji, each man carrying Rs. 500 tied round his waist, the situation had already become most dangerous for the Marathas in consequence of the annihilation of Govind Ballāl's force in the Doab and the strict investment of the Bhāu within his trenches at Pānipat. Six of these troopers came back at the end of the first day, their horses or their hearts having failed, and returned the money. The rest pushed on, travelling by night for safety through the wilderness west of the imperial highway, but at the very end of their journey, in the dim misty small hours of the morning of 6th January, they missed their way, entered the left wing of the Abdali camp, mistaking it for their own, and asked in Marathi what general's quarter it was. Their speech at once betrayed them, and the whole body of 293 men with their captain was cut off by the Durrānis, only one man escaping to carry the tale of disaster to Delhi. [Raj. i. 281, Husain Shahi 65, Nur-ud-din 41b, Kashi. 16.]