Fall of the Mughal Empire v2.c28.s9.8

v2.c28.s9.8

It was the dream of the Jat kings of Bharatpur to justify their title of *Braja-rāj* by actually ruling over the sacred city and district of Mathura. But that was possible only if they could be allowed either to cut the highway between the imperial cities of Delhi and Agra, or to hold Agra, the second capital of the Empire, in addition to Mathura. The sovereign of Delhi could not be expected to agree to this mutilation of his empire, and hence Mathura was held by the Jat Rajahs only on an eternally precarious tenure, and solely by the force of indisputably superior arms. And yet the Jats of Bharatpur could expand only by holding Agra and Mathura, and then from these secured bridge-heads crossing the Jamuna and overflowing into the Aligarh and Bulandshahar districts east of that river. The Bharatpur State is hemmed in on the west by the Rajput kingdoms,—Mewat (Narnol, Alwar etc.) being the bone of contention between the two races,—on the north by Delhi and its surrounding districts, and on the south-east by the Marathas, now firmly planted in Malwa. This geography inexorably dictated the course of Bharatpur history.