Fall of the Mughal Empire v3.c42.3

v3.c42.3

The story of Mahadji Sindhia's contest with Ismail Beg Hamadāni has taken us to the middle of 1788. It is now necessary to go one year backwards in order to study the acts of a less efficient but more harmful enemy at the royal Court. This was Ghulām Qādir Khan, the son and successor of Zābita Khan Ruhela. He had entered into his dead father's heritage (21 Jan. 1785) without paying the customary succession fee to the Emperor or his Regent. His house, like that of all Afghans, was torn by internal dissensions. Ghulām Qādir had once run away from his father to Sindhia's camp for refuge. He now imprisoned his paternal uncles and mother and attached their property. Sindhia courted his help against the Sikh raiders of the Cis-Satlaj and upper Doāb tracts, in oblivion of the fact that these men had been made by Zābita Khan the prop of his house.* In February 1787, Sindhia detached Ambāji Inglé to Karnal for controlling the Sikhs in that region by making a pact with Ghulām Qādir. But the young Ruhela Chief showed no eagerness to accept the invitation, and when at last he did come to see Ambāji (mid April) he left him abruptly.