Administrative System of the Marathas c18.s4.8

c18.s4.8

Why Shahu made the Peshwa his heir's guardian it is not very difficult to guess. He had no issue of his own. Sambhaji of Kolhapur was the probable successor. Shahu had no reason to be favourably disposed towards his Kolhapur rival. Eventually a young prince of the Kolhapur branch was discovered, whose boyhood, to say the least, was obscure and who was rightly or wrongly regarded as an impostor by the enemies of the Peshwa. It is quite natural that Shahu did not feel the same zeal for transmitting the royal prerogatives undiminished to an unknown boy about whose identity sinister whispers were made, as he would have felt for keeping untarnished all the divine rights of royalty for an heir of his body. On the other hand he knew the ability of his ministers. He had known them long. The family had served him for three generations, and constant association must have produced a natural attachment, and Shahu had probably nominated Balaji Baji Rao a guardian of the young Raja as a reward for good service, knowing fully well that the reward was well-deserved and the power was vested in able hands. Govinda Rao's incompetence or indifference, Tarabai's ambition, and Ram Raja's weakness gradually led to the promotion of the Peshwa to the real headship of the empire. In any case it secured the continuity of the royal line. Shahu's successors were all weaklings, and but for this transfer of authority: a revolution was bound to follow sooner or later, resulting in the deposition of the family in name as well as in reality. It is to be noted that the dynasty of the Mikados was also preserved from the possible consequences of weakness and incompetence, by the rise of the Shogunate, an institution quite analogous to the Peshwaship.