The Military System of the Marathas, with a Brief Account of Their Maritime Activities c17.61

c17.61

All customs, military, naval or administrative, are based on past experiences. In course of time they become antiquated and are then rejected. But in the period of transition, before their anachronism is detected and before they are finally abolished, they cause hardship and inconvenience. But it will not be just to condemn as inhuman or heartless those who may administer such antiquated laws and pursue such out-of-date customs in a period of transition. The average man hardly perceives the absurdity of the institutions he inherits from his fathers. Such was also the case with the Maratha naval leaders. Judged by the standard of modern times, their actions will undoubtedly appear high-handed, but they were simply observing in their daily official routine the same practices as their European contemporaries in Western India. The freedom of the seas was an idea yet unknown. Both on land and on sea might still constituted the best, if not the only, right. We should not forget that this was the age of ‘Letters of Marque’, and a King’s Commission or letter patent formed the sole difference between piracy and privateering. Piracy was condemned, but privateering was held honourable. One was expected to respect the rights of one’s compatriots, but common usage allowed little consideration for the rights of the foreigner on the high seas, and the more remote a naval captain was from his home, the less was he inclined to be hampered by inconvenient conventions. In Indian waters the Portuguese had set up a precedent which was probably based on customs prevailing on the coast. The precedent was followed by other nations, European and Indian. They challenged the Portuguese claim to the sovereignty of the sea, but the principle of the sovereignty itself remained unchallenged. This led to the numerous controversies and inconsistencies that mark the naval history of the period. But for these inconsistencies the Marathas alone were not responsible.¹ Had their naval power survived, they might have continued or abolished the antiquated claims they had once enforced. But as it is, they can hardly be condemned as pirates. Like the Portuguese naval commanders, Shivaji, Kanhoji Angria and Anand Rao Dhulap could also claim to be sovereigns of the sea, but, saddled with a hereditary system of naval command and incapable of advancing with time, they failed to compete with their English rivals, and their naval efforts seem as ineffectual and ephemeral today as the short-lived reign of terror established on the high seas by pirate chiefs of the west.