Fall of the Mughal Empire v3.c36.s8.2

v3.c36.s8.2

This Rao Pratap Singh, a Jaipur vassal of the Nāroka branch of the Kachhwa clan, had at first been banished by his overlord Mādho Singh of Jaipur, but had soon afterwards won his sovereign's pardon and restoration to his fiefs by his patriotic assistance in the battles with Jawahir Singh Jat in February 1768. During the next ten years (the reign of Prithi Singh, 1768-'78) he remained loyal. But when on 15th April 1778 the throne of Jaipur passed on to Sawai Pratāp Singh, an imbecile and feeble lad, the new sovereign's weakness and folly and the consequent confusion in his State roused his Nāroka vassal's dreams of territorial aggression and independence. The Macheri chief had already begun to fight for his own hand in the Agra-Mathura districts and Mewāt, now as the ally of the Jat Rajah and now as a partisan of the imperial general, as he found profitable.