Fall of the Mughal Empire v4.c56.s7: § 2. Daulat Rao Sindhia's hesitation and folly
Fall of the Mughal Empire v4.c56.s7
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§ 2. Daulat Rao Sindhia's hesitation and folly
v4.c56.s7.1
At an interview on 24th March 1803, Sindhia's ministers admitted that there was nothing hostile to their master's interests in the Treaty of Bassein, but added that they must hear from the Peshwā directly before giving their assent to the treaty. The Peshwā's special messenger arrived at the end of April; and then Daulat Rao shifted his ground and declared that he must take counsel with the other great Maratha feudatory, Bhonslé of Nagpur, before deciding on his attitude to the treaty.
v4.c56.s7.2
Daulat Rao's object was to gain time for completing an anti-British coalition before making a rupture with the English. It was a futile policy, considering the unbridgeable gulf between himself and Jaswant Rao Holkar, and his own blind greed in clinging to all his gains from the
v4.c56.s7.3
learning of the Peshwā's wishes from his expected envoy Bāloji Kunjar, he considered it useless to supply them with his copy of the treaty before Kunjar's arrival. So he supplied it only at the interview of 28th May. [MM. iii. 159.]
v4.c56.s7.4
House of Holkar, till the last moment. The Peshwā had gone over to English protection in November 1802, and it was 4th June 1803 before Raghuji Bhonslé joined Daulat Rao, and 9th July before the late Malhar Rao Holkar's heir was released from Sindhiā's prison and delivered to Jaswant Rao's agents. By this last date Resident Collins had already presented his ultimatum. But the negotiations were prolonged for three weeks more by Sindhiā making fresh but insincere proposals of a peaceful settlement. At last Collins withdrew from his camp on 3rd August and the war began.
v4.c56.s7.5
The needless presence of Daulat Rao Sindhiā and Raghuji Bhonslé with two vast predatory armies at Jamner, within ten miles of the Nizām's frontier, was a standing threat to the Nizām and to his protectors the English. Collins, by order of the Governor General finally called upon them to separate their forces and march back to their own capitals. This ultimatum was openly rejected on 1st August, and Collins took his departure on the 3rd of that month.
v4.c56.s7.6
The different ways in which the two sides prepared for the trial by combat which they knew to be inevitable, present by their contrast a lesson of the profoundest instruction to us.
v4.c56.s7.7
The whole course of Daulat Rao Sindhiā's actions leading up to the war with the English, was marked by folly, indecision and delay, as if mere deception and theatrical demonstration could decide the fate of nations. The futility of his policy was patent to all. The Kotā agent in his camp reported, "Daulat Rao at first alienated General Perron, now he is flattering him. He first destroys and then he has to humiliate himself (to undo the mischief). Such is the way in which he works," (7 March 1803.) And again, five days later, "Sindhiā and his ministers practise only deception and lying. People have lost all trust in them; they say one thing and do another. No sign of their reassuring any body's mind." On 23rd June this was the condition of their camp, "They have no strength to ascend the Ajanṭā pass, and have no money. Here horses and men are dying of hunger; many soldiers are going away. A campaign is ahead and (yet) the scarcity is great. We know not what God has ordained for us."*
v4.c56.s7.8
After Raghuji Bhonslé had come to Daulat Rao's camp, there were endless discussions between the two allies, but no action. Jaswant Rao Holkar though appealed to for joining a pan-Marātha confederation against the English, knew the weakness of Sindhiā's council and army and had no faith in Daulat Rao's promise of restoring the Holkar possessions. So, like the realist in politics that he was, he withdrew to his own capital, after getting hold of his nephew, the child Khāndé Rao, and left Sindhiā to his fate.