Fall of the Mughal Empire v2.c29.13

v2.c29.13

At the report of his approach the Sikh besieging force at once vanished from the scene. Abdali halted near Jandiala for two or three days when he learnt that the Sikhs had fled to the Sarhind district, and there joining their cis-Satlaj brethren had begun to plunder the country. Zain Khan the faujdar, with Bhikhan (Hingun, according to Cunningham) Khan of Maler Kotla, Murtaza Khan Paracha, Qasim Khan Maral and other officers, issued to oppose them, and halted at Maler Kotla, while the Sikh army lay ten kos to the north. In the night of 4-5 February, 1762, swift Durrani couriers came to Zain Khan and told him that the Shah had crossed the Bias and the Satlaj by unbroken rapid marches and would fall upon the flank of the Sikhs the next day, and that the Shah had ordered Zain Khan to issue next morning with all his troops and assail the Sikhs in front. But the Sikhs too had received intelligence of Abdali's approach and tried to escape from him by decamping south-eastwards. Early in the forenoon of 5th February, Zain Khan's vanguard under Qasim Khan fell in with the Sikhs near the village of Kup (6 miles north of Maler Kotla) and was driven back in a panic flight upon its base. But another officer named Murtaza Khan Paracha (with Miskin) stood his ground on a small eminence and was joined after some time by a detachment of Ahmad Shah's horsemen. The Durrani force, in two divisions,—one under the Shah and the other led by his wazir (with Zain Khan), moved round the two flanks of the Sikhs, slaying all they met with. The pursuit was kept up till the evening, when the tired victors reached Bharthala (10 m. n. e. of Maler Kotla) and encamped there. In the course of this running fight, some ten thousand Sikhs were slain and the day is still remembered by them as that of the *Ghallu-ghara** or great scrimmage.