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Rambles and Recollections of an Indian Official by William Sleeman

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CHAPTER 38

Aurangzeb and Murad Defeat their Father's Army near Ujain.


CHAPTER 39

Dara Marches in Person against his Brothers, and is Defeated.


CHAPTER 40

Dara Retreats towards Lahore--Is robbed by the Jats--Their Character.


CHAPTER 41

Shah Jahan Imprisoned by his Two Sons, Aurangzeb and Murad.


CHAPTER 42

Aurangzeb Throws off the Mask, Imprisons his Brother Murad, and
Assumes the Government of the Empire.


CHAPTER 43

Aurangzeb Meets Shuja in Bengal and Defeats him, after Pursuing Dara
to the Hyphasis.


CHAPTER 44

Aurangzeb Imprisons his Eldest Son--Shuja and all his Family are
Destroyed.


CHAPTER 45

Second Defeat and Death of Dara, and Imprisonment of his Two Sons.


CHAPTER 46

Death and Character of Amir Jumla,




CHAPTER 47


Reflections on the Preceding History.

The contest for the empire of India here described is very like that
which preceded it, between the sons of Jahangir, in which Shah Jahan
succeeded in destroying all his brothers and nephews; and that which
succeeded it, forty years after,[1] in which Mu'azzam, the second of
the four sons of Aurangzeb, did the same;[2] and it may, like the
rest of Indian history, teach us a few useful lessons. First, we
perceive the advantages of the law of primogeniture, which accustoms
people to consider the right of the eldest son as sacred, and the
conduct of any man who attempts to violate it as criminal. Among
Muhammadans, property, as well real as personal, is divided equally
among the sons;[3] and their Koran, which is their only civil and
criminal, as well as religions, code, makes no provision for the
successions to sovereignty. The death of every sovereign is, in
consequence, followed by a contest between his sons, unless they are
overawed by some paramount power; and he who succeeds in this contest
finds it necessary, for his own security, to put all his brothers and
nephews to death, lest they should be rescued by factions, and made
the cause of future civil wars. But sons, who exercise the powers of
viceroys and command armies, cannot, where the succession is
unsettled, wait patiently for the natural death of their father--
delay may be dangerous. Circumstances, which now seem more favourable
to their views than to those of their brothers, may alter; the
military aristocracy depend upon the success of the chief they choose
in the enterprise, and the army more upon plunder than regular pay;
both may desert the cause of the more wary for that of the more
daring; each is flattered into an overweening confidence in his own
ability and good fortune; and all rush on to seize upon the throne
yet filled by their wretched parent, who, in the history of his own
crimes, now reads those of his children. Gibbon has justly observed
(chap. 7): 'the superior prerogative of birth, when it has obtained
the sanction of time and popular opinion, is the plainest and least
invidious of all distinctions among mankind. The acknowledged right
extinguishes the hopes of faction; and the conscious security disarms
the cruelty of the monarch. To the firm establishment of this idea we
owe the peaceful succession and mild administration of European
monarchies. To the defect of it we must attribute the frequent civil
wars through which an Asiatic despot is obliged to cut his way to the
throne of his fathers. Yet, even in the East, the sphere of
contention is usually limited to the princes of the reigning house;
and, as soon as the fortunate competitor has removed his brethren by
the sword and the bowstring, he no longer entertains any jealousy of
his meaner subjects.'

Among Hindoos, both real and personal property is divided in the same
manner equally among the sons;[4] but a principality is, among them,
considered as an exception to this rule; and every large estate,
within which the proprietor holds criminal jurisdiction, and
maintains a military establishment, is considered a principality. In
such cases the law of primogeniture is rigorously enforced; and the
death of the prince scarcely ever involves a contest for power and
dominion between his sons. The feelings of the people, who are
accustomed to consider the right of the eldest son to the succession
as religiously sacred, would be greatly shocked at the attempt of any
of his brothers to invade it. The younger brothers, never for a
moment supposing they could be supported in such a sacrilegious
attempt, feel for their eldest brother a reverence inferior only to
that which they feel for their father; and the eldest brother, never
supposing such attempts on their part as possible, feels towards them
as towards his own children. All the members of such a family
commonly live in the greatest harmony.[5] In the laws, usages, and
feelings of the people upon this subject we had the means of
preventing that eternal subdivision of landed property, which ever
has been, and ever will be, the bane of everything that is great and
good in India; but, unhappily, our rulers have never had the wisdom
to avail themselves of them. In a great part of India the property,
or the lease of a _village_ held in farm under Government, was
considered as a _principality_, and subject strictly to the same laws
of primogeniture--it was a _fief_, held under Government on condition
of either direct service, rendered to the State in war, in education,
or charitable or religions duties, or of furnishing the means, in
money or in kind, to provide for such service. In every part of the
Sagar and Nerbudda Territories the law of primogeniture in such
leases was in force when we took possession, and has been ever since
preserved.[6] The eldest of the sons that remain united with the
father, at his death, succeeds to the estate, and to the obligation
of maintaining all the widows and orphan children of those of his
brothers who remained united to their parent stock up to their death,
all his unmarried sisters, and, above all, his mother. All the
younger brothers aid him in the management, and are maintained by him
till they wish to separate, when a division of the stock takes place,
and is adjusted by the elders of the village. The member, who thus
separates from the parent stock, from that time forfeits for ever all
claims to support from the possessor of the ancestral estate, either
for himself, his widow, or his orphan children.[7]

Next, it is obvious that no existing Government in India could, in
case of invasion or civil war, count upon the fidelity of their
aristocracy either of land or of office. It is observed by Hume, in
treating of the reign of King John in England, that 'men easily
change sides in a civil war, especially where the power is founded
upon an hereditary and independent authority, and is not derived from
the opinion and favour of the people'--that is, upon the people
collectively or the nation; for the hereditary and independent
authority of the English baron in the time of King John was founded
upon the opinion and fidelity of only that portion of the people over
which he ruled, in the same manner as that of the Hindoo chiefs of
India in the time of Shah Jahan; but it was without reference either
to the honesty of the cause he espoused, or to the opinion and
feeling of the nation or empire generally regarding it. The Hindoo
territorial chiefs, like the feudal barons of the Middle Ages in
Europe, employed all the revenues of their estates in the maintenance
of military followers, upon whose fidelity they could entirely rely,
whatever side they might themselves take in a civil war; and the more
of these resources that were left at their disposal, the more
impatient they became of the restraints which settled governments
imposed upon them. Under such settled governments they felt that they
had an _arm_ which they could not use; and the stronger that arm, the
stronger was their desire to use it in the subjugation of their
neighbours. The reigning emperors tried to secure their fidelity by
assigning to them posts of honour about their court that required
their personal attendance in all their pomp of pride; and by taking
from each a daughter in marriage. If any one rebelled or neglected
his duties, he was either crushed by the imperial forces, or put to
the _ban of the empire_', and his territories were assigned to any
one who would undertake to conquer them.[8] Their attendance at our
viceroyal court would be a sad encumbrance;[9] and our Governor-
General could not well conciliate them by matrimonial alliances,
unless we were to alter a good deal in their favour our law against
polygamy; nor would it be desirable to 'let slip the dogs of war'
once more throughout the land by adopting the plan of putting the
refractory chiefs to the ban of the empire. Their troops would be of
no use to us in the way they are organized and disciplined, even if
we could rely upon their fidelity in time of need; and this I do not
think we ever can.[10]

If it be the duty of all such territorial chiefs to contribute to the
support of the public establishments of the paramount power by which
they are secured in the possession of their estates, and defended
from all external danger, as it most assuredly is, it is the duty of
that power to take such contribution in money, or the means of
maintaining establishments more suited to its purpose than their rude
militia can ever be; and thereby to impair the _powers_ of that arm
which they are so impatient to wield for their own aggrandizement,
and to the prejudice of their neighbours; and to strengthen that of
the paramount power by which the whole are kept in peace, harmony,
and security. We give to India what India never had before our rule,
and never could have without it, the assurance that there will always
be at the head of the Government a sensible ruler trained up to
office in the best school in the world; and that the security of the
rights, and the enforcement of the duties, presented or defined by
law, will not depend upon the will or caprice of individuals in
power. These assurances the people in India now everywhere thoroughly
understand and appreciate. They see in the native states around them
that the lucky accident of an able governor is too rare ever to be
calculated upon; while all that the people have of property, office,
or character, depends not only upon their governor, but upon every
change that he may make in his ministers.

The government of the Muhammadans was always essentially military,
and the aristocracy was always one of military office. There was
nothing else upon which an aristocracy could be formed. All high
civil offices were combined with the military commands. The emperor
was the great proprietor of all the lands, and collected and
distributed their rents through his own servants. Every Musalman with
his Koran in his hand was his own priest and his own lawyer; and the
people were nowhere represented in any municipal or legislative
assembly--there was no bar, bench, senate, corporation, art, science,
or literature by which men could rise to eminence and power. Capital
had nowhere been concentrated upon great commercial or manufacturing
establishments. There were, in short, no great men but the military
servants of Government; and all the servants of Government held their
posts at the will and pleasure of their sovereign.[11]

If a man was appointed by the emperor to the command of five
thousand, the whole of this five thousand depended entirely on his
favour for their employment, and upon their employment for their
subsistence, whether paid from the imperial treasury, or by an
assignment of land in some distant province.[12] In our armies there
is a regular gradation of rank; and every officer feels that he holds
his commission by a tenure as high in origin, as secure in
possession, and as independent in its exercise, as that of the
general who commands; and the soldiers all know and feel that the
places of those officers, who are killed or disabled in action, will
be immediately filled by those next in rank, who are equally trained
to command, and whose authority none will dispute. In the Muhammadan
armies there was no such gradation of rank. Every man held his office
at the will of the chief whom he followed, and he was every moment
made to feel that all his hopes of advancement must depend upon his
pleasure. The relation between them was that of patron and client;
the client felt bound to yield implicit obedience to the commands of
his patron, whatever they might be; and the patron, in like manner,
felt bound to protect and promote the interests of his client, as
long as he continued to do so. As often as the patron changed sides
in a civil war, his clients all blindly followed him; and when he was
killed, they instantly dispersed to serve under any other leader whom
they might find willing to take their services on the same terms.

The Hindoo chiefs of the military class had hereditary territorial
possessions; and the greater part of these possessions were commonly
distributed on conditions of military service among their followers,
who were all of the same clan. But the highest Muhammadan officers of
the empire had not an acre more of land than they required for their
dwelling-houses, gardens, and cemeteries. They had nothing but their
office to depend upon, and were always naturally anxious to hold it
under the strongest side in any competition for dominion. When the
star of the competitor under whom they served seemed to be on the
wane, they soon found some plausible excuse to make their peace with
his rival, and serve under his banners. Each competitor fought for
his own life, and those of his children; the imperial throne could be
filled by only one man; and that man dared not leave one single
brother alive. His father had taken good care to dispose of all his
own brothers and nephews in the last contest. The subsistence of the
highest, as well as that of the lowest, officer in the army depended
upon their employment in the public service, and all such employments
would be given to those who served the victor in the struggle. Under
such circumstances one is rather surprised that the history of civil
wars in India exhibits so many instances of fidelity and devotion.

The mass of the people stood aloof in such contests without any
feeling of interest, save the dread that their homes might become the
seat of the war, or the tracks of armies which were alike destructive
to the people in their course whatever side they might follow. The
result could have no effect upon their laws and institutions, and
little upon their industry and property. As ships are from necessity
formed to weather the storms to which they are constantly liable at
sea, so were the Indian village communities framed to weather those
of invasion and civil war, to which they were so much accustomed by
land; and, in the course of a year or two, no traces were found of
ravages that one might have supposed it would have taken ages to
recover from. The lands remained the same, and their fertility was
improved by the fallow; every man carried away with him the
implements of his trade, and brought them back with him when he
returned; and the industry of every village supplied every necessary
article that the community required for their food, clothing,
furniture, and accommodation. Each of these little communities, when
left unmolested, was in itself sufficient to secure the rights and
enforce the duties of all the different members; and all they wanted
from their government was moderation in the land taxes, and
protection from external violence. Arrian says: 'If any intestine war
happens to break forth among the Indians, it is deemed a heinous
crime either to seize the husbandmen or spoil their harvest. All the
rest wage war against each other, and kill and slay as they think
convenient, while they live quietly and peaceably among them, and
employ themselves at their rural affairs either in their fields or
vineyards.'[13] I am afraid armies were not much more disposed to
forbearance in the days of Alexander than at present, and that his
followers must have supposed they remained untouched, merely because
they heard of their sudden rise again from their ruins by that spirit
of moral and political vitality with which necessity seems to have
endowed them.[14]

During the early part of his life and reign, Aurangzeb was employed
in conquering and destroying the two independent kingdoms of Golconda
and Bijapur in the Deccan, which he formed into two provinces
governed by viceroys. Each had had an army of above a hundred
thousand men while independent. The officers and soldiers of these
armies had nothing but their courage and their swords to depend upon
for their subsistence. Finding no longer any employment under settled
and legitimate authority in defending the life, property, and
independence of the people, they were obliged to seek it around the
standards of lawless freebooters; and upon the ruins of these
independent kingdoms and their disbanded armies rose the Maratha
power, the hydra-headed monster which Aurangzeb thus created by his
ambition, and spent the last twenty years of his life in vain
attempts to crush.[15] The monster has been since crushed by being
deprived of its Peshwa, the head which alone could infuse into all
the members of the confederacy a feeling of nationality, and direct
all their efforts, when required, to one common object. Sindhia, the
chief of Gwalior, is one of the surviving members of this great
confederacy--the rest are the Holkars of Indore, the Bhonslas of
Nagpur, and the Gaikwars of Baroda,[16] the grandchildren of the
commandants of predatory armies, who formed capital cities out of
their standing camps in the countries they invaded and conquered in
the name of their head, the Satara Raja,[17] and afterwards in that
of his mayor of the palace, the Peshwa. There is not now the
slightest feeling of nationality left among the Maratha States,
either collectively or individually.[18] There is not the slightest
feeling of sympathy between the mass of the people and the chief who
rules over them, and his public establishments. To maintain these
public establishments he everywhere plunders the people, who most
heartily detest him and them. These public establishments are
composed of men of all religions and sects, gathered from all
quarters of India, and bound together by no common feeling, save the
hope of plunder and promotion. Not one in ten is from, or has his
family in, the country where he serves, nor is one in ten of the same
clan with his chief. Not one of them has any hope of a provision
either for himself, when disabled from wounds or old age from serving
his chief any longer, or for his family, should he lose his life in
his service.

In India[19] there are a great many native chiefs who were enabled,
during the disorders which attended the decline and fall of the
Muhammadan power and the rise and progress of the Marathas and
English, to raise and maintain armies by the plunder of their
neighbours. The paramount power of the British being now securely
established throughout the country, they are prevented from indulging
any longer in such sporting propensities; and might employ their vast
revenues in securing the blessing of good civil government for the
territories in the possession of which they are secured by our
military establishment. But these chiefs are not much disposed to
convert their swords into ploughshares; they continue to spend their
revenues on useless military establishments for purposes of parade
and show. A native prince would, they say, be as insignificant
without an army as a native gentleman upon an elephant without a
cavalcade, or upon a horse without a tail. But the said army have
learnt from their forefathers that they were to look to aggressions
upon their neighbours--to pillage, plunder, and conquest, for wealth
and promotion; and they continue to prevent their prince from
indulging in any disposition to turn his attention to the duties of
civil government. They all live in the hope of some disaster to the
paramount power which secures the increasing wealth of the
surrounding countries from their grasp; and threatened innovations
from the north-west raise their spirits and hopes in proportion as
they depress those of the classes engaged in all branches of peaceful
industry.

There are, in all parts of India, thousands and tens of thousands who
have lived by the sword, or who wish to live by the sword, but cannot
find employment suited to their tastes. These would all flock to the
standard of the first lawless chief who could offer them a fair
prospect of plunder; and to them all wars and rumours of war are
delightful. The moment they hear of a threatened invasion from the
north-west, they whet their swords, and look fiercely around upon
those from whose breasts they are 'to cut their pound of flesh'.[20]




Notes:

1. 'Fifty years after' would be more nearly correct. Aurangzeb wa
crowned 23rd July, 1658, according to the author. See end of next
note.

2. On the death of Aurangzeb, which took place in the Deccan, on the
3rd of March, 1707 (N.S.), his son 'Azam marched at the head of the
troops which he commanded in the Deccan, to meet Mu'azzam, who was
viceroy in Kabul. They met and fought near Agra. 'Azam was defeated
and killed. The victor marched to meet his other brother, Kam Baksh,
whom he killed near Hyderabad in the Deccan, and secured to himself
the empire. On his death, which took place in 1713, his four sons
contended in the same way for the throne at the head of the armies of
their respective viceroyalties. Mu'izz-ud-din, the most crafty,
persuaded his two brothers, Rafi-ash-Shan and Jahan Shah, to unite
their forces with his own against their ambitions brother, Azim-ash-
Shan, whom they defeated and killed, Mu'izz-ud-din then destroyed his
two allies. [W. H. S.]

The above note is not altogether accurate. 'Azam, the third son of
Aurangzeb, was killed in battle near Agra, in June 1707. During the
interval between Aurangzeb's death and his own, he had struck coins.
Mu'azzam, the second, and eldest then surviving son, after the defeat
of his rival, ascended the throne under the title of Shah Alam
Bahadur Shah, and is generally known as Bahadur Shah. He was then
sixty-four years of age, his father having been eighty-seven years
old when he died. The events following the death of Bahadur Shah are
narrated as follows by Mr. Lane-Poole; 'The Deccan was the weakest
point in the empire from the beginning of the reign. Hardly had
Bahadur appointed his youngest brother, Kam Baksh ('Wish-fulfiller'),
viceroy of Bijapur and Haidarabad, when that infatuated prince
rebelled and committed such atrocities that the Emperor was compelled
to attack him. Zu-l-Fikar engaged and defeated the rebel king (who
was striking coins in full assumption of sovereignty) near
Haidarabad, and Kam Baksh died of his wounds (1708, A.H. 1120).


'In the midst of this confusion, and surrounded by portents of coming
disruption, Bahadur died, 1712 (1124). He left four sons, who
immediately entered with the zest of their race upon the struggle for
the crown. The eldest, 'Azim-ash-Shan ("Strong of Heart"), first
assumed the sceptre, but Zu-l-Fikar, the prime minister, opposed and
routed him, and the prince was drowned in his flight. The successful
general next defeated and slew two other brothers, Khujistah Akhtar
Jahan-Shah and Rafi-ash-Shan, and placed the surviving of the four
sons of Bahadur [i.e. Mu'izz-ud-din] on the throne with the title of
Jahandar ("World-owner"). The new Emperor was an irredeemable
poltroon and an abandoned debauchee.' (_The History of the Moghul
Emperors of Hindustan illustrated by their Coins_, Constable, 1892,
and in Introd. to _B. M. Catal. of Moghul Emperors_, same date.)

He was killed in 1713, and was succeeded by Farrukh-siyar, the son of
Azim-ush-Shan. The chronology is as follows:-

No. Sovereign. A.H. A.D.
VI. Aurangzeb Alamgir, Muhayi-ud-din . 1068 1658
['Azam Shah . . . . . 1118 1707
Kam Baksh . . . . . 1119-20 1708]
VII. Bahadur Shah-'Alam, Kutb-ud-din . . 1119 1707
VIII. Jahandar Shah, Mu'izz-ud-din . . 1124 1713
IX. Farrukhsiyar . . . . . 1124 1713

The question concerning the exact date from which the beginning of
Aurangzeb's reign should be reckoned is obscured by the conflict of
authorities and has given rise to much discussion. The results may be
stated briefly as follow:--

Aurangzeb formally took possession of the throne in a garden outside
Delhi on the 1st Zu'l Q'adah, A.H. 1068, July 31, A.D. 1658, but
subsequently orders were passed to antedate the beginning of the
reign to 1st Ramazan in the same year, equivalent to June 2, 1658.
After the destruction of Shah Shuja, Aurangzeb returned to Delhi in
May, A.D. 1659, and was again enthroned with full ceremonial on June
15, 1659 (= A.H. 1069). Some authors consequently assume the
accession to have taken place in 1659. But the reign certainly began
in A.D. 1658, and should be reckoned as running from the official
date, June 2 of that year. The dates given above are in New Style
(N.S.). If recorded in Old Style (O.S.) they would be ten days
earlier. (See Irvine and Hoernle in _J.A.S.B._, Part I, vol. lxii
(1893), pp. 256-67; and Irvine, in _Ind. Ant._, vol. xl (1911), pp.
74, 75.)

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