Fall of the Mughal Empire v2.c27.s25: § 24. The spoils of the victors
Fall of the Mughal Empire v2.c27.s25
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§ 24. The spoils of the victors
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“The booty captured within the entrenchment was beyond calculation, and the regiments of Khans (i. e., 8000 troopers of Abdāli clansmen) did not, as far as possible, allow other troops like the Irānis and Turānis to share in the plunder ; they took possession of everything themselves, but sold to the Indian soldiers handsome Brāhman women for one *tuman* and good horses for two *tumans* each.” [Nur-ud-din, 50*b*.] The Deccani prisoners, male and female, reduced to slavery by the victorious army numbered 22,000, many of them being the sons and other relatives of the sardars or middle class men. Among them ‘rose-limbed slave girls’ are mentioned, which shows that the Maratha officers during their victorious occupation of Delhi had imitated the Peshwa’s example and replenished their harems with the fair-coloured beauties of the northern hill range, for whom there were regular markets in Delhi Lahor and other great cities. Besides these 22,000 unhappy captives, some four hundred officers and 6,000 men fled for refuge to Shujā's camp, and were sent back to the Deccan with money help by that Nawāb, at the request of his Hindu officers. The total loss of the Marathas after the battle is put at 50,000 horses, captured either by the Afghan army or the villagers along the route of flight, two hundred thousand draught cattle, some thousands of camels, five hundred elephants, besides cash and jewellery. "Every trooper of the Shah brought away ten, and sometimes twenty camels laden with money. The captured horses were beyond count, but none of them was of value; they came like droves of sheep in their thousands." *
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§ 25. The casualties in the Maratha army.
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Among those who fell in the battle was the Peshwā's eldest son Vishwās Rao, whose body was detained for three days by the Durrāni soldiers clamouring that they would stuff it and carry it away to their country as a memorial of their victory over 'the Emperor of the Hindus'; but it was at last surrendered at Shujā-ud-daulah's entreaty to his Brāhmans for cremation. The headless trunk of the Bhāu was dragged out of a huge heap of the slain two days after the battle, and the head on the third day, and burnt at different times with proper rites. Jaswant Rao Puār, one son of Pilāji Jādav, Tukoji Sindhiā, Sāntāji Wāgh (covered with 40 wounds)
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∗ Spoils.—Kashiraj, 28; *Siyar*, iii. 69 (=*Mux*. 191); Nur-ud-din, 50*b*; Raj. vi. 408 and 409; *Manaxil*, 79-81.
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and several other captains were known to have perished here. Jankoji Sindhiā, helpless from severe wounds and with a broken arm hung by a sling from his neck, was found and concealed in a tent by Barkhurdār Khan, who agreed to ransom him for seven lakhs; but when Najib Khan, the mortal enemy of the house of Sindhia, got scent of the matter and told Abdāli, Barkhurdār had Jankoji murdered and buried in secret in order to avert his master's wrath. [Kashiraj.] Ibrāhim Khan Gārdi, also badly wounded, took refuge in Shujā's camp, but the Durrāni soldiers demanded the execution of this Muslim ally of the infidels, and the Shah yielded to their clamour. Shamsher Bahadur, who had escaped to Kumbher, died of his wounds, in spite of all the attention and care of Suraj Mal. Another notable general, Antāji Mānakeshwar, on his way home was killed by the Baluch lords of Farrukhnagar, as also was Bāji Hari.
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Among these, the historian has a special reason for lamenting the death of Antāji, which has robbed posterity of a most brilliant account of the battle of Pānipat from the Maratha side. He has left behind him the most graphic and detailed despatches on his other campaigns and reports of Delhi Court affairs. He was, in fact, a journalist before his time, and possessed the modern pressman's facile pen, eye for the picturesque, descriptive power, and—we must mournfully add,—disregard of truth for producing effect or glorifying himself.
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Māhādji Sindhia received during his flight wounds from a Durrāni pursuer which lamed him for life. It was, in short, a nation-wide disaster like Flodden Field; there was not a home in Maharashtra that had not to mourn the loss of a member, and several houses their very heads. An entire generation of leaders was cut off at one stroke.*
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As for Sadāshiv Rāo Bhāu, the survivors of that fatal day made him the scapegoat of the Maratha debacle. They ascribed the loss of their northern empire and army solely to his overweening conceit, contempt for the advice of wiser men, and that intellectual blindness with which the gods first afflict those whom they wish to destroy. Later generations of Maratha writers have echoed this cry, but with what little justice the authentic documents cited in the foregoing narrative of his campaign will have shown. But his conduct on the last day no student of the military science can justify. When a soldier makes the supreme sacrifice, there may be sorrow for it, but not regret. The fruit of his action is immaterial to him. The young hero—only two years older than the Bhāu,—who fell into the arms of victory on the Heights of Abraham, was fond of singing,
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∗ Antaji,—Kashiraj 28. Mahadji lamed,—Manaxil 85-88, Husain Shahi 73. Ibrahim Gardi,—Kashiraj, 31-32 (poisoned by order), Husain Shahi 74 (corpse disgraced and exposed), Mux. 190 (confined in a cage and then beheaded.) Gulistan-i-Rahmat, 67.
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Why, soldiers ! why
Should we be melancholy boys ?
Why, soldiers ! why,
We whose business 'tis to die ?
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It would have made no difference in his outlook upon life if he had changed places with his gallant French rival and closed his eyes amidst the darkness of defeat.
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But a generalissimo who has led into ruin half a lakh of fighters and eight times that number of non-combatants entrusted to his care, and made no provision for their compact orderly retreat under proper leaders in the event of an almost certain defeat, stands on a different footing and must receive a different verdict at the bar of history.
Linked texts (1)
- Bayān-i wāqiʿ — Khwāja ʿAbd al-Karīm Kashmīrī 1780, Persian