Another one on history and hopefully the last one on this row. The way history is taught in schools is about facts, at 1757 battle of plassey happened and that led to British foothold in the country or that Aurangzeb defeated Sambhaji in 1689 and so on.
The devil is always in the details, in the case of Siraj us Daulah he barely ascended the throne, lasted for a year and was killed in that time and his own general and the finance person took revenge on him. The general was also an old man by those days standards and for the army which pretty much was a decentralized structure back then to back him and not the king is something that is not explicitly stated. On other hand Sambhaji was crowned right after Shivaji death and lasted almost a decade and led successful campaigns against his other Deccan rivals. He and his people stood strong against the might of Mughal ruler Aurangzeb. And for a fact he was backed by the army, which was led by his step mothers own brother when some ministers in the council decided to place his 10 year old step brother on the throne.
There are ample such stories when the ruler didn’t take people to confidence he lost the throne in no time or in a short time. Case in point our own Mysore kingdom, Hyder Ali managed to keep the throne for he at the least placed if for name sake ruler from wodeyar family and while his son wanted to do away with it and thanks to his fanaticism for Islam he eventually lost it. Or the Nayakas of Chitradurga when the Dalavayi’s tried to take over the throne as shadow rulers.
Go to the present to Wikipedia you will see exactly opposite, both Siraj ud Daulah and Tipu Sultan are freedom fighters while Sambhaji was a useless son of great Maratha ruler.
Again, it’s not their fault for they quote sources and in case of Sambhaji who are the sources, the Portuguese of Goa for they were forbidden from fanatically spreading Christianity in Goa. Irony is, folks who were happily engaged in slave trade by shipping people of India across the globe blamed Maratha for unthinkable things. Even our own “historians” like Jadhunath Sarkar quote directly from the Jesuits documents without taking it with a few grains if not a load of salt. Or the fact that the same is probably missing or not available in British documents who were right there in Bombay.
Since I am reading about Sambhaji, a hero made famous to me by the movie Chavva and if one looks at mere facts, he defected to Mughals for a year and fought in a battle or two with them and he came back.
But the details of how he was sent away either for safe keeping or what ever else by his own father who was heading on a southern campaign. How he lost his mother at a very early age and father was busy with nation building. The jealousy of the step mother who became even more powerful in the royal household after his grandmother’s death.
The fact that some of the ministers for whatever reason didn’t trust him to be the next king and really wanted to place the young Rajaram on the throne, this begs the question who will be the regent on behalf of the king, the king maker?
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