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The Battle of Panipat took place on January 14, 1761 at Panipat (Haryana State, India) about 80 miles north of Delhi, between the Maratha forces of north-western India aiding their allies, the Mughal Empire, and Afghan forces under Ahmad Shah Abdali. Almost 100,000 people died in the one-day battle.
The battle pitted the French-supplied and trained artillery of the Marathas against the famous light cavalry of the Afghans. The matchup would have been rather one sided in favour of the Marathas had not their own cavalry decided to charge under unfavourable conditions, leading to their defeat. Both forces were so heavily attritted that the Mughal Empire fell, the expansion of the Maratha's power ended, and Ahmad Shah's Durrani Empire suffered continual attacks by the growing Sikh power and eventually retired to the north of Kandahar. The Marathas had also persued his fleeing army right up to Attock at the foothills of Afghanistan in 1756 under Raghobadada.
Prelude to Panipat
The Mughal Empire of north-western India had been in decline for some time after Ahmad Shah's first attacks against them in 1749, eventually culminating in his sacking of Delhi in 1757. He left them in nominal control however, which proved to be a fateful mistake when his son, Timur Shah, proved to be utterly incapable of maintaining control of the Afghan troops. Soon the local Sikh population rose in revolt and asked for the protection of the Marathas, who were soon in Lahore. Timur ran for the hills of Afghanistan.
Ahmad Shah could not allow this to go unchecked, and in 1759 rose an army from the Pashtun tribes with help from the Baloch, and invaded India once again. By the end of the year they had reached Lahore, but Marathas continued to pour into the conflict and by 1760 had formed a huge single army of over 100,000 to block him.
After lots of manoeuvring and skirmishes at Karnal and Kunjapura and failing to prevent Abdali crossing Yamuna river they set up defensive works in the excellent ground near Panipat, they blocked Ahmad's access back to Afghanistan and Abdali blocked theirs to south. Abdali slowly tightened the noose by cutting off Maratha Army's supply lines. Sikhs and Jats (with the exception of Ala Singh) did not supplied Marathas. When their supplies and stores dwindled to nothing, the Marathas then moved in almost 150 pieces of modern long-range rifled French made artillery. With a range of several kilometres, these guns were some of the best and latest in the world and a powerful force that had previously made the Marathas invincible on the battlefield.
Siege
The Afghan forces arrived in late 1760 to find the Marathas in well-prepared works. Realizing a direct attack was hopeless, they set up for a siege. The resulting face-off lasted two months. During this time Ahmad continued to receive supplies from locals, but the Marathas own supply line was cut off.
Realizing the situation was not in their favour, the Marathas under Sadashiv Bhau decided to break the siege. His plan was to pulverise the enemy formations with cannon fire and not to employ his cavalry until the Muslims were thoroughly softened up. With the Afghans now broken, he would move camp in a defensive formation towards Delhi, where they were assured supplies.
The line would be formed up some 12km across, with the artillery in front, protected by infantry, pikemen, musketeers and bowmen. The cavalry was instructed to wait behind the artillery and bayonet wielding musketeers, ready to be thrown in when control of battlefield had been fully established.
Behind this line was another ring of 30,000 young Maratha soldiers who were not battle tested, and then the roughly 30,000 civilians entrained. Many were middle class men, women and children on their pilgrimage to the Hindu holy places and shrines, a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to see Aryavarta (Aryan Land). The civilians were supremely confident in the Maratha army, regarding it as one of the best in the world, and definitely one of the most powerful in Asia. Behind the civilians was yet another protective infantry line, of young inexperienced soldiers.
Battle opens
Before dawn on January 14, 1761 the Maratha forces emerged from the trenches, pushing the artillery into position on their pre-arranged lines, some 2km from the Afghans. Seeing that the battle was on, Ahmad positioned his 60 smoothbore cannon and opened fire. However, because of the short range of the weapons, the Maratha lines remained untouched. Ahmad then launched a cavalry attack to break their lines.
The first defensive salvo of the Marathas went over the Afghans' heads and inflicted very little damage, but the Afghan attack was nevertheless broken by Maratha bowmen and pikemen, along with some famed Maratha gardi musketeers stationed close to the artillery positions. The second and subsequent salvos were fired at point blank range, and the resulting carnage sent the Afghans reeling back to their lines. The European-style plan had worked just as envisioned.
The Marathas then started moving their infantry formation forward, led by the artillery. The Afghans responded with repeated cavalry attacks, all of which failed. About 17,000 Afghan cavalry and infantrymen lost their lives in this opening stage of the battle. Gaping holes were opened in their ranks, and in some places the Afghans and their Indian Muslim allies began to run away.
The Marathas cavalry charge
At this stage it looked as though Bhausaheb would clinch victory for the Marathas once again. However, some of the Maratha lieutenants, jealous of the exploits of their artillery chief (Commandant de la gard - Ibrahim khan Gardi), decided to exploit the gaps in the enemy lines & dash; despite strict instructions not to charge or engage Afghan cavalry in hand to hand fight. The mass of Maratha horsemen raced through their own artillery lines and charged towards the demoralised Afghans, intending to cut the faltering army in two.
The over-enthusiasm of the charge saw many of the half starved Maratha horses exhausted long before they had travelled the two kilometres to the Afghan lines; some simply collapsed. Making matters worse was the suffocating odour of the rotting corpses of men and animals left on the field from the fighting of the previous months. Still, a major mass of Maratha cavalry collided with the Afgan cavalry, initially taking down a few thousands Afghans.
In response, the Afghan officers stiffened their troops resistance. Abdali sent his body guards to call up his reserves of 40,000 from his camp and arranged it as column right in front his and cavalry of musketeers, and swivel mounted cannons on the back of camels. because of their positioning on camels they could fire an extensive salvo over the heads of their own infantry and at the Maratha cavalry, who were unable to withstand the rifled muskets and camel-mounted swivel cannons of the Afghans.
With their own men in the firing line, the Maratha artillery could not respond, and about 7,000 Maratha cavalry and infantry perished before the hand to hand fighting began at around 2PM. By 4PM the tired Maratha infantry began to succumb to the onslaught of attacks from fresh Afghan reserves, protected by armoured leather jackets.
Attack from within
The Maratha's Muslim logistics infantrymen (Rohillas), who had not been trusted to fight in the front line because their loyalty was suspect—or, rather, who were suspected of being loyal to the Koran or fellow Muslims and not to their country— now responded to the calls of the Afghan army for jihad and revolted. This caused brought confusion and great consternation to loyal Maratha soldiers, who thought that the enemy has attacked from behind.
Sadashivrao Bhau, seeing his forward lines dwindling and civilians behind, could not move forward his young soldiers as reserves from behind and felt he had no choice but to come down from his elephant and take a direct part in the battle on horseback at the head of his troops. He left instructions with his bodyguards that, if the battle were lost, they must kill his wife Parvati bai, as he could not abide the thought of her being dishonoured by Afghans.
Some Maratha soldiers, seeing that their general had disappeared from his elephant, panicked and began to flee. Vishwasrao, the son of Prime Minister Nanasaheb, had already fallen to Afghan stray shot, in the head. Sadashivrao Bhau and his loyal bodyguards fought to the end, the Maratha leader having three horses shot out from under him.
Rout
The Afghans pursued the fleeing Maratha army and the civilians, while the Maratha front lines remained largely intact, with some of their artillery units fighting until sundown. Choosing not to launch a night attack, made good their escape that night. Parvatibai escaped the Armageddon with her bodyguards, and eventually returned to Pune.
The Massacre
Mass of surrendered Maratha soldiers were handcuffed and then murdered, their heads chopped off by Afgans to earn blessings for killing Kafirs on account of their families back in Afghanistan.
(“the unhappy prisoners were paraded in long lines, given a little parched grain and a drink of water, and beheaded… and the women and children who survived were driven off as slaves - twenty-two thousand, many of them of the highest aristocratic rank in the land, says the Siyar-ut-Mutakhirin.”22)
The Afghan cavalry and pikemen ran wild through the streets of Panipat, killing any Maratha soldiers or civilians who offered resistance. About 6,000 women and children sought shelter with the north Indian local ruler, the Shuja-ud-Daula (alley of Abdali), who was actually undecided before the war about if he should join the Marathas or Abdali. His Hindu officers persuaded him to protect the Maratha women and children. Another 22,000 women and children seeking refuge in streets of panipat were hounded back in afgan camps as slaves. Children over 14 were beheaded before their own mothers and sisters. Women were made to carry the severed heads of Marathas to the afgan army accountant so the afgan soldiers earned 1 silver coin per head brought in.
Afghan officers who had lost their kin in battle were permitted to carry out massacres the next day, also in Panipat and the surrounding area. They arranged victory mounds of severed heads outside their camps. About 10,000 Maratha civilians and soldiers alike were slain this way on 15th January 1761. Many of the fleeing Maratha women jumped into the Panipat wells rather than risk rape and dishonour. Many others did their best to hide in the streets of Panipat when even the North Indian Hindus / Muslims of the town refused to give them refuge.
Abdali's soldiers took about 22,000 women and young children and brought them to their camps. The women were raped in the camp, many committed suicide because of constant rapes perpetrated on them. All of the prisoners were exchanged or sold as sex slaves to Afghanistan or North India, transported on bullock carts, camels and elephants in bamboo cages.
A conservative estimate places Maratha losses at 45,000 on the Panipat battlefield itself, and another 20,000 or more in surrounding areas besides at least 22,000 women and children as prisoners and slaves. According to Mr. Hamilton of Bombay Gazette about half a million people were present there on Panipat town from Maharashtra and on any rate he gives figure of 40, 000 prisoners as executed.
The Afghans are thought to have lost some 30,000.
Following the battle
To save their kingdom, and in the name of Islam, the Mughals once again changed sides and welcomed the Afghans to Delhi, forgetting that Marathas had just lost 100,000 men and women for their cause. However, the news soon arrived that Marathas had organised another 100,000 men in the south to avenge their loss and to rescue the captured prisoners. He left Delhi two months after the battle, heading for Afghanistan with his loot of 500 elephants, 1500 camels, 50,000 horses and at least about 22,000 women and children.
The Mughals remained in nominal control over small areas of India, but were never a force again. The empire officially ended in 1857 when its last emperor was accused of being involved in the Sepoy Mutiny and exiled.
The Marathas expansion was stopped in the battle, and soon broke into infighting within their empire. They never regained any unity, and were soon under increasing pressure from the British. Their claims to empire were officially ended in 1818.
Meanwhile the Sikhs, who were left largely untouched by the battle, soon retook Lahore. When Ahmad returned in March 1764 he was forced to break off his siege after only two weeks due to rebellion in Afghanistan. He returned again in 1767, but was unable to win any decisive battle. With his own troops arguing over a lack of pay, he eventually abandoned the district to the Sihks, who remained in control until 1849.
This 3rd battle of Panipat saw an enormous number of casulties and deaths in a single day of battle, perhaps unmatched even today in the later wars. It was the scene of uncommon valour, unwanted strategic blunders, murders of prisoners of war, and large scale rapes perpetrated on women.
Perpetual Atrocities on descendants of Maratha prisoners of war
To this day in year 2004 after 243 years of the war, the batches of descendants of prisoners of wars still under slavery can be traced to at least Balochistan in Bugti and Marri tribal areas.
The Maratha Bugtis and Marri in Balochistan are an interesting case of what may be a caste forming even under Islamic rule. Theirs is a clan claiming descent from Marathas captives of war brought back by members of the Bugti tribe, who served the armies of Ahmad Shah Durrani (Abdali) after the fateful battle of Panipat.
In time they underwent forceful 'Bugti-ization' and became Muslims. Although , they were once considered as bonded labour. They could not own or buy land. Up to a generation ago they could be 'bought' for twenty or thirty rupees. Their womenfolk remain a fair game for Bugtis and Marris. This means officially panipat war on Marathas have not ended even today.
The Maratha and Marri Bugtis took jobs as unskilled labourers, which their tribal overlords disdained. Over the years some of them have come to occupy higher positions. However they are still targeted and remain to be rescued. It is interesting to note that this caste-like phenomenon has endured for more than two centuries, even in a region largely devoid of Hindus.
The descendants of other batches of maratha prisoners taken in Afghanistan remains a mystery to be traced. However Maharashtra as a nation and Maratha leadership even today has failed to recognise existence of these descendants and rescue these people (on the lines of Jewish agency in Israel) if they are willing even today. These are war crimes perpetrated even today we need to verify and Maharashtra state government needs to admit their existence and it raise fund for this and provide rescue or humanitarian aid. We need to investigate how many prisoners were taken originally by statistical method and investigate other areas of Afghanistan and Pakistan if there exists such tribe who trace their ancestry to marathas as prisoners from panipat war.
I think an appeal to United Nations (UN) and international intervention is required to research undiscovered chapter of history and provide necessary help to these People of Indian origin (PIO) if there is truth in information which is currently available.
Comments: the so called Afghan victory is debatable. The loss of fighting men was comparable on both sides and both the maratha as well as durrani empires shrunk as a result.prisoners of war were taken because Jats, Sikhs and Mughals declined to provide them shelter. No major battle was won by the Afghans ever after and there were no invasions in to India, rather the Sikhs gobbled up major chunk of the Afghan kingdom and conducted raids up to Kabul and collected taxes as a result of this pulverisation. On the other hand,marathas were back in Delhi after a decade under Mahadji Scindhia. The story about descendants of prisoners of war is ridiculous. In the next hundred years Afghanistan was invaded by Sikhs and British(with sizeable Indian troops) on numerous occasions as deep as Ghazni and Bamiyan and the territories were under their administration for significant periods if any 'prisoners of war' or descendants theirof wanted to return.The truth is that in a territory like Afghanistan which has been invaded by every race in the world other than the Japanese and whose cities have been sacked hundreds of times (Balkh tops the list, 1500 times, BBC documentary), it's impossible to make out the races and tribes as distinct other than probably the Pashtuns, Tajiks, Uzbeks and Hazaras.
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