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Fall of the Mughal Empire v2.c27.s6: II. Was Malhar Holkar responsible for the disaster to Dattaji Sindhia on 9 Jan. 1760?

Fall of the Mughal Empire v2.c27.s6

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II. Was Malhar Holkar responsible for the disaster to Dattaji Sindhia on 9 Jan. 1760?

v2.c27.s6.1

No. That Malhar did not join Dattaji before this fatal battle was due solely to Dattaji's pride and miscalculation of enemy forces. When Datta first heard of Abdali's invasion of the Panjab, he was at Shukartal and Malhar near Sawai Madhopur. This great distance between them and the fact of Malhar being then involved in the siege of Barwara and therefore unable to disentangle himself from his Rajput enemies and to march to Datta's assistance at a day's notice, should be carefully borne in mind.

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Datta first asked Malhar to come to him, [SPD. ii. 115] and the latter sent his siege-guns back to Rampura and got ready to march away. "On the day he joined his van" he received a letter from Datta to say that there was no report of Abdali's coming soon, and that he was still holding the trenches against Najib. So, Malhar, "feeling reassured about that quarter," recalled his guns and laid siege to Barwara. But on 27th Dec. he, all of a sudden, received Dattaji's frantic call to come to his aid in the campaign against Abdali, and began his march towards Delhi five days later. [SPD. ii. 117.] He could not possibly have been in time to join in the battle of Barari-ghat. And, from the fact of the Marathas being hopelessly outclassed in weapons and outgeneralled by Abdali, I am convinced that if Malhar had joined Dattaji, he would have merely led larger hecatombs to the slaughter. What Malhar could have done by his guerilla tactics (ghanimi) was seen at Sikandrabad on 4th March 1760.

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CHAPTER XX

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SADASHIV RAO BHAU'S DELHI EXPEDITION, 1760.

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