In 1738, Shahu granted the notification for campaigning to Raghuji. In it, the details of the sphere of activity has been mentioned as, “Suba Lucknow, Bidar, Maqsudabad (Murshidabad), Bundelkhand, Allahabad, Patna, Dhaka.”
Out of these, the Peshwa had already established his control over Bundelkhand, and in the recent campaign, the Peshwa had made that province as his primary base. The campaign plans of both were finalised at Satara.
After bringing his prisoner Chanda Saheb back to Berar, Bhaskarram met Mir Habib, one of the officials of the Nawab of Bengal, and was acquainted of the manner in which Aliwardi Khan had dispossessed his benefactor’s family and taken control of Bengal. Raghuji took leave of Maharaj and immediately went to Nagpur. After returning in June 1741, he resolved to go eastwards. In the monsoon months that year, preparations for the invasion of Bengal and Odisha were completed.
Mir Habib was sitting at Nagpur waiting to demand military help from Raghuji. Later, when Aliwardi Khan killed Sarfaraz Khan, and massacred the family of Murshid Quli Khan, Mir Habib could not bear it and he took up the challenge to mount a resistance.
At this time, the fame of Raghuji’s prowess had spread everywhere. In the battle of Damalcheri he had killed Safdar Ali and had rendered the Nawab of Carnatic into dust. It had become famous that he had captured Tiruchirappalli and carried away Chanda Saheb to Satara as his prisoner. So, Mir Habib secretly hatched a plan to take his help, and defeat Aliwardi Khan. Although Aliwardi left Haji Ahmed’s son Saulat Jung in Odisha, this young man in a short time earned the displeasure of all the old ministers. Before long, Rustam Jung’s son-in-law Mirza Baqir returned with a few hundred Maratha soldiers and occupied Cuttack. Saulat Jung was imprisoned with his family in the Barabati fort. Haji Ahmed was distressed, and Aliwardi Khan had to return to Odisha to secure the release of his nephew. Mirza Baqir’s small army was no match before Aliwardi’s force, and he fled the battlefield to the Maratha country.
Having recovered Cuttack, Aliwardi sent Saulat Jung to Murshidabad with part of his army, retaining the best officers and about five thousand men with himself. He spent some time settling the administration at Cuttack, appointed a Sheikh Masum in charge, and then departed for Bengal. On the way, he attacked the king of Mayurbhanj who had supported Mirza Baqir, defeated and killed him. In Bihar, the Hindu Rajas of smaller places were subdued by Aliwardi’s nephew Zainuddin, who was the deputy governor of the province. By the end of 1741, therefore, Aliwardi had consolidated his rule by defeating all the rebels of Bihar, Bengal and Odisha.
It was not a day too soon, as the longest war of his reign was about to burst upon him. Two armies left the Maratha country for Bengal by December 1741. One was from Nagpur led by Bhaskarram. The other was from Pune and led by Nanasaheb Peshwa, who had matters to attend to in Bundelkhand before he could go further east.
History is sometimes the sum-total of the narratives written close to the events of the day. Sometimes it is not, and one has to read between the narratives. There are several Persian narratives such as the Siyar-al-Mutakherin, the Riyaz-us-Salatin, the Muzaffar-Nama and the Ahwal-i-Mahabat Jung; the last written by the son-in-law of Nawab Sarfaraz Khan. There are fine differences in each of them and their authors view events based on their own relative positions. The author of Siyar, for instance, had sympathies for Aliwardi Khan, as his own father was a nobleman in Bihar at the time. Some other narratives allude to the role played by Nizam-ul-Mulk in instigating the Marathas to go to Bengal, so that he could regain the lost regions of the Carnatic in their absence. Some refer to the Marathas having been induced to attack Bengal by the Delhi court. The defeated Rustam Jung and Mir Habib are other known catalysts of the invasion.
Then there were the British who also wrote of the times. Orme was one, Holwell was another. JZ Holwell was present at Kolkata from 1732 until 1760, and based on his notes of the times, published his ‘Historical Notes’ of the period. He narrates events of the time in Bengal in fairly graphic detail. Holwell is also a famous survivor (and author) of the ‘Black Hole’ of 1756 that was widely believed as completely true for several decades afterwards. He wrote his narrative after returning to England in 1760 and it gives us another perspective on the events of 1740. He wrote almost two decades before the Siyar-e-Mutakherin authored by Ghulam Hussein Khan. That said, it must be mentioned that Holwell had an intense dislike for Aliwardi Khan and always referred to him as ‘the Usurper’.
To be continued…
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