Frontiers

by Medha Deshmukh Bhaskaran

  Shivaji wonders earnestly if and whether his dream of freedom is worth the deaths of Baji, Shiva Kashid and others? Are wars and battle really justified, gaining peace and prosperity for some by paying with violent and brutal death of some others? Was he not responsible for their deaths? Hasn’t he made their wives widows and their children father-less? Who can advise him? All he could do was to think of Samarth Ramdas, the saint poet who lived in the forests of Jawali, who had said,

  They have let their pyres burn bright

  with everlasting flames to light up the endless night

  only to show us what is wrong and what is right . . .

  The words bring some solace, but there is more: Shivaji also worries about the seven thousand men still stuck at Panhala. He has written to Trimbak Dabir, the fort commander of Panhala, to surrender the fort without bloodshed, and hopes that the king will comply.

  It is almost midnight and the fort has gone quiet, the fort extensions are deserted. The only sound filling the valley is that of the mountain wind whistling and moaning through the canopies of the enormous trees at the foothills. Shivaji ventures into Sayee’s room for the first time after her death and stands in front of her empty bed. A few samayees lit in the corners gleam in their own pale light, and the wooden pillars stand mute, dissolving in their own shadows. It was here that she breathed her last. The room is filled with the memories of her very last days and her very last thoughts.

  ‘Death, death!’ he says loudly.

  ‘Who can avoid death?’ he hears Soyara’s musical voice. He swings around and sees the tall and pretty woman with a face so fetching that one needs some will power to remove one’s gaze from her.

  ‘No one, not even you or I,’ he replies politely.

  ‘That is so true,’ she agrees quickly with her husband and whispers in her silken voice, ‘but it is also one’s karma how and when one dies.’

  It takes Shivaji several moments to understand what Soyara is trying to say. He smiles sadly and retorts, ‘A tragedy has struck us. Why do you talk in riddles?’

  She looks like an alabaster statue, luminous in her pale-golden sari with her jewels twinkling around her neck, in her ears and on her hands. The white jasmine flowers tied to her hair fill the room with a sweet fragrance but her face has turned ashen. Sayee was her husband’s love and her death might not change things; death cannot kill the intangible. She knows all too well that fear and insecurity are making her say what she does not intend to.

  ‘She was a strong woman,’ Soyara mutters, trying to lessen the hurt she has inflicted on her husband.

  ‘Will you not ask me about the battles I fought while death circled over my head?’ Shivaji asks sardonically.

  Before she can reply, a maid comes running with a message, ‘A scout has arrived from Chakan and he has news.’ Shivaji rushes out without another glance at Soyara and she knows instantly that she has lost her chance. She feels confused and sad.

  2

  It rains in Chakan too but Abdul Mabud is not worried, he has finished his pre-launch work. His diggers have dug trenches towards the fort wall, his labourers have constructed raised platforms at suitable points and his artillerymen have mounted large cannons on them. The cannons that have been brought from the Mughal forts in the Deccan. He has been pressing the siege vigorously, all through the rain, braving the occasional attacks of arrows, stones and grenades fired at him and his men from the ramparts and the bastions, with only one goal in mind: the fort must be captured and every man from the Maratha garrison must be killed. As night falls, Abdul sends messages to all besieging commanders. The trench at the north-eastern side of the fort is fully stuffed with explosives. The plan is sure and simple, once the wick is ignited by Shaista Khan and the explosives blow, the northern side of the gate and wall will turn into rubble, creating a gaping hole for the Mughals to enter.

  Inside the fort, it is quiet. Hours before sunset, Firangoji has swallowed his evening meal of a few pieces of dry bread made of sorghum and washed it down with salty well water. He has a terrible premonition that something is about to happen. He comes out of his barracks and looks at the sky covered with dark clouds and then diverts his gaze towards the bastions of the main gate and sees several archers keeping vigil. Everything looks normal but still there is something sinister, intangible yet palpable, in the air. Seeing his expression, a few men from the fort garrison gather around him. He commands everyone to gather in the courtyard. They were in their barracks after their meal.

  ‘Get all the grenades, large stones, muskets, bows and arrows and pile them in the middle of the courtyard,’ he shouts at the men who are running to give his message to others. It is time to go into a contingency mode. The time has come, he thinks.

  War drama is happening outside the fort as planned by the Mughal. The wick is lit by Shaista on time and as planned—three hours before sunset. A series of ear-splitting sounds shake the region, a huge fireball is seen where the bastion stands and then burning debris including massive pieces of stone wall near the bastion are seen flying in the air. As the enormous parts of the rubble fall on earth, they make repeated thudding sounds. The group of Maratha archers standing on that bastion meet a horrific end. A huge cloud rises above the fort as the acrid smell of smoke fills the region. From the courtyard of the fort, Firangoji and his few hundred men watch in horror as they see a part of the strong wall that separates them from the Mughals being blown away. All the archers keeping vigil have vanished in the rubble. The fort commander has been expecting this sort of disaster to happen. He closes his eyes for a brief moment and remembers Raja Shivaji’s words: ‘Our forts are our best defences. Our northern stronghold, the Chakan Fort, is under your care, and I trust that you will defend it wisely . . .’

  Firangoji turns to his men and shouts, ‘We shall not stand and watch the fall of this fort! What a shame it would be that we do nothing! Raja Shivaji has entrusted the fort, the northern stronghold of our kingdom, to us and we shall guard it as long as it is humanly possible.’

  The bastion is reduced to a high mound of debris. Within hours, the squadrons of Mughal soldiers press forward: the infantrymen, followed by heavy cavalrymen and then the war elephants. Night has fallen and it has started to drizzle. The air vibrates with the Mughal war cry, ‘Deen! Deen! Deen!’ as Shaista Khan’s men raise their torches in the air. The mound of debris is still hot but they move forward only to find a high embankment of earth made by the Marathas. Within a few moments, rockets, musket shots, grenades, arrows and stones start flying from behind the earth mound and land on the marching Mughals. Small infernos rise as hundreds of Shaista Khan’s infantry and cavalrymen start falling dead.

  ‘Har Har Mahadev!’ The air starts trembling with the battle cry of the Marathas.

  The storming Mughals stop as night falls but they are forced to stand in the rain on the slimy, blood-drenched ground all through the night.

  By early next morning, the Mughals have changed their strategy. Fifty armoured war elephants charge at the mound followed by thousands of horsemen. The fort garrison is mowed down and some fall back into the tiny citadel in the middle of the courtyard. Firangoji Narsala and some of his men are forced to leave the fort from secret exits. They disappear into the nearby jungle. Raja Shivaji has always insisted that when death is certain and if one is unable to further harm or fight the enemy, one must not die in vain, but flee, remain alive to fight other battles.

  On the fifty-seventh day, Shaista captures Shivaji’s northern domination at the cost of a thousand men. The saffron flag of the Marathas is quickly replaced by the green, Mughal alam. The moss-green flag, made of silk; embroidered with the motif of the rising sun eclipsed by a crouching tiger, flutters over the fort’s citadel in the midst of the ruins of the fort.

  3

  Salimgad Fort in Dilli, used as a prison by Aurangzeb, is immersed in darkness. Its round bastions made of rubble masonry soar over the waters of the Yamuna that flows between the fort and the Qila-e-mub
arak. The winding corridors that join the cells are lit by torches hung on the wall in dire need of repairs. A shackled Suleiman Shikoh sits in one of those cells and thinks about his last day before he had decided to flee to Kashmir.

  It was more than a year ago when life’s reality had started unfolding for Suleiman; everything was over, his dreams, his family and his life. He had pretended to watch the sunset from the terrace above the Rani Mahal of Allahabad Fort, but his thoughts had been elsewhere. It was winter and the evening breeze from over the Ganga was cold, but that had not bothered him. His eyes had wandered beyond the enormous wall of the fort and gazed at the sangam of the Ganga and Yamuna. Despite the orange hues of the reflecting sun, the line dividing the rivers was clear.

  His eyes had moved to a collection of shallow boats with decks rigidly pinned together, forming a path over the water to cross the river for his horses and elephants. Is it the end of the road? he had thought. A part of him was already dead, the sounds of the wailing of his wives he was forced to leave behind had made him feel impotent, and the memory of the young women he had gifted away to men of power in hope that they would help him escape had made him feel like a pimp. He had to leave everything behind, the trunks containing jewels and weapons hidden in the vaults of the fort, thousands of war animals including elephants left at the mercy of their caretakers. The victor and the vanquished, such misleading words . . . Just a few days ago he had been a victor, when he had pushed back Shah Shuja’s army from the battleground near Varanasi, and forced them to flee to Bengal. Within days, he was the vanquished; his father Dara Shikoh’s defeat at the hands of Aurangzeb, his father’s third brother, had been nothing less than a death sentence. Suleiman’s generals, Mirza Raja Jai Singh and Diler Khan, had since disappeared along with their armies, obviously to join Aurangzeb. Suleiman’s path to Punjab was blocked. At Haridwar, Sambhal and many other places, the imperial forces were waiting for him in ambush. A massive army led by his grand-uncle Shaista Khan was already marching towards Varanasi. There was only one option—to flee with minimum horsemen, cross the forests and seek refuge in the kingdom of Prithvi Singh, the king of Kashmir. That was a year ago, and just when he had started feeling safe, a revolt had broken out and the king’s counsellors took over the reins. The same night they had arrested him and handed him over to Mirza Raja Jai Singh who had personally come to take him to Dilli, as a prisoner of the new emperor!

  Suleiman looks out from the small window of his prison cell and notices the waters of the Yamuna shimmer in the pale moonlight. The glittering water reminds him of his happy childhood spent at the palaces of Agra and Dilli, and a bitter smile creases his handsome face. Tomorrow, he will be facing Aurangzeb who is supposed to announce an appropriate punishment for the ‘crimes’ Suleiman has committed.

  It is only the next day that Suleiman actually realizes what is in store for him. He is taken, still shackled, to the diwan-e-khaas, where he sees all his younger cousins, ministers, umrahs and mansabdars. When he looks at the throne that rightfully belonged to his father, Dara Shikoh, his eyes become moist.

  The throne is far from inanimate, and the gold peacocks seem drunk with power. The gold columns of the throne on which the seat of power rests shimmer in the light of innumerable chandeliers burning in the diwan-e-khaas of the Qila-e-mubarak in Dilli. The diamonds and rubies embedded in them glitter like stars in a clear sky. Reluctantly, Suleiman raises his eyes and sees his father’s murderer sitting on the throne, eyes half-closed, counting tesbih beads. The assassin wears a gold-coloured turban fitted with an aigrette studded with large diamonds and a huge topaz. It looks familiar, and then it dawns on Suleiman that it was given to his father by his grandfather. Suleiman shudders with rage; the murderer is also a thief!

  Finally Aurangzeb opens his eyes and gazes at his handsome nephew standing before him bound in metal chains. The young man does not stoop like his father but walks towards the throne, his head held high, looking straight into the new emperor’s eyes with complete disregard—as if he has nothing to lose. But he has, he still has his spirit and that needs to be broken.

  Jahanara has come all the way from Agra to witness her family’s heart-wrenching drama. She sits in a balcony separated from the main court by a latticed wall, and gazes at the twenty-five-year-old Suleiman, her favourite nephew, in shackles, and tears blur her eyes. The diwan-e-khaas is packed with men, all standing according to their rank and position. She can recognize a few whom she has seen before: Jaffar Khan, her mother’s sister’s husband and now the wazir-e-azam of the empire, Mirza Raja Jai Singh, who has been elevated to the position of a subhedar of Dilli, and Muhammad Amin Khan, son of Mir Jumla, who is now the new mir bakshi of the empire. Maharaja Jaswant Singh Rathod, Diler Khan, Danishmand Khan, previously a Dara loyalist, and a few more are seen in the first few rows in their finery and colourful turbans.

  There are others in the court—ulemas, the learned, sayyids, the nobles, and qazis, the men of justice—who stand at the left side of the throne in their ankle-length robes and long beards. She looks back to see the royal women behind her and is shocked to see Roshanara who she hasn’t seen for a while. Her younger sister pretends as if she has not noticed Jahanara. Roshanara wears a short-sleeved bodice studded with pearls as if she has come for a ceremony. Behind her are many women from the royal seraglio—Aurangzeb’s daughters, Suleiman’s sisters, and wives and daughters of ministers. Everyone has tears in their eyes—except Roshanara.

  The trial has begun.

  ‘You are a traitor to the empire. You had taken refuge in the kingdom of Garhwal and incited the king to fight with the imperial army. Do you want to say anything in your defence?’ A mullah standing to the left of the throne accuses Suleiman. There is utter silence in the court and all eyes are focused on the prince.

  Suleiman smiles bitterly and says, ‘No, I have not done anything wrong and I have nothing to say to the honourable court.’

  ‘Every criminal says so. If you have nothing to say then you will face the consequences of your actions,’ the clergy announces.

  The silence in the hall of private audiences has turned transparently ominous. Jahanara sighs; the fate of her nephew is sealed. She looks at Aurangzeb, his face is expressionless. She turns her teary gaze towards Suleiman who stands with his head held high, his silky hair falling on his muscular shoulders, his face red, his eyes redder still. She notices that everyone present is gazing at their own feet as if they are busy surveying the floor. Jahanara is aware that for Aurangzeb it is dicey to announce the death verdict since there are no serious charges against Suleiman and those of sedition are hearsay, not proved.

  She is curious to know what Aurangzeb has to say.

  Aurangzeb opens his eyes and announces, ‘Despite whatever you have done I promise that no harm shall befall you. Have faith in Allah, you shall be treated kindly. Allah hu Akbar! God is great. Your father was put to death because he went against Islam and became a kafir. You have nothing to fear.’ Aurangzeb pauses. ‘But we cannot forget that you have tried to go against the emperor and that is a serious crime. You will be under observation and we shall keep you in some place safe, like the Gwalior Fort.’

  This seems like an anti-climax. For a moment Suleiman looks puzzled, then performs kurnish. He waits for a few moments, letting the silence choke the audience, and then says, ‘If you intend to feed me with pousht made of opium seeds that will first make me insane and then kill me slowly, I beg you to please kill me, put me to death in a quick manner, in whichever way the emperor desires.’

  The hall echoes with the solemn words when Aurangzeb says loudly, ‘This drink will most certainly not be administered.’

  Suleiman performs another kurnish.

  4

  Houses on the outskirts of Kurnool have been set on fire and the evening sky is covered with black smoke that hangs over the Tungabhadra river. Siddi Jauhar, despite having a severe headache, stands all alone on the western burj of the Kurnool Fort and sadly gazes at the
destruction of his city. After the Panhala debacle, he had managed to flee and reach his home, but the angry Ali Adil Shah wants him dead. Now the Adilshahi squadrons are gunning for him. Half his army has deserted him to join Ali, thinking that their master has betrayed them by helping Shivaji escape. For the first time in his life, Jauhar feels that life is not worth living any more. He sighs, clutches his head with both hands and thinks that he must do what he intends to do. Ali’s troopers will not stop at anything. He knows that after a while they will enter the fort like untamed elephants gone wild, goring anything in their path. They will surely enter his zenana quarters and the rest is too ghastly to brood over.

  He moves away from the battlements and runs along the ramparts as archers guarding the fort give him puzzled looks. The news of the impending calamity seems to have reached the women quarters for he can hear some wailing and screaming. He reaches a massive watchtower and looks around. Making sure that there is no one to see what he is doing, he enters a small room that has steps descending to a vault. It is dark and damp in the narrow passage but he knows that there is a small iron door flush to the wall. He takes out a large key tucked in his belt, unlocks the door and kicks it open. The memories of how he had lured the young jagirdar of Kurnool and stabbed him to death here surface, along with a musty smelling draught of chill air. It is the first time he has entered the tunnel after he had left young Malik bleeding to death somewhere in there. In the gloom and darkness of the tunnel, a million images flash before his eyes. His nostrils pick up another stench, like something dead and rotting, as though the body of the boy is still waiting for him after so many years. Then he thinks he has heard something: the last screams of the dying boy echo in the tunnel and pierce his ears. He soldiers on, like a suicidal man, unafraid of the dark, undaunted by the reptiles hiding in the crevices of the rocks he is walking on. It turns darker and he starts to flounder, his hands moving about him like a blind man searching for obstacles in the path. He stops and listens; the sounds of the outside world have faded away and even the echo of the screams has stopped. He stands still for a while, and takes out a jambia dagger tucked in his belt. Holding its hilt with both his hands, he raises it high and brings it down with all the force he can muster, stabbing his stomach one, twice, thrice, till he can no longer repeat it.