Part 2: From the high-water mark at Delhi to the fatal Treaty of Bassein, Sardesai’s Main Currents of Maratha History analyses how internal flaws doomed the empire built by the Peshwas. Sir Charles Warre Malet, concluding a treaty in 1790 with the Peshwa, by Thomas Daniell (1805). Next to Shivaji Maharaj, Sardesai regarded Chhatrapati Shahu as the most consequential figure in the making of the Maratha state. Emerging from eighteen years of Mughal captivity, Shahu presided over the transformation of a bruised Maratha kingdom into an expansive pan-Indian empire. Captured at seven when Aurangzeb took Raigad in 1689 CE, Shahu grew up in the imperial camp, where he was retained as a political hostage whom the Mughal Emperor hoped to use as a pawn against Maratha resistance. When finally released in 1707 after Aurangzeb’s death, Shahu’s mother and family remained in Mughal custody as guarantees of his loyalty. This long captivity shaped his political worldview. Sardesai noted that Shahu acquired a gentler, more accommodating temperament than his grandfather Shivaji, defined by practical wisdom, common sense, and an intensely obliging nature. Critically, Shahu carried a solemn pledge of loyalty to the Mughal throne which created an extraordinary historical contradiction: while Shivaji had built his state in explicit opposition to imperial rule, Shahu accepted Mughal suzerainty even as his Peshwas dismantled imperial authority across the subcontinent. The contradiction would shape the course of Maratha history of the next several decades as Shahu insisted on honouring his personal vow to Delhi, forcing his ministers to expand the Maratha footprint without formally destroying the Mughal throne. Sardesai argued that this policy of accommodation resolves a major paradox of Maratha history during its critical phase: why the Peshwas could send armies as far as Attock and Mysore while leaving nearby strongholds like Ahmednagar, Trimbak, and Junnar in Muslim hands. Clear and Present Danger The wily Aurangzeb had released Shahu expecting the move to trigger a Maratha civil war which the latter sought to avert. After his 1708 coronation, Shahu offered to partition the kingdom with his cousin Shivaji II (Rajaram’s son), but Tarabai, the formidable widow of Rajaram, claimed the entire inheritance for her son. The ensuing struggle was eventually settled by treaty: the territory south of the Krishna River went to Rajaram’s younger son, Sambhaji of Kolhapur, while Shahu retained the northern lands around Satara and Pune. Maharani Tarabai, as depicted by Baburao Painter (1928). Though left with a modest core territory, Shahu gained room to manoeuvre. With the south effectively blocked by the Kolhapur branch, the north became his natural field of expansion. Sardesai observed that the critics who faulted Shahu for pursuing distant conquests before consolidating his hold over Maharashtra missed the strategic logic of his position: he had to choose between remaining trapped in a local succession feud or building an empire elsewhere. Chhatrapati Shahu with his Peshwa, Balaji Bajirao during a hunt by Shivram Chitari. While Sambhaji dissipated his energy in family squabbles, Shahu surrounded himself with brilliant, ambitious commanders like his Peshwa Baji Rao I, Khanderao Dabhade, Ranoji Scindia, Malharrao Holkar, Udaji Pawar, Kanhoji Angre and Raghuji Bhosle among others and gave them the freedom to operate. As in epochs past, Malwa – that hoary route to Indian supremacy - became the gateway to this Maratha expansion. The Mechanics of Expansion Initially, though, Shahu’s political survival was extremely fragile. Most established Maratha sardars had backed his ambitious aunt Tarabai, and the defection of Shahu’s Senapati (Commander-in-Chief) Chandrasen Jadhav further weakened his authority. He owed his recovery largely to Balaji Vishwanath, whose loyalty and political acumen earned him the Peshwaship in 1713. Balaji recognized that the weak central authority could neither suppress nor directly command the independent armies raised by figures like Kanhoji Angre, Khanderao Dabhade, and Kanhoji Bhosle. His solution was to channel this restless energy outward. The opportunity came from Delhi. When the Sayyad ministers of Farrukhsiyar appealed to Shahu for assistance, Balaji recognised that an imperial crisis could become a Maratha opportunity. The expedition to Delhi in 1718, ostensibly undertaken to help the Mughal emperor, enabled Balaji to secure important imperial concessions and gave the Marathas a recognised political and fiscal foothold in the north. His sons, Baji Rao I and Chimaji Appa, would carry the policy forward after his death in 1720. Sardesai also contextualized this expansion within the broader collapse of Mughal authority, highlighting the role of Rajput alienation. Decades of intolerant policies under Aurangzeb had shattered the alliance between Delhi and the Rajput houses. In 1710, Rajput rulers met at Pushkar and collectively resolved to renounce their allegiance to the Mughal throne. Sawai Jai Singh of Jaipur, who had befriended Shahu during his years in the imperial camp, remained deeply sympathetic to Maratha ambitions. Sardesai maintained that at least during Shahu’s lifetime, Marathas and Rajputs shared the same national and religious aspirations, operating within a shared political space where regional powers were actively replacing a dying empire. The relations, unfortunately, deteriorated after Shahu’s death. Sawai Jai Singh (1688-1743) Meanwhile, Balaji’s financial framework institutionalized this expansion. His successors turned Chauth and the Saranjami system into self-funding mechanisms for distant military campaigns. The defining contest of this era pitted Baji Rao against Nizam-ul-Mulk when after much complex manoeuvring across Malwa and Karnataka, Baji Rao trapped the Nizam’s forces at Palkhed in 1728. The resulting treaty compelled the Nizam to recognize Maratha tax claims, temporarily neutralizing the most formidable power in the Deccan. Saranjami grants offered military incentives, while Chauth collections funded permanent settlements in Baroda, Nagpur, Indore, Dhar, Dewas, Ujjain, and Jhansi, planting vibrant Marathi centers across central and northern India. While early Maratha exactions undoubtedly drained wealth from conquered provinces, Sardesai emphasized that this capital remained within the subcontinent, eventually recirculating through administration, trade, and regional development. Sardesai likened Shahu’s governance style to that of Queen Victoria in his ability to discern talent in state servants and direct it toward the national interest. Treating all factions alike, Shahu eschewed caste prejudice, settled military disputes, and rewarded merit while punishing misconduct. This balance of central legitimacy and field autonomy gave the Maratha state its extraordinary vitality. For Sardesai, the six decades from 1713 to 1773 represented the golden age of Maratha power, driven by the first four Peshwas who risked everything to realize Shivaji’s ideal of Hindupad-Padshahi. The Crisis of Succession The first major check on this expansion stemmed from Shahu’s declining health. In 1743, while Peshwa Balaji Bajirao (son of Baji Rao I) was consolidating Malwa and probing toward Bengal, Shahu fell gravely ill. The twenty-five-year-old Peshwa was recalled to Satara, where he became trapped in court intrigues. Shahu lingered for five years - a costly delay that tied the Peshwa to the capital at a time when he should have been consolidating the northern frontier before the arrival of the Afghan invader, Ahmad Shah Abdali. The succession contest pitted Shahu’s queens against the formidable Tarabai. The Peshwa had initially favoured bringing Sambhaji of Kolhapur to the throne, thus aiming to unite the two rival branches of the house of Shivaji much like the Union of the Crowns of England and Scotland in 1707. Shahu rejected the idea, refusing to yield to his lifelong rival. Tarabai then presented a surprising alternative in form of Ram Raja, whom she claimed was her secretly raised grandson and a direct descendant of Shivaji II. Shahu accepted him as heir. However, Ram Raja proved to be a weak ruler, leading Tarabai to later denounce him as an impostor - a manoeuvre Sardesai viewed as a cynical bid to seize power for herself. The Peshwa eventually managed this crisis by confining both Tarabai and Ram Raja at Satara while concentrating the reins of administration in his hands. Yet, Balaji Bajirao had inherited an expanding empire without the unifying authority of a strong monarch above him. Sardesai argued that a Chhatrapati of Shahu’s calibre, capable of providing overall political direction, would have enabled the Peshwa to accomplish far more abroad. The fundamental structural flaw of the Maratha state was that it could not reconcile the independence of its great commanders with the authority of the central government. Centrifugal Tendencies The older ministers and sardars who had served under Shivaji continued to enjoy hereditary privileges and jagirs, frequently viewing the Peshwa as an equal rather than a superior. Sardesai traced this friction to a deeply rooted trait in the Maratha political character: an impatience of control and defiance of authority. Even Shivaji had been forced to accommodate powerful regional chiefs reluctant to submit to the Bhonsle line. Under Shahu, these internal divisions broke out repeatedly. Chandrasen Jadhav and Rao Rambha Nimbalkar defected to the Nizam; Trimbakrao Dabhade raised an open rebellion while Raghuji Bhonsle and Balaji Bajirao clashed in Central India and Bengal. Following Shahu’s death, Yashwantrao Dabhade and Damaji Gaikwad rebelled against the Peshwa, while Malharrao Holkar was accused of intrigues that weakened the army before Panipat. The fourth Peshwa, Madhavrao I, had to spend years suppressing the rebellion of his uncle, Raghunath Rao, alongside coalitions involving the Nagpur Bhosle, the Pratinidhi, and the Patwardhans. Thus, the Peshwa exercised the administrative powers of the state without holding the royal authority of the Chhatrapati. Sardesai emphasized this dwindling of government power and prestige at each crisis as a primary reason the Marathas ultimately fell to the British with comparative ease. Missed Opportunities Comparing the Maratha political leadership with its British counterpart, Sardesai identified the decade between 1750 and 1761 as the decisive turning point in modern Indian history. While the Seven Years’ War (1756-63) saw Britain defeat the French in India, secure Bengal and Madras, and project power towards Allahabad, the Marathas were distracted by minor regional conflicts and internal rivalries. Major-General Robert Clive Clive Examining the Enemy's Lines, Battle of Plassey (a 1908 illustration) According to Sardesai, the third Peshwa, Balaji Bajirao, committed two monumental strategic errors. First, the Peshwa allied with the British to destroy the naval fleet of the refractory Angres at Vijaydurg, thus effectively wiping out his own state’s maritime defence line on the Western coast. More seriously, he failed to support Raghuji Bhosle’s claims in Bengal when Nawab Siraj-ud-Daula came under pressure from the East India Company. This was not merely a missed opportunity but, in Sardesai’s interpretation, a failure to understand the obligations created by Maratha expansion. Raghuji Bhosle had conquered Bengal and secured the payment of Chauth; in return, the Marathas were expected to protect the Subahdar. When the British turned against Siraj-ud-Daula, the Peshwa therefore had both an interest and, Sardesai believed, an obligation to intervene. In 1756, the Peshwa was at the apex of his power and faced no comparable threat in the Deccan. A concerted move against the British in Bengal and the Karnatak might, Sardesai thought, have checked their advance. Instead, Balaji Bajirao became preoccupied with Delhi and needlessly antagonised Ahmad Shah Abdali by pushing Maratha control beyond the Sutlej into Punjab, thus setting the stage for the disaster at Panipat. The irony was immense. At Plassey and Panipat, two struggles separated by less than four years, the future of India was being decided. At Plassey in 1757, the British turned Bengal into the bedrock of an empire; at Panipat in 1761, the Marathas and Afghans exhausted one, thus “facilitating the aims of the British for Indian supremacy.” The Panipat Contest The causes of the Panipat disaster stretched back two decades to the expansionist policies of the first three Peshwas, who sought to realize Shivaji’s ideal of Hindupad-Padshahi. This ambition inevitably brought the Marathas into collision with every power competing for the fragments of the collapsing Mughal Empire. Ahmad Shah Abdali and his grand wazir, Shah Wali Khan (ca.1760's) The catalyst was Nadir Shah’s sack of Delhi in 1739, which reduced the Mughal Emperor to a figurehead reliant on regional protectors. As the imperial court turned to Satara and Pune for survival, the mid-eighteenth century witnessed rapid political instability, marked by the deaths of key leaders in short succession: Sawai Jai Singh in 1743; Nadir Shah in 1747; Emperor Muhammad Shah and Nizam-ul-Mulk in 1748; Abhay Singh of Jodhpur and Shahu in 1749; and Nasir Jang and Ishwari Singh of Jaipur in 1750. Left without firm oversight from the center, Maratha commanders in the North allowed personal rivalries and harsh financial exactions to alienate their natural allies, the Rajputs. In Jaipur, Ishwari Singh (Sawai Jai Singh’s son) was driven to suicide in a particularly ghoulish manner by Maratha financial demands. As Jadunath Sarkar describes, in a vivid set-piece in his classic Fall of the Mughal Empire (1932, vol. 1): “It was 12th of December, 1760. Evening came and with it the news that [Malharrao] Holkar had arrived within twenty miles of the city. Ishwari Singh ordered his servant to bring a live cobra and some arsenic as needed for preparing a medicine. It was done. At midnight he swallowed the poison and caused the cobra to sting him. Three of his queens and one favourite concubine took poison along with him and all five of them died in the silence and seclusion of that palace chamber.” Malharrao Holkar (1694-1766) Ishwari Singh of Jaipur, son of Sawai Jai Singh. The incident later triggered widespread anti-Maratha violence in Jaipur. Sardesai argued that had Shahu been alive, such wanton aggression would never have been permitted, as it shattered the political coalition required for a lasting Hindu empire. At Delhi, Maratha commanders became entangled in the Mughal court’s conflict with the Rohillas. In 1752, faced with repeated invasions by Ahmad Shah Abdali, the Mughal wazir Safdar Jang and Emperor Ahmad Shah signed a defensive treaty with Scindia and Holkar. In exchange for military protection, the Marathas were granted the right to collect Chauth across northern India, including Punjab. This agreement made a major war inevitable, locking the Afghan invader and the Maratha Peshwa in direct competition for control of the Mughal throne and the governance of Delhi. Patthargarh fort outside Najibabad, built by the Rohilla Najib-ud-Daula, by Sita Ram (1814-15) Yet Sardesai rejected the view that Panipat was the deathblow to Maratha power. While human losses were catastrophic, the political setback was temporary. Within a decade, under the capable leadership of Peshwa Madhavrao I and Mahadji Scindia, Maratha armies returned to Delhi, restored Emperor Shah Alam II to his throne under Maratha protection, and fulfilled the terms of the 1752 treaty. The true point of decline, Sardesai insisted, came with the premature death of Peshwa Madhavrao I in 1772. The Last Statesmen The last great phase of Maratha power, Sardesai argues, bears the unmistakable stamp of two men: Balaji Janardan, better known as Nana Fadnavis, the Brahmin statesman and Mahadji Scindia, the Maratha soldier-statesman. Though occasional rivals and reluctant partners, both were intensely devoted to preserving Maratha sovereignty as British power encircled India. Mahadaji Sindhia, by James Wales (1792) Nana Fadnavis, by John Thomas Seton (1778) Under French mercenary Benoit De Boigne, Mahadji had created a disciplined regular army on the European model while restoring Maratha authority over the Mughal emperor and the Rajput states. Nana’s supreme achievement was diplomatic. When the British exploited Narayanrao’s murder to support Raghoba and expand on the western coast, Nana forged a grand coalition bringing the Nizam, Hyder Ali, and the Nagpur Bhonsles into alliance against them, while negotiating French naval support at Poona. Entangled in the American Revolutionary War and facing France globally, Britain’s position in India was unusually vulnerable. Concluded in 1782, the Treaty of Salbai secured peace and vital breathing space. Without the joint efforts of Nana Fadnavis and Mahadji, Maratha power might have collapsed decades earlier, argues Sardesai. Yet, he does not gloss over Nana’s failures. Sardesai says that Nana’s pursuit of Raghoba was excessively vindictive. Instead of letting him fade into exile, Nana hunted him relentlessly, confiscating the property of his supporters and punishing their families. The result was widespread resentment and administrative paralysis. A conciliatory approach of the sort followed by someone like Sakharam Bapu might have healed family fractures and perhaps produced a very different Baji Rao II, argues Sardesai. A deeper weakness was Nana’s geographic shortsightedness. Irritated by Mahadji’s growing prominence after Salbai, Nana could not comprehend why he remained in Malwa rather than returning to the Deccan. Mahadji had grasped what Nana missed: the geopolitical center of gravity had shifted to the north. From Malwa, Mahadji was positioned to counter British expansion from Bengal while managing Delhi and Rajasthan. Having fought British armies directly, his understanding of the threat was practical rather than theoretical. Maratha authority would have been vastly strengthened had Nana stepped into the background and given Mahadji a freer hand, while exposing the young Peshwa, Sawai Madhav Rao, to northern military realities. However, Sardesai explicitly refutes the charge that Mahadji sought personal independence at the expense of the state. Mahadji demanded operational freedom to save a collapsing state, but never severed his partnership with Nana, repeatedly expressing full confidence in his sagacity. Their relationship was more complex than mere personal rivalry. Nana and Mahadji represented two essential yet increasingly incompatible models of statesmanship. Nana had the administrative genius to hold the Pune court together, but remained rigid, suspicious and provincial. Mahadji possessed the soldier’s foresight, realizing long before his contemporaries that the British were not just another regional contender, but an entirely new kind of imperial power. Grand Illusion The brief victory over the Nizam at Kharda in 1795 offered a final display of Maratha unity under the young Peshwa Madhavrao II. But triumph turned to tragedy in October 1795, when the fragile Peshwa died after falling from his balcony at Shaniwar Wada. His death triggered a total breakdown of central authority. Nana Fadnavis, after much wrangling, eventually placed Raghoba’s son, Baji Rao II, on the throne. He proved venal, suspicious and incompetent. His ally, the equally frivolous Daulatrao Scindia, lacked Mahadji’s vision, leaving De Boigne’s disciplined brigades without effective political direction. Durbar of Daulat Rao Scindia, by Khairullah (1825) The end came swiftly. In 1802, spirited Yashwantrao Holkar defeated the combined armies of the Peshwa and Scindia outside Pune. Fleeing to Bassein, Baji Rao II signed the fatal treaty with the East India Company, accepting a subsidiary force to regain his throne and effectively surrendering Maratha independence. In the Second Maratha War that followed, Arthur Wellesley defeated Scindia and Bhosle at Assaye and Argaon, while Lord Lake captured Delhi and took the Mughal Emperor under British protection. Bajirao II, coloured lithograph,1888 Sardesai, however, refuses to blame the Maratha collapse solely on two bad rulers. He contends that if two incompetent youths could destroy a state built over generations, the institution itself was fundamentally flawed. A deeper failure, according to him, was the inability of the Marathas to learn from European powers. After defeating the Portuguese at Bassein under Baji Rao I and Chimaji Appa, the Marathas neglected to preserve their docks, foundries, and technical expertise into a permanent naval arsenal, later resorting to hiring individual Portuguese specialists. Had Bassein remained an active naval base, the Peshwas might never have needed British aid to suppress the refractory Angres. Benoît de Boigne (1751-1830) This neglect was even starker in artillery. While global powers built their empires on gunnery, the Marathas relied permanently on foreign mercenary commanders from Ibrahim Khan Gardi at Panipat to De Boigne and Perron under Scindia. Sardesai asks a trenchant question here: why did statesmen of the calibre of Nana and Mahadji never make the systematic training of indigenous artillerymen a national priority? The answer reveals the core Maratha weakness: a systemic lack of institutional organization. There was no unity of command, no structured delegation of authority, and no clear-cut administrative assignments. The Maratha state remained a loose collection of powerful individuals and hereditary jagirs where a modern state required coordinated institutions. Compared to rival Indian states, the Marathas possessed superior military and political capability. But before they could consolidate their jagirdars under a unified central government, they encountered a British state backed by scientific knowledge, constitutional organization, unity of command, and naval supremacy. Sardesai observes that this structural gap was worsened by sudden mortality. Between 1794 and 1800, the Maratha state lost its most experienced leaders – Mahadji died in 1794 and Nana in 1800. A generation that had survived Panipat and checked British expansion was replaced by men of lesser calibre. Richard Wellesley by Sir Thomas Lawrence (1813) Opposing them was a formidable British establishment: Lord Wellesley and his brothers Arthur (the future victor of Napoleon) and Henry, supported by brilliant administrator-diplomats like Mountstuart Elphinstone, John Malcolm, Barry Close, and Jonathan Duncan. Wellington at Assaye (1803), a battle he considered tougher than Waterloo. The tragedy of the Marathas was not an inevitable defeat by a superior civilization. They had repeatedly defeated their regional rivals and held the British at bay. Their downfall came when history altered the goalposts of geopolitical competition and the Maratha state failed to evolve.
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