Fall of the Mughal Empire v3.c42.15

v3.c42.15

From the barren interlude of the prince's adventure, we now turn to the history of Ghulām Qādir. Immediately after being created Mir Bakhshi, the Ruhela chieftain renewed his career of usurping the Crownlands in the Doab,—both the Emperor's privy purse estates (sarf-i-khās mahals) and the jāgirs of the Marathas, as the only means of finding subsistence for his growing army. He had already seized Jhinjhāna, Barnāwa, Baraut, Budhāna and other districts up to Mirat city. The Maratha outpost at Mirat held out for some time, but the defence broke down when Mahadji retired from before Agra at the end of the year. Ghulām Qādir pushed on southwards through the Doāb, occupying the country and driving out the agents of the lawful jāgirdārs. [DY. i. 226, 230.] Further south, Himmat Bahadur had laid siege to the Maratha fort of Firuzabad, Phup Singh Jat and Yaqub Khan Pathan had recovered their respective seats of Mursan and Khurja, and Malik Md. Khan and Himmat Bahadur established their own rule over the entire tract from Sikandrabad to Firuzabad and Aligarh. [*Ibid.* 246, 248] The conflicting ambitions and plotting for treachery among these nobles prevented any concerted action by them against Mahadji. In the earlier months of 1788, while Malik Muhammad was seizing lands round his jagir of Koil-Jalesar, Ghulām Qādir remained involved in the siege of Aligarh (which fell to him on 17th February) and Ismail Beg in that of Agra fort. But when at the end of March Sindhia renewed his offensive north of the Chambal, Ismail Beg made a pact with Ghulām Qādir, brought him over to Agra (9 April) and joined forces with him. How the campaigns of these two allies failed in the end and left the Jats and Marathas undisputed masters of that field, has been already narrated in the last chapter.