Fall of the Mughal Empire v2.c28.s3: § 6. Najib fights Suraj Mal and Jawahir, 1763-1765
Fall of the Mughal Empire v2.c28.s3
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§ 6. Najib fights Suraj Mal and Jawahir, 1763-1765
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He had barely recovered health and strength, when in December he was suddenly recalled to Delhi by Suraj Mal's attack on the Baluch zamindars and threatened invasion of Delhi. Najib tried hard to pacify the Jat king, but without success. The campaign ended in Suraj Mal's being shot dead (25 December 1763) during a night attack and all his troops dispersing, as we shall learn in detail in Chapter 23. The disappearance of the greatest of the Jat kings, the immature character of his youthful successor, and the internal dissensions that ravaged the Bharatpur State, all combined to give Najib a respite from that enemy till November next, when Jawahir Singh, after assembling a vast force of his own tribesmen and hired Sikh Maratha and Gosain troops, attacked Najib to avenge his father's death. This life and death struggle kept Najib busy in Delhi till the middle of February 1765, when he succeeded in defeating the attack, and stood triumphant as the undisputed lord of Delhi. This repulse of the Jat king, even though supported by Imad, Malhar Holkar and the myriads of Sikhs, marks the climax of Najib's greatness. The holy month of Ramzān began on the next Friday, 22 February 1765, and Imad begged leave to enter Delhi and offer his Friday prayers in the Jāmi Masjid of the capital. For six years he had ruled over the city as an wazir mightier than the sovereign and Najib had then ranked among his humble retainers. And today as Imad rode through the Broad Street of Delhi to the Grand Mosque, the citizens saw with wonder that Najib was seated side by side with him on the same elephant. Such was his present exaltation. [Nur. 91.]
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Meantime, his patron, Ahmad Shah, had been defeated by the Sikhs and recalled quickly to Afghanistan by disorder in his own army and kingdom (end of March 1764.) In the following September, Najib, anticipating the storm visibly brewing from the new Jat Rajah's quarter, sent his own envoy Meghraj to Abdali in Qandahar, via Jammu. In response to this appeal, Ahmad Shah reached Mustafabad-Buria (25 m. s.e. of Ambala) by rapid marches in February 1765; but by that time Najib had already made peace with his enemy, and Abdali hurried back to his own country without giving Najib time to meet him.
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§ 7. Najib sternly represses refractory villagers in Hariana, 1765.
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Freed from the Jat menace, Najib marched to the Sonepat district (in the north of Delhi) for subduing the turbulent tenantry, who would not pay rent unless forced to do so. "Here many villages were in rebellion; their leaders were a body of Jats residing in Buānā (16 miles north-west of Delhi), who were notorious for their highway robbery and usurpation of other people's lands and cattle." Najib first went to the district headquarters and peacefully demanded the revenue. On being refused, he rode out at midnight with his troops, came upon the village at dawn, slew the Hindu abbot and his monks who had their hermitage near the place, and tried to seize the cattle that were being led out of the village to their pasture. The villagers opened fire with their matchlocks. A thousand of them were armed with muskets and 2,000 with side arms; besides, three hundred matchlockmen of the Bhangi (sweeper) caste had been hired by them. The Ruhela troopers encircled the village, standing beyond range. The villagers began to parley, but had no real intention of paying, they only mocked Najib.
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By this time it was noon and the Ruhela troopers and their horses, standing in the open, were suffering dreadfully from the Sun (April 1765); they had brought no artillery with them. The village had a mud wall twice the height of a man, all around it, with a dry ditch below. But Najib’s spirit was up. He could not bear the thought that the Amir-ul-umara of the Empire should lay a regular siege to a peasants’ mud fort or retire leaving it untaken. His plan was quickly formed: dismounting all his troopers and even officers, he made a simultaneous assault from all sides, at a given signal, immediately after firing a salvo from his camel-swivels, which had been advanced to the front. A sudden distraction and alarm seized the villagers, and only one camel-gunner and one infantryman on Najib’s side were killed, while the Ruhelas ran forward, jumped into the ditch, and clung to the wall; climbing on one another’s back they entered the village in spite of the shower of bullets. The villagers, losing heart, took to flight. A body of them, who were mounted along with their women, broke through the Ruhela cordon and escaped by the back gate. The leading men of the village took refuge in a house and continued to hold out with their musket fire. The Ruhela soldiers dispersed for plunder and slaughter, and it was an hour before they could be rallied and made to carry this house by assault. Two thousand men were slain and about the same number of women and children were made prisoners, and finally the sacked village was set on fire. "From the massacre at Buānā a great terror spread throughout Hariānā, and all the landlords made submission and paid their revenue." [Nur. 93a-97b.]
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Having thus restored Government authority in the north Delhi region, Najib returned to the capital, whence he was soon recalled to Najibabad by the news of the illness of his wife, a daughter of Dundi Khan. She died, leaving two sons and one daughter behind. After spending the rainy season there, Najib in October returned to Delhi, and turned to subduing the peasantry of the region west of the capital, in the modern Rohtak and Hisar districts.* Some 30 miles west of Rohtak city there was a village which had paid no revenue for three years. Parleys went on for ten days, and then the villagers agreed to terms. A collector was posted there, but he was attacked at night. The news reached Najib's camp; at once he rode out, came up to the village while it was still dark and delivered an assault on it. The village was set on fire; many of its inhabitants fled away, the rest were slain or taken prisoner. This terrified the headmen of Bhiwāni, a most important village in the neighbourhood (35 miles s. e. of Hisar), notorious for its bold and successful defiance of the local governors and even of the Emperor in person. After a futile preparation for armed opposition, the villagers realized Najib’s overwhelming superiority and fled away at night, evacuating all their houses. “Next morning the Ruhela soldiers entered the village and brought away heaps of grain to their camp. All the men, and even their animals, fed on this grain for four or five days. When they marched away, they set fire to a great store of grain. Even after that, so much was left that it could not be computed...Najib after devastating Bhiwāni, went towards Rohtak, where he heard of a Sikh raid into his Saharnapur estates and marched thither.”
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∗ Nur. 98b-100a. SPD. xxix. 99. CPC. ii. Ch. Gulz. 485a.