The Military System of the Marathas, with a Brief Account of Their Maritime Activities c8: Chapter IV: Infantry and Cavalry

The Military System of the Marathas, with a Brief Account of Their Maritime Activities c8

Language: English

Chapter IV: Infantry and Cavalry

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Krishnaji Anant Sabhasad says that Shivaji had 45,000 cavalry and only 10,000 Mawle infantry in his army.³ But the few figures that we have of his expeditionary forces at different dates contradict this estimate. A cavalry trooper was necessarily more expensive. He needed a good horse, better equipment and therefore a higher salary. Shivaji’s military operations were often confined to hilly regions where horses would be of little or no use. He frequently led his men through unfrequented mountain tracks where the sure-footed Mawle alone could go, and the accuracy of Krishnaji Anant’s account is, therefore, more than doubtful. From the few figures available in the contemporary correspondence of the English factors it appears that during Shivaji’s time the infantry preponderated over the cavalry.) On 12 November 1668, the Carwar factors informed their countrymen at Surat of a report that Shivaji contemplated an expedition against Goa and had with that intent assembled an army of 2,000 horse and 8,000 or 10,000 foot.¹ The army that appeared near Hubli in 1673 consisted, according to a report current at Carwar, of 2,000 horse and 4,000 foot.² In 1675 Shivaji laid siege to the fortress of Phonda and in the besieging force, as we learn from a Carwar letter, dated 14 April, the cavalry was far outnumbered by infantry, their respective strength being 2,000 and 7,000.³ On 19 November 1678, the Rajapore factors wrote to their friends at Bombay that the Bijapur generals dared not attack Shivaji who had 15,000 horse and 20,000 foot at Panhala.⁴ Even in the small force that had joined Sambhaji in his foolish rebellion the cavalry formed the minority, for, when the prodigal son returned to his father’s castle at Panhala, he was accompanied, according to an English report, by 300 horse and 1,000 foot.⁵ The infantry continued to maintain its majority in the Maratha army even after Shivaji’s death, for in 1707 Dhanaji Jadhav, as we are told by the Bundela chronicler, had under his command a strong infantry force of 25,000, while his cavalry numbered 5,000 only.⁶

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³ Sen, *Siva Chhatrapati*, pp. 136—9.

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¹ Factory Records, Surat, Vol. 105, fol. 72.

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² Factory Records, Surat, Vol. 88, fol. 32.

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³ Ibid, fols. 36-7.

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⁴ Factory Records, Surat, Vol. 107, fol. 177.

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⁵ Ibid, Vol. 108, fols. 34-5.

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⁶ Scott, History of the Dekkan, Vol. II, p. 116.

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In the Peshwa period, however, the position was reversed. The Marathas were no longer compelled to defend their hearth and home. Secure in their native territories, they were now in a position to carry war into enemy country, and in these distant expeditions, designed mainly for plunder, a cavalry force was far more useful than infantry. In a Portuguese report, dated June 1787, therefore, we read that the Peshwa could bring in the field 80,000 to 100,000 horse, 10,000 foot and 40 to 50 pieces of artillery.⁷ In the few lists of military saranjams of the later Peshwa period that have come down to us, we find no mention of infantry at all, and Tone¹ tells us that in his days the Maratha did not care to enlist as a foot-soldier and the infantry consisted almost entirely of outsiders. The Maratha footmen were employed mainly for the suppression of disturbances by the Bhils, Kolis and other turbulent tribes.

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⁷ Biker, Tratados da India, Vol. VIII, p. 269. We also come across similar figures in Bombay Public Consultation that show the steady numerical decline of infantry in the Peshwa’s army, e.g. B. P. C. Range CCCXLI, No. 9, 25 February 1737-38, p. 51: “the notice we have received of Chimnajee’s arrival

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¹ Illustrations of some Institutions of the Mahratta People, p. 44.

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The first official mention of the employment of soldiers from other parts of India we find in a brief paper, dated 1734-35, which announced the appointment of Tryambak Rao Somvanshi as Sarlaskar and the enlistment of a number of Rajputs who had come from Jai Sing.² Whether these men were admitted to the infantry, and if so, on what terms, we do not know. It is also not stated whether Jai Sing had been asked to send them or whether they had voluntarily come in search of employment in the Maratha army. Seven years later two Arabs were employed by Balaji Baji Rao at a monthly salary of 11 Rupees each.³ In 1750 one Raje Muhammad, a Jamadar of infantry, was sent to Khandesh to get fifty recruits for the Peshwa’s force, but the salary, it seems, was to be fixed after a personal inspection, and probably after haggling with each man, the rate suggested varied from seven to eight and a half Rupees.⁴ In a document, dated 1753-54, we find the name of Muzaffarjang,⁵ the gardi officer,⁶ mentioned for the first time. About this time the Peshwa had probably organised the trained battalions of his army and this necessitated the further employment of non-Marathas. The published records, however, throw no light on the condition of their service during the Peshwaship of Balaji Baji Rao.

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² Peshwas’ Diaries, Vol. I, p. 124.

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³ Peshwas’ Diaries, Vol. III, p. 165.

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⁴ Ibid, p. 176.

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⁵ Ibid, p. 178.

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⁶ The word gardi was applied to sepoys trained in the European fashion. It was derived from the word ‘guard’ in its English, French or Portuguese form. See Elliot and Dowson, History of India, Vol. VIII, footnote p. 155.

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at Tannah with seven thousand horse and five thousand foot’; and in Range CCCXLI, No. 11, a postscript in Captain Inchbird’s letter from Kolaba, dated 10 April 1740, says that Nana had with him, when he went to assist Manaji against his brother Sambhaji, three thousand cavalry and only fifteen hundred infantry.

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During the administration of the next Peshwa, however, we find a deliberate attempt to strengthen the new infantry force by recruiting a large number of Sikhs, Arabs, Abyssinians, Sidis and other non-Marathas. In 1770-71 Sumer Sing, a gardi officer, was commissioned to enlist 400 men at a monthly salary of 12 or 13 Rupees, but it was laid down that the men would be paid for ten months only though they were expected to serve throughout the year.¹ Ali Mardan Khan, another gardi Jamadar, was asked to recruit another body of 400 men at a monthly salary of 16 Rupees but these men were expected to find their own muskets (Banduk). Sher Sing, a Sikh officer, was ordered to engage 2 Jamadars and 198 sepoys of his persuasion, at a salary of 25 and 12 Rupees respectively.² And Apaji Ganesh of Ahmadabad was required to find 400 able-bodied Arabs at a salary of 15 to 16 Rupees per month; 100 good Abyssinians at a salary of 15 Rupees per man and one thousand Sidis at a salary of 15 to 16 Rupees.³ These men were to be inspected by one Debi Sing, a Jamadar, sent from the headquarters, and Apaji Ganesh was urged not to employ men of other races or light armed men. These were not the only foreigners employed in the Peshwa's service. Goddard tells us that there were a number of Sindhis among the garrison of Ahmadabad,⁴ while a Portuguese writer asserts that Negro deserters⁵ from Goa were readily employed in the frontier force of the Marathas; but the terms of their employment we do not know. It is needless to say that Indian Christians and Portuguese of pure or mixed origin were also welcomed in the new regiments. In 1789-90 four Portuguese soldiers were employed in the Poona infantry at a monthly salary of 25 Rupees; their Christian comrades were paid 15 Rupees per month, while the Indian footmen in the same regiment got no more than 9 Rupees each.⁶

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¹ Peshwas’ Diaries, Vol. IX, p. 336.

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² Ibid.

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³ Ibid, p. 337.

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⁴ G. W. Forrest, Selections from State Papers, Maratha series, p. 397.

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⁵ Joseph Roger, Relacao dos successos prosperos e infelices do illust, e excellent, Senhor D Luiz Mascarenhas, Conde de Alva, p. 16.

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⁶ Peshwas’ Diaries, Vol. VI, p. 193.

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Of all these foreigners the Arabs enjoyed the highest reputation for valour and intrepidity, and Blacker tells us that ‘Every substantive Native Power had a portion of these troops’.¹ Prinsep confirms this statement when he writes: ‘It may be proper to mention, as a proof of the estimation in which the Arabs are held as soldiers by the native powers, the rate of pay they received in the Peshwa’s army in comparison with natives of other countries’. Arabs, natives of Arabia, according to this authority, got 15 Rupees a month, their descendants born in the country got 10 Rupees, the Hindustani sepoy was paid 8 Rupees, while the lowest salary, that of 6 Rupees a month, was allotted to the Maratha and his fellow Dakshinis in the infantry service.²

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¹ Blacker, Memoir of the Operations of the British Army in India during the Mahratta War of 1817, 1818 and 1819, p. 21.

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² H. T. Prinsep, History of the Political and Military Transactions, Vol. II, p. 160.

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But the foreigners in the Maratha army were not always better soldiers than the country recruit. Robert Orme wrote very disparagingly of the Christian recruits from Goa serving not only in the Maratha infantry but also in the trained battalions of the English East India Company. He says: ‘They are little superior in courage to the lower castes of Indians, and greatly inferior to the higher castes, as well as the Northern Moors of Indostan; but because they learn the manual exercise and the duties of a parade with sufficient readiness, and are clad like Europeans they are incorporated with the European troops’.³

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³ Orme, Military Transactions in Indostan, 1763 edition, Vol. I, p. 81.

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The Arab, Abyssinian, Sindhi, Sikh and other non-Maratha recruits in the Peshwa’s army were enlisted by their own Jamadars, commissioned for the purpose, and were either equipped by these recruiting officers, or had to find their own arms. This partly explains the difference of pay alluded to above, but the custom naturally led them to identify their interests with those of their Jamadars, and their loyalty to the Peshwa was, at the best, uncertain.

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The cavalry of the Peshwa consisted of four classes, (1) the Khasgi paga, (2) the Silledars, (3) the Ekas or Ekandas and (4) the Pendharis.

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Of these the Khasgi paga or the Peshwa’s private cavalry were by far the best. They formed a choice body armed, equipped and paid directly by the State; but their number was very small. According to Kasiraj Pandit, the *Khase paga* at Panipat did not number more than 6,000 out of a total of 38,000 cavalry under different chiefs.¹

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¹ *Asiatic Researches*, Vol. III, p. 106.

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A document, dated 1744-45, gives details about the composition of a cavalry force in the Peshwa's service and the terms of its payment.² The commander of this force was Ranoji Bhonsla and its fighting strength was 700, but of these only 90 were *Bargirs* of the *Khase paga* or men equipped by the State; forty-four of these *Bargirs* were musketeers and the rest spearmen. The remaining 610 seem to have belonged to the ordinary *Silhedar* type. These men were to be paid 2 Rupees per head per week, but it was laid down that as soon as the plundering raids began, their allowance was to be entirely stopped, with the exception of that of 124 musketeers, who were granted a reduced allowance of 2 Rupees and 8 as. to be paid every six weeks. This shows a direct and important departure from Shivaji's rule of not permitting his soldiers to have any share in the spoils of the war. The 90 *Bargirs* were to be paid 413 Rupees only every six weeks, but it seems that their *rojmura* or allowance was not to be stopped even when the campaign began and their saddle bags were full of loot.

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² *Peshwas' Diaries*, Vol. III, pp. 166-7.

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The number of non-combatants attached to a cavalry regiment was generally very large. Ranoji Bhonsla had with him no less than five clerks and 181 attendants. There were in his regiment 9 stirrup holders, 5 farriers, 8 camel drivers, 4 khidmatgars, 3 musicians, 2 scouts, 5 store keepers, 2 wardrobe keepers, 13 palanquin bearers, 2 saddlers, 1 washerman, 2 macebearers, 1 leather worker, 1 sweeper, 2 drummers, 4 messengers, 1 torchbearer, 1 barber, 1 tailor, 7 water-carriers, 2 sunshade bearers, 2 trumpeters, 4 elephant drivers, 1 potdar and 99 grooms. These non-combatants cost the Peshwa's Government very little. Most of them did not get more than 3 Rupees in six weeks and they were very lucky if this small sum was punctually paid.³

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³ Ibid.

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Besides their ordinary wages the soldiers of the Maratha army of all classes and descriptions could expect a reward or compensation if they were wounded in action. After the battle of Rakshasbhuvan In 1763-64 such rewards were awarded to 29 wounded *Silhedars* and *Bargirs* of different races and nationalities. The allowance granted on this occasion varied from 5 Rupees for a wound caused by a rocket to 100 Rupees for a grievous swordcut, and five persons received compensation for the injuries their horses had received in action, while funeral expenses were granted to the relatives of three persons killed on that day. The Marathas, however shy of risking their own person and that of their charger, defied all dangers to remove a wounded friend or the dead body of a comrade from the field,¹ and the Government did not leave the orphans of a dead trooper uncared for. They could be fairly sure of a state pension called *Balparveshi*, and as soon as these orphans came of age, they were admitted to the military service of the State.

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¹ Keating says: ‘It is a business I cannot account for that in spite of every annoyance these people always carry off the dead.’ Forrest, *Selection from State Papers, Maratha Series*, p. 228. Forbes observes : ‘Many of the Mahrattas fell in attempting to carry off the killed and wounded, an act of humanity to which they pay the greatest attention. They seldom leave a body on the field, and venture almost to the cannon’s mouth, rather than suffer the remains of a friend to be exposed; out of the number killed in this action only seven bodies were found after their retreat.’ *Oriental Memoirs*, 2nd edition, Vol. I, p. 385.

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The State had its own grasslands or *Kurans* for the fodder of the horses of the cavalry while stationed in the country, and compulsory free labour was often employed for the service of the cavalry. Thus in 1775 the services of 323 Mahars, 54 Mangs, 52 cobblers and 10 saddlers were requisitioned from the districts of Poona, Sangamner, Parner, Rahuri, Khed, Junnar, Nevase, Karde, Gandapur and Belapur for such petty work as making ropes and repairing the saddles and bridles for the private cavalry of the Peshwa.²

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² Peshwas’ Diaries, Vol. VI, pp. 185-6.

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The *Silhedars* expected a portion of their stipulated pay in advance under the style of *nalbandi* or shoeing expenses, but such payment did not always ensure their attendance at the mobilisation camp.

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The third class of horsemen employed by the Peshwa were single volunteers known as *Ekas* or *Ekandas*. Tone says: ‘The third and the most numerous description are volunteers who join the camp, bringing with them their own horse and accoutrements: their pay is generally from forty to fifty rupees per month, mostly in proportion to the value of their horse'.¹

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¹ Tone, Illustrations of some Institutions of the Mahratta People (1818), p. 37.

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These troops were generally armed with muskets and matchlocks, swords and targets, spears and lances, daggers and clubs and bows and arrows. John Henry Grose says that the muskets and matchlocks were used 'chiefly in bush-fighting where when they have made a discharge, they retreat in a hurry to their main body. But their chief dependence is on their swords and targets. Their swords are, generally speaking, of an admirable temper, and they are well trained up to the exercise of them; so that on all occasions on battle, they quit their musket, and betake themselves to them with great success'. 'As to their targets, they are exactly round, convexing almost to a point on the outside, light and covered with so smooth and hard a varnish or lacquer, that if tolerably good, they will easily turn a pistol-ball, and at some little distance a musket one. They also have among them excellent slingers and archers; but of these they make lately less account since the introduction of firearms; though considering their imperfection in the management of these last, it is a query whether they are much gainers by the change.'² Nearly forty years later when William Henry Tone wrote his Letters, the Marathas, or rather their foreign employees, had learnt to make better use of their firearms, but in the cavalry charge they still relied more upon their swords than on their banduks or muskets. Says Tone: 'The bandook takes a longer time to load than the firelock, as it is chambered, but then it carries a ball much farther and infinitely truer; and long practice enabled the nujeebs to load with a readiness sufficiently applicable to ordinary service; they are also excellent swordsmen and are usually employed in making a charge upon any appearance of confusion in the enemy.'³

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² John Henry Grose, Voyage to the East Indies, pp. 124-5. This account of the arms and weapons used by the Marathas is corroborated by the Marquis of Alorna and Padre Francisco Alvares. See Instruccao do Exmo Vice-Rei Marquez de Alorna ao seu successor, ed F. N. Xavier, 3d edicao, pp. 49-50 and Relacao da guerra que fizerao os Maratas no reyno de Carnate e Madure desde o anno de 1740 athe ode 1745 (Archivo Ultramarino of Lisbon. Fundo geral 4179).

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³ Tone, Illustrations of some Institutions of the Mahratta People (1818), pp. 47-8.

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We may here mention another offensive weapon, a projectile that was commonly used by the Muhammadans and the Marathas alike. It was still in use during the Sepoy mutiny, as we learn from Field-Marshal Earl Roberts, but has become obsolete with the rapid progress of science. This was the war-rocket manufactured by private contract for the Peshwa’s army, and the average price of one of these curious weapons was 5 Rupees each. The rockets were carried by camels, and probably the rocketeers were also mounted on them.

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Colonel Wilks gives the following description of an Indian rocket: ‘This Indian instrument receives its projectile force from the same composition which is used in the rockets of ordinary fireworks; the cylinder which contains it is of iron, and sometimes gunpowder, at its extremity, causes it to explode when it has reached its object, a straight sword blade is also not unfrequently fixed to the rocket; an attached bamboo or reed steadies its flight; the rocket men are trained to give them an elevation proportioned to the varying dimensions of the cylinder, and the distance of the object to be struck. As those projected to any distance describe a parabola of considerable height, a single rocket is easily avoided, but when the flight is numerous, the attempt would be useless and their momentum is always sufficient to destroy a man or horse. Such was the ancient Indian instrument, so inferior to the Congreve rocket of modern European warfare.’¹

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¹ Wilks, *Historical Sketches of the South of India*, Vol. II, footnote p. 27. Also see William Irvine, *The Army of the Indian Moghuls*, pp. 147-50.

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A rocket was most effective in frightening away the war elephant largely employed in the Mughal army in India. In 1687 during the expedition against Golkonda, ‘Ecruch Khan’s elephant, frightened at the noise of a rocket, ran away. The driver used every endeavour to turn him, but in vain; so that the Khan was taken prisoner.’² The greatest injury was effected by a rocket when it chanced to light on the enemy’s magazine, but generally an Indian soldier was much more afraid of a rocket than of a musket ball, as Muhammad Ja’far Shamlu says of Abdali’s followers fighting at Panipat: ‘As for a musket bullet, the heroes cared not what it might do, and in that scene of carnage and slaughter the only dread entertained by the renowned and gallant combatants was for a cannon-ball, or the flight of a rocket’.¹

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² Scott, *History of the Dekkan*, Vol. II, p. 66.

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¹ Elliot and Dowson, *History of India*, Vol. VIII, p. 153.

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The Maratha horseman as well as his comrade in the infantry was very lightly and scantily clad. Grose wrote in 1757, ‘A roll of coarse muslin round their heads, to which they give the name of puckery, or turbant, or perhaps a bit of cloth, or striped calico, or cuttance-cap; a lungce or clout, barely to cover their nakedness, and a pamree or loose mantle to throw over their shoulders, or to lye on upon the ground, composes the whole of their wardrobe. This however is only to be understood of their common men, though the officers do not much out-figure them: so that nothing can present a more rag-a-muffin appearance than these troops, together with their little ill-favored horses, the furniture of which is in a stile answerable to the rest.’² This continued to be the usual dress of the ordinary Maratha trooper throughout the eighteenth century, for the author of *Tarikh-i-Ibrahimkhan*, who wrote during the Governor-Generalship of Lord Cornwallis, also says that ‘the ordinary dress worn by these people comprises a turban, tunic, selah (loose mantle) and janghiah (short drawers)’.³ But the *gardis*, who accompanied Parashram Bhau Patwardhan on his Mysore expedition, were better dressed. ‘Their coats’, says Lt. Moor, ‘are of red serge with a blue collar and cuff cut in the country taste to lap over before and tie with strings’;⁴ but the firearms used by them were as usual defective; we are informed by the same authority ‘their arms are for the most part English, and out of twenty, two will be found without locks, six without cocks and perhaps not a flint among the remaining twelve’.⁵

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² Grose, *Voyage to the East Indies*, p. 126.

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³ Elliot and Dowson, *History of India*, Vol. VIII, p. 263.

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⁴ Moor, *A Narrative of the Operations of Captain Little’s Detachment*, p. 83.

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⁵ Ibid.

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As the Maratha needed very little provision for his subsistence, he was not encumbered with much baggage and, before the introduction of the heavy field artillery, could move very swiftly. The English and Portuguese observers who wrote about the middle of the eighteenth century were all impressed with their celerity, but there was very little discipline among them. The Marquis of Alorna was of opinion that they were no better than rabble. ‘I would have no hesitation’, he wrote, ‘with a corps of five thousand regular soldiers to attack such an army though fifty thousand strong.’¹ Tone and Moor also adversely commented on the little discipline that they found in the Maratha army. The former observed: ‘That every man in a Mahratta camp is totally independent; he is the proprietor of the horse he rides which he is never inclinable to risk, since without it he can get no service.’²

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¹ Instruccao do Exmo Vice-Rei Marguez de Alorna ao seusuccessor, p. 49.

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² Illustrations of some Institutions of the Maharatta People, p. 40. Sir Thomas Munro, however, goes further and says that the majority of the horses employed in the Maratha army belonged to non-combatant businessmen who hired them to the Jahgirdars and the Government. See Gleig, Life of Sir Thomas Munro, Vol. II, pp. 269-70.

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Another defect in the Maratha army was that it was in a state of unpreparedness for a period of four months in the year, when the privates dispersed and returned to their respective homes, and, even after the expiry of the usual annual recess, at least six weeks elapsed before they could be reassembled.

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The Pendharis formed a source of income to the Maratha generals. These predatory hordes accompanied the Maratha army in its expeditions and were employed not so much for fighting as for plundering the country through which they passed. They received no pay from the Peshwa or his principal chiefs, but, on the contrary, paid to the general, to whose army they were attached, a tax, called Palpatti, in return for the protection which they received from him. Though the Pendharis became most numerous towards the close of the Maratha period, they were by no means the peculiar product of the Maratha method of warfare. The employment of trained robbers to harass an enemy was the time-honoured custom among the ancient Hindu princes. Kautilya recommended the employment of ‘brave thieves and wild tribes who make no distinction between friend and foe’, and Brihaspati and the author of Shukra’s polity lay down rules about the division of spoils brought by such licensed robbers. ‘When anything has been brought from a hostile country by freebooters’, says Brihaspati, ‘with the permission of their lord, they shall give a sixth part to the King and share (the remainder) in due proportion.¹ The same principle is also advocated by the *Sukranitisara*.² It lays down: ‘if thieves steal something from other’s kingdom by the King’s order, they should first give one-sixth to the King and then divide the rest among themselves’. This proves beyond doubt the employment by belligerent powers of thieving hordes similar to the Pendharis, who shared their spoil with the State employing and protecting them, as did the Pendharis during the Peshwa period.

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¹ *Sacred Books of the East*, Vol. XXXIII, p. 241.

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² *Sukraniti* (Sacred Books of the Hindus), p. 211.

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This military custom prevailed also during the Mughal period as Manucci says, ‘Along with the armies there marched privileged and recognised thieves called Bederia (Bidari); these are the first to invade the enemy’s territory, where they plunder everything they find. The handsomest items are reserved for the general; the rest they sell on their own account. Prince Shah Alam, when he was within the territories of Shivaji, near Goa, had in his army seven thousand such, whose orders were to ravage the lands of Bardes’. ³ Irvine is unwilling to identify these Bidaris with the Pendharis but the Maratha chroniclers mention the presence of the latter in the Mughal armies operating against Shivaji. Moreover the Pendharis did not belong to any particular race, caste or creed. They drew their recruits from all parts of India without any distinction of race and religion and it is no wonder that the criminal tribe of Bedars should preponderate in their ranks. We find in a contemporary ballad that a number of Bedars were employed by the Maratha generals exactly for the same purpose for which the professed Pendharis were usually engaged at the time of the battle of Kharda.⁴

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³ Manucci, *Storia do Mogor*, Vol. II, p. 459.

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⁴ Sane, *Patre yadi Bagaire*, pp. 55-6. ‘Bedadyasi hukum taka raste band karun.’

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When the Pendharis were for the first time associated with the Marathas is not exactly known. From the account available in the Maratha chronicles it does not appear that Shivaji ever employed these marauders like his Mughal adversaries did. But by the time of Balaji Baji Rao the Pendharis had become a common feature of the Maratha force. In a letter addressed to Dattaji Sindhia in 1753-54 the name of a Pendhari leader, Dost Muhammad, is mentioned.¹ It appears from two letters of the time of the first Madhav Rao that sometimes a few enterprising men sought the Peshwa’s permission for adoption of this lucrative profession, and the number of Pendharis attached to each military officer was strictly limited. The first of these letters runs as follows: ‘Shivchand, Pem Sing, Mohan Sing, Hiraman and Bhopat Beldar represented that if permission were given them to plunder in foreign territories and to reside without molestation in the Peshwa’s camp, they would collect some Lugare and Beldar families for the purpose, and prayed that a kaul to that effect might be issued. Having taken into consideration this petition, a new dhal has been given, and permission has been granted for your residence in the camp, on condition that you should pay five Rupees for each tent of the Beldars resident in the army and you should render to the State any elephant, palanquin, drum or banner that you may obtain in your raids.’² The second letter was addressed to Tryambak Rao Dhamdhere, who was authorised to entertain in his camp 50 Pendhari families, ‘but for every Pendhari tent exceeding that number, a Palpatti or tent tax at the rate of three Rupees per tent would have to be paid’.³

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¹ Peshwas’ Diaries, Vol. III, p. 178. Jonathan Scott mentions an earlier Pendhari chief, but on reference to the Persian manuscript, on which he relied, it was found to be an error of reading, see Hobson Jobson, ed. Crooke, p. 713.

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² Peshwas’ Diaries, Vol. IX, pp. 324-5.

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³ Ibid, p. 325.

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The Pendharis, as has been already indicated, were not employed for fighting but exclusively for plundering purposes. Their method has been described by an anonymous writer in 1819: ‘The climate and hardy habits of these plunderers render tents or baggage an unnecessary incumbrance; each person carries a few days’ provision for himself and for his horse, and they march for weeks together, at the rate of thirty and forty miles a day over roads and countries impassable for a regular army. They exhibit striking resemblance to the Cossacks as well in their customs as in the activity of their movements. Their arms are the same, being a lance and a sword, which they use with admirable dexterity, their horses like those of the Cossacks, are small, but extremely active and they pillage without distinction, friends as well as foes. They move in bodies seldom exceeding two or three thousand men, and hold a direct undeviating course until they reach their destination, when they at once divide into small parties, that they may with more facility plunder the country, and carry off a larger quantity of booty, destroying at the same time what they cannot remove. Fighting is not their object, they have seldom been known to resist the attack even of an inferior enemy; if pursued they make marches of extraordinary length, and if they should happen to be overtaken, they disperse, and reassemble at an appointed rendezvous; or if followed into their country they immediately retire to their respective homes’.¹

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¹ Origin of the Pindarries preceded by Historical Notices on the Rise on the different Mahratta States, pp. 147-9.

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Among the Maratha chiefs Holkar employed the largest number of Pendharis, but as these hordes cost their employers nothing, they found their way into the service of every chief. Of their leaders, the most well known was Amir Khan, who was certainly more than a mere plunderer, and his ability rendered him a much greater nuisance to his neighbours than the average Pendhari leader.

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Besides the infantry and the cavalry, the Marquis of Alorna also mentions the employment of war elephants by the Marathas. ‘The elephants’, says he, ‘taught and trained for war are of the greatest value to the Hindus, when they are intrepid and not afraid of noise. Princes, generals and distinguished persons mount them; they are used to attack the enemy carrying different platoons of men armed with bow and arrow. When infuriated they cause great harm with the trunk.’² The Hindu princes in ancient days and their Muhammadan successors kept a large number of fighting elephants but it does not appear that they formed a prominent feature of the Maratha army. Shivaji’s army was certainly not accompanied by these enormous brutes, and we have no proof of their presence in the camp of Sambhaji and Rajaram. Shahu and his principal officers were mounted on stately elephants during their slow and pompous march to Miraj and both Sadashiv Rao and Viswas Rao directed the Maratha operations at Panipat seated on caparisoned elephants. The Marathas wisely refrained from using these beasts for offensive purposes on a large scale, for it is very easy to frighten an elephant with firearms, and more often it proved a source of confusion to its own party. Such a case has been mentioned by Gemelli Careri. ‘The Moghuls resolving to make the last effort to take it,’ (Daman) he says, ‘and having to this purpose placed two hundred elephants in the front with long sharp swords in their trunks, the beasts, frightened with the fire of the Portuguese muskets, ran disorderly upon the Mahomedan army cutting to pieces abundances of men, with the same weapons they were armed to destroy the Christians.’¹

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² Ins ruccao do Exmo Vice-Rei Marquez de Alorna, p. 50.

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¹ Churchill’s *Voyages*, Vol. IV, p. 197.

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The Maratha commanders can be divided into two classes. There were veterans like Malhar Rao Holkar, who had risen from the lowest rank. They could claim a wide and varied experience but were generally illiterate or ill educated even when judged by the standard of their own days. But the second class, to which belonged hereditary princes like Balaji Baji Rao and Daulat Rao Sindhia, could claim men more fortunate in their birth, and therefore of a more cultured type. A Maratha has been generally represented as an uncultured barbarian, mainly because his portrait has been almost always drawn by his enemies. Wilks says, ‘They are well characterised by the Persian compound Muft-Khoor, eating at other people’s expense.’ ‘A modern Maratha’, he continues, ‘is utterly destitute of the generosity and point of honour which belong to a bold robber. If we should attempt to describe him by English terms, we must draw a character combined of the plausible and gentle manners of a swindler, the dexterity of a pickpocket, and the meanness of a pedlar; equally destitute of mercy and shame, he will higgle in selling the rags of a beggar whom he has plundered or overreached; and is versatile, as occasion offers, to swagger as a bully, or to cringe as a mendicant when he dares not rob².’ Such sweeping generalisation, it is needless to point out, is neither fair nor accurate. Moor, who could claim to know the Maratha officers much better than Wilks, deliberately exempted them from the charge of inhumanity;³ and Skinner, who served under them, found many lovable traits in the Maratha character. ‘I have made myself well known among the Maratha chieftains', he says, ‘whom I found a good, generous hearted race of men.’¹

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² Wilks, J., *Historical Sketches of the South of India*, Vol. I, footnote pp. 252-3

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³ Moor, *A Narrative of the Operations of Captain Little’s Detachment*, p. 142.

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¹ Baillie Fraser, *Military Memoirs of Lt. Col. James Skinner*, C.B., Vol. I, pp. 141-2.

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Nor were they devoid of culture; of Shivaji’s officers, Raghunath Narayan Hanmante was a scholar of great reputation, and compiled the *Raj Vyavahar Kosh*;² Parashram Pant, the founder of the Pratinidhi family, was a Sanskrit author; Mahadaji Sindhia employed his scanty leisure in composing devotional hymns, and in spite of all his faults, the second Baji Rao was known as a good scholar and theologian. A boy of a good family was early given a military training. He was not only taught the use of the ordinary weapons and riding, an accomplishment in which the Marathas generally excelled, but he was often sent on active service in company with his elder relatives.³ But the education of the average chief was not limited to this practical military training. He was expected to learn Sanskrit, to know the epics and read such works as *Vidurniti*. Some of them attained some proficiency in Persian and accountancy, as it was then practised. It is true that their education was very limited judged by modern standards, and they had hardly the intellectual equipment of a student of the military academies of Europe in the second half of the eighteenth century. But in their military knowledge and cultural attainments the hereditary chiefs were certainly not inferior to their contemporaries in other parts of India; and as men, if they were no better, they were not certainly worse than commanders of other nationalities.

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² A very interesting work in Sanskrit, composed in the style of the *Amara Kosha*. Its aim was to supply Sanskrit synonyms for Persian words, then in common use.

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³ V. K. Rajwade points out that during the Peshwa period boys of noble birth were expected to join the army at an age when they go to school today.

Linked texts (1)

Rājakośanighaṇṭu — Raghunātha Paṇḍita 1639, Sanskrit