Third Battle of Panipat

The Third Battle of Panipat took place on 14 January 1761 at Panipat between a northern expeditionary force of the Maratha Empire and invading forces of the King of Afghanistan, Ahmad Shah Abdali, supported by two Indian allies—the Rohilla Afghans of the Doab, and Shuja-ud-Daula, the Nawab of Awadh. The battle is considered one of the largest and most eventful fought in the 18th century.

Location

The specific site of the battle itself is disputed by historians, but most consider it to have occurred somewhere near modern-day Kaalaa Aamb and Sanauli Road.

The battle lasted for several days and involved over 125,000 troops. Protracted skirmishes occurred, with losses and gains on both sides. The forces led by Ahmad Shah Durrani came out victorious after destroying several Maratha flanks. It is believed that between 60,000–70,000 were killed in fighting, while the numbers of injured and prisoners taken vary considerably.

The result of the battle was the halting of further Maratha advances in the north, and a destabilization of their territories, for roughly ten years. This period is marked by the rule of Peshwa Madhavrao, who is credited with the revival of Maratha domination following the defeat at Panipat. In 1771, ten years after Panipat, he sent a large Maratha army into northern India in an expedition that was meant to re-establish Maratha domination in that area and punish refractory powers that had either sided with the Afghans, such as the Rohillas, or had shaken off Maratha domination after Panipat.

The Third Battle of Panipat

In January 1760, news reached the prime minister Nanasaheb Peshwa that Ahmad Shah Durrani better known as Ahmad Shah Abdālī had invaded and captured the Punjab region.

Abdali had formed an alliance against the Marathas with other Rohilla chieftains principally Najib-ul-Daula and the Nawab of Awadh Shuja-ud-Daula. Abdali recruited Afghans displaced by the war.

Nanasaheb Peshwa was then at the zenith of his power, having defeated the Nizam at Udgir. He chose Sadashivrao to lead the Maratha army to Delhi. Unlike Malharrao Holkar and Raghunathrao, both of whom had deep knowledge of northern India, Sadashivrao was unfamiliar with the personages and politics of the region. This was to prove costly, as he mishandled the regional kings and failed to form alliances with them. The main reason for the failure of the Marathas was that they went to war without good allies.

An army of between 55,000 was gathered and started its northward journey from Patdur (modern Partur) on 14 March 1760. It was accompanied by roughly 200,000 non-combatants including family members and a large number of pilgrims desirous of making pilgrimages to Hindu holy sites in northern India as they felt safe in the presence of the army. The Maratha forces of Holkar and Scindia joined the army on the way.

Sadashiv Rao was responsible for successfully adjusting the hit-and-run tactics used by the Maratha cavalry as these tactics were ill-suited for the western-style heavy artillery and infantry that he had learnt from the French. These changes had resulted in several victories for the army such as in Udgir. However, some of the Maratha generals (like Holkar) were not ready to adopt the new strategy completely and pointed out that the new units of artillery and infantry were not compatible with the other forces in the army and that the generals were not adequately trained on the deployment of the new units. Despite the reservations of his generals and a shortage of time and money, Bhau formed a unit consisting of 10,000 infantry and 50 artillery pieces.

Holkar and Scindia tried to persuade Bhau to strike diplomatic ties with Maharaja Suraj Mal, Jat Raja of Bharatpur and the Rajputs, Sikhs, Shuja-ud-Daula and Muslim leaders in north India. However, the Rajputs refused to support the Marathas citing unjust tribute from Rajputana and interference in the internal and political matters of Rajputana. Therefore, the Rajputs wanted to keep the Marathas away from at least the Rajputana. In 1748, the Marathas had interfered in succession of Jaipur kingdom trying to install the younger son as the king in place of the eldest son but the Maratha army under Malharrao Holkar had been checked by Maharaja Suraj Mal in 1749.

Therefore, both Holkar and Scindia knew Maharaja Suraj Mal's strength and realised that an alliance with him was essential to win the coming war with Abdali. Despite the fact that Suraj Mal had killed Holkar's son in a battle, Scindia requested Suraj Mal to come to Agra to meet Sadashivrao Bhau for a greater cause though Suraj Mal did not trust Bhau. Both Holkar and Scindia gave their word of honour to Suraj Mal for his personal safety while persuading him to come to the Bhau's camp. Suraj Mal agreed to join the Maratha forces to defeat the foreign invader from Afghanistan.

Previous victories with artillery had made Bhau overconfident. Bhau was a man of strong character. He did not seek cooperation of the Jat and Rajput kings while planning for the war with Abdali but rather planned to punish them later to try to subjugate them. This led to their non-co-operation and an acute shortage of supplies. He did not heed the sound advice of Suraj Mal, who held power around Delhi and Agra, to leave the civilians at Agra and take only soldiers to the battlefield though there was a severe shortage of food and other supplies. This proved fatal on the fateful day of the final battle as the food finished and the starved soldiers and horses could not fight properly and a desperate Bhau had to order an attack. The Sarvakhap Panchayats which included Jats also supported the Marathas.

The overbearing attitude of the Bhau when he met the regional kings at Agra worsened the matters. The Bhau failed to forge an alliance with the Jats though they held sway on the food supplies around Delhi. In fact, Bhau decided to arrest Suraj Mal but Holkar and Scindia, who had given their word of honour to Suraj Mal while persuading him to come to the Bhau's camp, tipped off Suraj Mal at night and he left just after midnight. Bhau sent his men after him in the morning but Raja Suraj Mal and his men had reached the safety of Ballabhgarh fort by then and Bhau's men returned empty-handed.

Bhau also spurned the offer from the Sikhs for alliance though his commanders tried to persuade him. Therefore, he did not get any supplies from Punjab. Thus, inability to anticipate the food supplies of his army and inability to forge alliances was major cause of defeat in the Battle of Panipat.

The slow-moving Maratha camp finally reached Delhi on 1 August 1760, and took the city the next day in a battle in which artillery units were crucial in destroying the fortifications of Durrani's forces. However, Bhau found only a little supplies in Delhi for his forces.

The supplies from the region immediately around west and south of Delhi had dried up as Bhau had antagonised the regional rulers. Therefore, Bhau moved about 110 km north of Delhi to Karnal (which is further north of Panipat) and captured the fortified village of Kunjpura about 10 km northeast of Karnal on the west bank of Yamuna river with a blitzkrieg offensive that demolished the fort's ramparts with artillery shelling and an attack of cavalry and musketeer units. The entire garrison of Durrani was killed. Durrani had earlier crossed the Yamuna river and was on its east bank. The river was swollen in flood and could not be crossed. Durrani watched helplessly from the east bank of the river and could do nothing to save his garrison and the Kunjpura fort on the west bank of the river. The Marathas achieved a rather easy victory at Kunjpura, although there was a substantial Afghan army posted there. Some of Abadali's best generals were killed. Ahmad Shah was encamped on the left bank of the Yamuna River, which was swollen by rains, and was powerless to aid the garrison.

However, the supplies that Bhau got at Kunjpura lasted only a few weeks as there was a large number of non-combatants in his camp.

The massacre of the Kunjpura garrison, within sight of the Durrani camp, exasperated Durrani to such an extent that he ordered crossing of the river at all costs. Ahmed Shah and his allies on 17 October 1760, broke up from Shahdara, marching north. Taking a calculated risk, Abdali daringly plunged into the river, followed by his bodyguards and troops. Between 23 and 25 October 1760 they were able to cross at Baghpat, (a small town midway between Delhi and Panipat on the east bank of Yamuna), as a man from the village, in exchange for money, showed Abdali a way through Yamuna, from where the river could be crossedunopposed by the Marathas who were still preoccupied with the sacking of Kunjpura.

After the Marathas failed to prevent Abdali's forces from crossing the Yamuna River, they set up defensive works in the ground near Panipat, thereby blocking his access back to Afghanistan, just as his forces blocked their access back towards Delhi. However, on the afternoon of 26 October Ahmad Shah's advance guard reached Samalkha, about halfway between Sonipat and Panipat, where they encountered the vanguard of the Marathas. A fierce skirmish ensued, in which the Afghans lost 1000 men killed and wounded but drove the Marathas back to their main body, which kept retreating slowly for several days. This led to the partial encirclement of the Maratha army. In skirmishes that followed, Govind Pant Bundele, with 10,000 light cavalry who weren't formally trained soldiers, was on a foraging mission with about 500 men to gather supplies. They were surprised by an Afghan force near Meerut, and in the ensuing fight Bundele was killed. This was followed by the loss of another 2,000 Maratha soldiers who were delivering the army's payroll from Delhi. This completed the encirclement, as Ahmad Shah had cut off the Maratha army's supply lines.

With supplies and stores dwindling, tensions rose in the Maratha camp as the mercenaries in their army were complaining about not being paid. Initially the Marathas moved in almost 150 pieces of modern long-range, French-made artillery. With a range of several kilometres, these guns were some of the best of the time. The Marathas' plan was to lure the Afghan army to confront them while they had close artillery support.

By November 1760, Durrani, managed to have 45,000 soldiers to block Maratha passage to the south towards Delhi. Durrani thereafter gradually isolated the Marathas financially and cut off their meagre supplies from their base in Delhi. This eventually turned into a two-month-long siege led by Abdali against the Marathas in the town of Panipat. During the siege both sides tried to cut off the other's supplies. At this the Afghans were considerably more effective, so that by the end of November 1760 they had cut off almost all food supplies into the besieged Maratha camp (which had about 1,00,000 non-combatants). According to all the chronicles of the time, food in the Maratha camp ran out by late December or early January and cattle died by the thousands. Reports of soldiers dying of starvation began to be heard in early January. Durrani had noted the huge number of non-combatants following Bhau's army, and ordered an attack on their camp, slaughtering large numbers of civilians and soldiers' families. The resulting casualties and refugees fleeing to the Maratha camp caused overcrowding, supply shortages and shook the morale of Bhau's army, forcing him to turn his attention to safely transporting the civilians to Pune. In January 1761, Bhausaheb faced famine and was blocked reinforcement due to Durrani's control of key transportation routes.

On 13 January 1761, the Maratha chiefs begged their commander, Sadashiv Rao Bhau, to be allowed to die in battle than perish by starvation. The next day the Marathas left their camp before dawn and marched south towards the Afghan camp in a desperate attempt to break the siege. The two armies came face-to-face around 8:00 a.m. on 14 January 1761, the Makar Sankranti day, and the battle raged until evening.

Finally the Marathas, who were on the verge of starvation, made a bold effort to break the blockade and issued forth to battle. The attack on Durrani was fierce and his wazir was found sitting on the ground eating mud and telling his fleeing soldiers that Kabul is far off. The battle was in the favour of Marathas till about 2 pm, when a stray bullet hit Vishwasrao and Durrani managed to throw in ten thousand troops who had fled the battlefield along with fresh 500 slave troops that guarded him. Bhausaheb was surrounded along with Jankoji Scindia and Ibrahim Gardi, while Malhar Rao Holkar managed to slip away. Fighting to the last man, Bhausaheb perished in battle.

Sadashivrao Bhau along with Ibrahim Khan Gardi had planned and were executing a battle strategy to pulverise the enemy formations with cannon fire and not to employ his cavalry until the Afghans were thoroughly softened up. With the Afghans now broken, he would move camp in a defensive formation towards Delhi, where they were assured supplies. But some Maratha generals overacted while some left battlefield leaving their defences open resulting in the defeat of the Marathas.

Durrani was taken unaware by the early morning attack, and decided to counter-attack during daylight. Durrani faced heavy initial losses. A stray bullet hit Vishwasrao, Bhau's nephew and heir to Nanasaheb Peshwa and he died on the spot. Bhau departed the battlefield to visit the corpse and plunged into the Afghan army, Vishwas rao's death had a devastating effect on the morale of his troops. Durrani attacked to take advantage of the confusion and weakness of Bhau's forces. Bhau counter-attacked but ultimately the army was defeated and any remaining civilians were massacred.

Role of Jats

Ram Sarup Joon writes that ...The political aim of Ahmed Shah Abdali was to create differences between Hindus and Muslims and thereby strengthen the Delhi throne. To some extent he succeeded in his evil designs. With this ignoble policy, a country wide resentment spread amongst Hindus. By this time the Marathas had got sufficient power in Deccan. They became champion of the people's cause and decided to have a pitched battle with Abdali. They rushed messengers to all Hindu rulers and asked them to unite and support Marathas for the common cause of defending the religion.

It is a pity, that the Rajput rulers did not respond favorably and gave an evasive reply. However, the daring Jat Ruler Raja Suraj Mal volunteered readily with his formidable Jats force.

On the other side all the Muslims rulers in India, united to support Ahmed Shah Abdali. Ahmed Shah cunningly invited Ghazi Uddin with the assurances that he would reinstate him as Grand Wazir. Suraj Mal permitted Ghazi Uddin to return to Abdali, but he was so heavily indebted to the Jats, that he categorically rejected Abdali's invitation.

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An operational conference was held at Agra to discuss the plans for the battle against Abdali. Suraj Mal was a tactician of high caliber. He appreciated that the enemy had superior forces. The only way in which Marathas could win was by organizing their forces into highly mobile hard hitting groups. He suggested that they should shed their heavy baggage and their families and send them across River Chambal to the fort of Deeg for safety. He also advised that they should avoid pitched battle, conduct guerilla warfare and continue harassing and delaying the enemy till the on-set of the rainy season. By this time Abdali's forces which were not accustomed to hard life would get demoralized and worn out. Then the Marathas should attack, and neutralize the enemy forces. These tactics of Raja Suraj Mal were very much appreciated by all the Maratha Chiefs except (Sadashiv) Raghunath Rao Bhau, who considered the adoption of these tactics to be below his dignity. He bluntly told Suraj Mal that the Marathas did not need help or guidance from any quarter for the battle of Panipat. Inspite of this Raja Suraj Mal remained in support with Ghazi Uddin and 18,000 troops. In July 1760, Marathas occupied Delhi, Ghazi Uddin was appointed Wazir and a prince of Moghul dynasty was placed on the throne of Delhi. But soon after, much against the wishes of Raja Suraj Mal, the Marathas removed Ghazi Uddin from Wazarat and appointed a Mahratta in his place.

They ordered the golden ceiling of Diwan-e-Am to be removed. Raja Suraj Mal, disapproved of this action and told them that being a thing of beauty it should not be destroyed. He offered to pay a sum of Rs Five lakhs to Marathas, provided they spared the historical monument but Marathas did not desist from doing so and ultimately they got gold worth Rs 3 lakhs only out of it.

The patience of Suraj Mal got exhausted by these

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ravages and the insulting behavior of Bhau. He left for Bharatpur without informing anyone. Raja Suraj Mal, now had two enemies, and obviously he was required to fight whoever came out victorious.

The Marathas were badly defeated at the Battle of Panipat. A large number of them were butchered, their treasury was looted, their woman molested and they fled away from the battlefield helter-skelter, worn and weary, naked and hungry, the Maratha soldiers entered the territory of Raja Suraj Mal. He looked after them, gave them food and clothes and finally bid them farewell after giving one rupee and one seer of gram to each for their home journey. A sum of Rs 10 lakhs was spent by Raja Suraj Mal on this occasion.

See also

• Third Battle of Panipat - A Mystery Revealed - By Swami Omanand Sarswati
• Father F.X. Wendel

Gallery

File:Bhambar Heri village in new - Dainik Jagan, 19 Feb.jpg

References

Back to Jat Wars

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