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  Raghunath has already met the jagirdar of Jawali, Chandrarao Morey, before, with a proposal for an alliance against the Adilshahi king. The at-first-polite proposal was followed by many warning letters. But the man had repeatedly and vehemently refused their offer and snubbed their threats. Raghunath is aware that for a jagirdar like Raja Shivaji, dealing with the defiant deshmukhs of his jagir is an internal matter, but intimidating another jagirdar or seizing another jagir is treason. The Adilshahi rulers already hate Shivaji for grabbing the hill forts that lie within his jagir. The new king, Ali Adil Shah, calls him a traitor, a notorious rebel and a namak haraam—one who, after eating their salt, is not loyal to his masters. Ten years ago, before he fell ill, the late Mohammed Adil Shah had wanted Raja Shivaji dead. Who could ever forget the battle of Purandar?

  ‘You have seen the valley. Aren’t the hills of Jawali far more hostile than the ones we have in Maval?’ Shivaji asks excitedly.

  Raghunath nods. The Sahyadri Range runs north to south along the western edge of the Deccan. These mountains separate the plateau called Desh from the narrow coastal strip called the Konkan. At Maval the hills are steep and rocky, girded towards the top by massive basaltic rocks. The lower slopes are riddled with deep, snaking dells that look like enormous elephant trunks. These hills are regarded as the war elephants of the region. Just twenty-five kos southwards, in Jawali, the same mountains take on a more aggressive avatar. The hills become steeper, the valleys deeper and the forests at the foothills denser.

  ‘To invade the valley, one needs hill men who can also ride horses. Heavy, armoured cavalry is the main strength of our king. The valley will make it as redundant as a ship stuck in sand dunes. If Maval is our sword, Jawali will be our shield. Remove Morey for good,’ Shivaji says softly.

  Raghunath understands in a flash.

  ‘To expand northwards we need to fight the Mughal, to expand eastward or southwards we need to fight the Adilshahi. We are not strong enough, not yet. We want Jawali. Once that is in our hands, it will be easier to take over the western region, the coastal region of Konkan,’ Shivaji announces as if his jagir is already an independent territory.

  ‘Konkan is ruled by the Mughal and Adilshahi sultanates in parts, and not to forget the African Siddis holed up in the invincible sea fort Janjira,’ Raghunath reminds his raja lest he has forgotten.

  ‘Konkan’s western borders are all sea, and eastern borders all hills. It is easier to fight their armies on that strip than anywhere else. Also we need to be stronger in areas where they are weaker,’ Shivaji says.

  ‘Meaning?’ Raghunath sounds puzzled.

  ‘Konkan will give us opportunities to develop our navy,’ Shivaji utters softly, his eyes distant.

  ‘We are trapped between the Mughal empire and the Adilshahi, living in the coils of two hungry pythons, Konkan is the key even if the entire Deccan comes under the Mughal,’ Shivaji sighs, looking at Raghunath, resentment evident in his features. ‘Aurangzeb has crushed Hyderabad. The entire eastern Deccan may soon turn bloody.’

  Raghunath blinks as the revelation hits him. Jawali is Raja Shivaji’s first step to prepare for a major, long drawn-out war, not just against his own king, Ali Adil Shah, but against something far bigger and far more powerful.

  After Raghunath leaves, Shivaji returns to pacing the corridors of the Lal Mahal. The red palace is not the usual palace with gardens, domes, cupolas or carved parapets and pillared courts. It is actually a large, two-storey building made with red bricks, near the southern boundary of Pune. It has a front yard planted with neem and pipal trees. The backyard has sheds and stables for cattle and horses. The central courtyard is used as a meeting place.

  A cold breeze blows in from the north-west. A silky window curtain flutters. Shivaji walks towards the steps leading to the ground floor. The house is unusually quiet, and the prayer room where his mother chanted mantras to evoke the powers of the family deity, Goddess Bhavani, is vacant. Gently rising smoke from the incense sticks is trying to fill the emptiness. His mother, wives and daughters have left for the Purandar Hill Fort as it has become dangerous to live on the flat plateau of the Sahyadri Range. He removes his sandals, walks inside the prayer room and kneels before the statue of Goddess Bhavani. She is the violent avatar of Goddess Parvati, the giver of life. Her kohl-smeared, enormous eyes glare at him.

  Swaraj is Lord Shiva’s wish, he prays, and you are his energy. You have brought me here for a purpose. Help me fulfil that purpose, Divine Mother . . .

  Twenty years ago, Shahji Bhosale, Shivaji’s father, had been forced to serve the Adilshahi and move three hundred kos away to Bendakaluru, the kingdom’s southern borders. Shivaji remembers how his father had taken his elder brother and left, while he and his mother had stayed put on the hill fort of Shivneri near the town of Junnar, a part of his father’s jagir. The years that followed saw Emperor Shah Jahan and the king of the Adilshahi rip away portions of the Nizamshahi, like dogs fighting over a dead rabbit. The region to the north of the river Bhima that included the prosperous cities of Ahmednagar, Junnar and Nashik was swallowed up by the Mughals. The region to the south of the Bhima, like north Konkan, Pune, Wangi, Paranda and the cities of Solapur and Pandharpur, was devoured by the Adilshahi. The Bhosale jagir was axed into two.

  When the Mughal armies had galloped across Junnar and Ahmednagar to find and slaughter families who had served the Nizamshahi, his mother and he had had to flee to the southern part of their jagir that came under the Adilshahi. His first journey to this terrain was etched on his heart by sharp, cutting memories. Even now, after twenty years, when he recalls them, they bring to the surface the heartbreaking sorrow of those times. He can even hear the sound of pebbles rolling under the hooves of the horses as they crossed the stony riverbeds of the Bhima and Mutha rivers. It takes him back to his past.

  One night, he was woken up by cries and screams and had run out to see people running helter-skelter. He caught a few words: ‘Mughal’, ‘armies’, ‘marching’. Somewhere close by, he heard his mother shout instructions. ‘No torches!’ she yelled. ‘We must cross the river Bhima as soon as possible!’ Everything was happening very fast, and before he knew it he had been whisked up behind his mother on her steed as around twenty people raced down the mountainside. It was still dark. It would be a while even before the morning star shone in the eastern sky. The slopes of Shivneri were dark, but they knew the trail so well that they could have descended blindfolded. They had finally reached the river Bhima at dawn. It was almost dry, with a small stream of brownish water trickling on its own meandering path over the vast riverbed. They had kept going on, through fields and forests and unpaved paths. Nobody had said much, and he had been too scared to ask much. It was almost evening by the time they crossed another dry riverbed.

  ‘River Mutha,’ someone had said. ‘We are almost there’.

  Beyond the Mutha, sloping columns of the sun’s beams fell over the leafless branches of babul trees that covered every patch of land. Mother had said that they would be living here, but he could see no houses; there were no streets. He held on to his mother with a tight grip as she steered her horse through narrow paths covered with sallow grass blades. The earth had looked broken and caked, as if the soil had not drunk a drop of water for years. He spotted ruins of temples, with crumpled mortar and broken pillars. Occasionally they came across the stinking carcasses of dead animals—cows and goats swollen like billows, with all four legs stiff and stretched. The stench was overbearing. Columns of dust made his throat parched and his eyes teary. He rubbed them against his mother’s sari so that he could see. He noticed strange people staring at them. They looked different, large-eyed, faces covered with dust, tangled hair as matted as a bird’s nest. He had feared that they would attack them. His wooden sword was slung to his belt. But mother had told him that to face a real enemy he needed a real sword made of steel. It was getting dark. He tried to see as far as he could to search for his kingdom, to see temple spires going high
in the air, with saffron flags fluttering above them and pillared palaces behind their walled courtyards.

  His kingdom was not waiting for him.

  CHAPTER TWO

  1

  Abdullah Qutb Shah feels safe in Golconda Fort. Sitting in his private theatre on the third floor of his many-arched pavilion called the balahisaar baradari, he wants to forget what has happened to his beloved Hyderabad. He does not want to remember how he had left his subjects in the hands of those cold-hearted, lice-ridden, libidinous and uncouth men of Aurangzeb. He reads Aurangzeb’s paigam again. The Mughal prince has written in chaste Persian:

  The war against you is ordained by Allah, and I must fulfil his wishes, not just as a leader of the Sunnis but also as the destroyer of those who do not conform to His idea of Islam. Twenty years ago, my father, Emperor Shah Jahan, had warned you—you, a Shia Muslim ruler who gladly agreed to be the vassal of the empire and pay a yearly tribute of ten lakh rupees—that if you do not pay the tribute on regular basis we shall annex your sultanate. Let me remind you of the arrears. You owe me twenty lakh rupees, that is, one thousand five hundred ser of pure gold. And it is not just about the money. With great distress, we consider you a rafizi and ghul-i-biyabani. We have pledged to protect your subjects from following your perceptions of our faith. We want to save them from hell. If we allow you to rule, we will do injustice to the soil of Hindustan. You have left us with no alternative but to destroy you.

  The letter has Aurangzeb’s palm impression.

  Hurriedly he downs a few goblets of wine, and intoxicated, he wanders unsteadily towards the eastern windows and narrows his eyes to stare at his beloved city in the distance. It has been two months since it was captured and torn apart by the savage soldiers of Aurangzeb, backed by his own grand wazir, Mir Jumla. And what had he, the king of the Qutbshahi, done to stop the calamity? Nothing!

  The city has fallen and once the imperial army is successful in capturing this fort, his kingdom will only be a distant memory—if he lives, of course. His eyes scan the battlefield between the city and the fort. The earth looks wounded with freshly dug trenches. The northern side of the Musi has become a burial ground. He has lost thousands of his swordsmen, archers and musketeers. The air is heavy with the stench of decaying bodies and the odour of spent gunpowder. Beyond the battlefield, he can see the siege. He is horrified. Hundreds of cannons stand in a semi-circle around the fort, waiting for orders. Aurangzeb has arrived personally from Aurangabad with fresh reinforcements. His personal squadron has the most brutal, remorseless beasts who have not known life outside killing fields. Aurangzeb’s favourite commander and maternal uncle, Shaista Khan, has also joined him.

  ‘It is all over,’ Abdullah says to himself, and nothing else matters to him any more. The shortage of cannonballs and explosives has rendered his long-range, high-calibre cannon, mounted on the fort’s ramparts, useless. Behind him, Taramati sings, her body swaying as she personifies Carnatic music in her mystic dance of Bharatanatyam. A sole musician seems lost in the tha-tdhi-thom rhythms of his mridangam. Her postures, sometimes gracefully feminine and sometimes aggressively masculine, kindle the expressions of the element of fire in the world around her. The air is jolted alive with her melodious voice as she makes a crisp alaap to explore the Raga Sahana where the verses of the grand poet Kshetrayya elevate the union of a man and woman to the celestial order. She is devotion, he is God. Taramati’s voice surges earnestly like a youthful spring from the mountains. Her words rain from her Muslim master’s arched, multi-storey palace and sprinkle the lush gardens covering the hilltop. A faint trail of her singing manages to caress the protective ring of walls made of huge blocks of masonry, fortified by eighty-seven bastions and armed with cannons. Some residual strains of her magical voice reluctantly dip and vanish into the muddy waters of the moat infested with crocodiles.

  2

  ‘Last year, the Mughal empire collected taxes worth one lakh ser of gold. The Adilshahi has collected one-fourth of that amount. And we, the so-called Hindu warriors, fight with each other for scraps of our own land thrown at us by them, the invaders. They treat us as lesser humans and we prove them right by behaving like beasts!’ Shivaji thunders.

  Raghunath has been summoned again. This time the meeting is being held in a dark, inner room adjacent to the main foyer, lit with a single lamp. The elderly diplomat has well-honed instincts and understands Shivaji well. He has guessed that the jagirdar of Jawali has once again refused to join hands with Raja Shivaji, inciting his fury.

  ‘Time has come to eliminate Morey. Make it happen during negotiations,’ Shivaji orders.

  ‘I understand,’ Raghunath says gravely as he feels his heart pounding in his ribcage. It is a clear-cut order, without any possibility of debate or justification. A diplomat or a vakeel follows an unwritten rule: he will not kill and nobody will kill him. The diplomatic immunity allows him unhindered access into the homes of the landlords and the courts of Islamic rulers. The time has come to break that law in order to usher in the new world order.

  ‘Even laws are amended for a greater reason,’ Shivaji says, regarding his vakeel who stands straight and looks younger than his years.

  ‘How do you think Ali Adil Shah will react?’ Raghunath asks.

  ‘The Muslim sultans rule the cities and the jagirdars and watandars rule the villages, while the poor continue to be the bondsmen, the ghulams; everyone in power wants the old order to continue,’ Shivaji says, ignoring the question.

  Bells have started tolling for the evening worship at the Ganesha temple. So loud are the peals that it seems as if the priests are trying to jolt awake the Vighnaharta, the remover of obstacles. The echoes burn holes in the shallow calm of the region, as if exposing the depth of its violent history. The peace that they enjoy now is so fragile, so brittle, that it is almost a fantasy. Raghunath maintains a solemn expression. He has heard that the Mughals have taken over Hyderabad. It is time to wait and watch. But Raja Shivaji is not one to wait and worry; he has planned his own offensive.

  ‘Ali Adil Shah seeks to eliminate us, and Aurangzeb seeks to swallow the Deccan that includes the Adilshahi. Someday we may come face to face with the mighty Mughal. It is time to look into history to prepare for the future,’ Shivaji says softly as he regards the vakeel.

  Raghunath nods. History is a quarry of lessons. The serious Mughal incursions had begun more than thirty years ago when Jahangir was the emperor. His empire had stretched from Bengal in the east to Sindh in the west and Kashmir in the north to Gujarat and Khandesh in the south. But further south, in the region of Deccan, it was another story. Unlike the north where the Mughal reigned supreme, the Deccan was ruled by three Muslim shahis. Roughly saying, the Nizamshahi dynasty of Ahmednagar had ruled over the Maratha country, while the Adilshahi of Bijapur ruled over Karnataka and the Qutbshahi of Golconda over Andhra. Physical proximity made the Nizamshahi the first target of Emperor Jahangir’s strategy of expansion. He had unleashed his army on Nizam Shah, who was a useless drunkard. His wazir, the African warrior Malik Ambar, had maintained order and fiercely defended the kingdom’s northern borders from Daulatabad Fort. Raja Shivaji’s father, then a regent of Nizam Shah, had shielded Ahmednagar, the capital of the Nizamshahi thirty-five kos south of Daulatabad. Jahangir had failed, again and again, his addiction to opium responsible for his defeats. Meanwhile, his footloose generals did nothing other than enjoying life.

  But times have changed. Aurangzeb is no Jahangir!

  Raghunath glances at Raja Shivaji who is now gazing in the direction of the hills of Maval. He wonders if his raja can see something that he cannot. Emperor Jahangir was gone, but the Mughal passion for the Deccan had lived on like an immortal spirit, hovering in the Deccan skies, hungrier and meaner than before. After the death of Jahangir, his son, Emperor Shah Jahan, had marched into the Deccan with more than one lakh cavalrymen. The last king of the Nizamshahi was captured and sent to the prison in Gwalior to be killed by opium overdose. But Shi
vaji’s father had decided to guard the Nizamshahi by using the hills and the hill forts of Maharashtra as his hideouts. He had also formed an alliance with the Adilshahi against the Mughal. Shah Jahan had countered him intelligently by threatening the Deccan kingdoms. Abdullah Qutb Shah had quickly turned the Mughal empire’s vassal whereas Mohammed Adil Shah had decided to fight for his kingdom. Shah Jahan’s army had entered the kingdom by three different routes, destroying all traces of cultivation, burning down cities, towns and villages. They had driven off cattle and butchered the old people and captured young men and women as slaves. All this had gone on incessantly till the Adilshahi had become the tributary state of the Mughal empire.

  ‘They always form alliances to trap us,’ Shivaji says.

  Raghunath knows it very well. The defeated Mohammed Adil Shah was forced to form an alliance with the triumphant Shah Jahan. Shahji Bhosale was alienated and forced to surrender. He was given an ultimatum to serve the Adilshahi or die. The allied forces had even tried to flatten his jagir. They wanted to teach him a lesson he would never dare to forget. Raghunath remembers vividly how their cavalrymen had come to Pune screaming, ‘Deen! Deen! Deen!’ Houses were set on fire and columns of smoke had first spiralled upwards and then swept across the bleak skies. The protective wall and its bastions had turned into mere rubble. The land was ploughed by donkeys to make it ill-fated so that no one dared to till it again. The peasants had fled into the nearby forests. Raja was a little boy of five then, living with his mother in Shivneri Fort near Junnar.

  ‘Do not blame only the Muslim rulers. The men who actively helped them flatten our jagir were the Hindus. It was Jagdev who ploughed Pune with donkeys. And it was Rayarao who ordered his men to set fire to the barns and houses. And our king bestowed him with a lofty title—The Brave One,’ Shivaji’s words lance through the vakeel’s conscience.