Fall of the Mughal Empire v3.c36.s6.5

v3.c36.s6.5

The chance of the Sikhs came during the eclipse of the Delhi monarchy which began in 1760 in consequence of the murder of Alamgir II by his wazir, the prolonged Durrāni invasion, and the knocking out of the Marathas from the North Indian political ring at Pānipat in January 1761; and they were most prompt in seizing it. While the Panjab proper remained for a generation afterwards a debateable ground between the Durrāni governors and the Sikh sardars, the Cis-Satlaj country came, soon after that battle, to be dotted with Sikh principalities, large and small, which swept away all other local proprietors and Governmental authorities from the Satlaj in the west to the Jamuna in the east, and from the foot of the Himalayas to the southern border of the modern Karnal district (the 29th degree of North latitude.) And even beyond this region the Sikh power overflowed fitfully into the upper Doab and the north Delhi portion of the Rohtak district, and through Hariana to Narnaul on the Shekhawati frontier.