Panipat (English) by Vishwas Patil

Author:Vishwas Patil [Patil, Vishwas]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9789388689960
Publisher: Eka
Published: 2019-12-15T23:00:00+00:00

Emperor Abdali sat in his conference pavilion. Giving him company were his trusty Wazeer Shah Wali Khan and one of his most valiant soldiers Sardar Barkhurdar Khan. Attempts had been made earlier to bring about a truce between the Marathas and the Afghans, but they had come to naught. On the one side was Shuja-ud-dowlah, struggling with might and main to bring it about; on the other side was Najeeb, struggling with equal ferocity to ensure it didn’t come about. But the forces on both sides of the Yamuna had become sick and tired of starvations and deprivations of different kinds; the talk on both sides was, ‘See if you can do something, please. A little this way or a little that, a little give and take, but let’s get out of this mess!’ A good agreement was what both sides wanted. Abdali told his wazeer, ‘It’s now been nine months that our forces have been stuck in this land. A way out has to be found. Our soldiers have not seen the thresholds of their houses for nine months now. How much longer can they stick it out in a foreign land, after all?’

‘And Aalam-panaah, we have nothing to show for so much time spent!’

‘We don’t care for the crown of Hindustan, which we could have snatched, if we had wanted to.’ Abdali turned towards Barkhurdar Khan and said, ‘See if a truce can be hammered out. Take cognizance of Najeeb Khan’s main demands. As far as we are concerned, we want to be decently compensated for the losses suffered by our forces. If Hindustan has to be fractured for making a permanent settlement, so much the better.’

‘Aalam-panaah, I am certain that some deal can be struck,’ said the wazeer.

‘Well, yes, I think so too. But Barkhurdar, you have to take care. I don’t want to have to listen to Najeeb’s gripes every morning, and I don’t want these Marathas to be running all over the place either.’

Barkhurdar Khan bowed low and left the pavilion. He had to hurry across the river and get into a talk with the Marathas. Najeeb had been waiting for Barkhurdar to emerge from the pavilion to head for the river. He got into step with the general. He had put his resources to work to ensure that it would be Barkhurdar who went for the talk, without the good man knowing anything about it. The emperor had earlier decided to dispatch his seniormost officer, Shah Wali Khan himself. As soon as Najeeb had got wind of it, he had got after Commander-in-chief Jahaan Khan to orchestrate some tweaking. Najeeb knew the wazeer was desperate for the army to head homewards, and would very likely agree to some of the absurd demands of the Marathas, and all the travails they had been through would have gone waste. ‘How can a truce be made with these monkeys who slew your son in the Punjab?’ he had told Jahaan Khan. ‘It is much better to send a stronger person for the talk who would not settle for a truce on easy terms.

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