Author: H.V. Seshadri
Publication: Organiser
Date: June 19, 2005
URL: http://www.organiser.org/dynamic/modules.php?name=Content&pa=showpage&pid=83&page=7
Introduction: When Shivaji went
to meet Aurangzeb at Agra, people cutting across all barriers of
caste, language and religious customs, thronged throughout the route
to pay respects to him.
It is on this day-the Jyes-htha
Shukla Triodashi of 1674-named Anandanama Samvat that Shivaji was coronated.
The grand function took place atop the 5,000-ft high Raigadh fort in Maharashtra.
He became thereafter a full-fledged chhatrapati-a Hindu emperor in his
own right.
In Maharashtra, the day is celebrated
as Shiva Rajyarohana Utsav-the day Shivaji was coronated. However, the
RSS celebrates it as the Hindu Samrajya Dinotsav. The reason for this is
simple. Shivaji himself, as a teenager, had taken the pledge to establish
Hindavi swaraj and not his own kingdom. He had also declared that it was
the will of God that the move should succeed. On his royal seal, he had
declared that this auspicious raja mudra of Shivaji, the son of Shahji,
would grow like the moon on the first day of Shukla Paksha and be venerated
by the entire world.
Evidence of the all-Hindu character
of the function came in abundance even at the time of the coronation. Jayaram,
a gifted teenaged poet, came all the way from Tamil Nadu to pay his poetic
tributes to Shivaji. Gaga Bhatta, a Vedic scholar of great repute, arrived
from Kashi and prepared a new scriptural text to install Shivaji as a sovereign
Hindu king. Waters from the seven sacred rivers of the country were brought
for his holy bath.
Even prior to this event, when Shivaji
went to meet Aurangzeb at Agra, people cutting across all barriers of caste,
language and religious customs, thronged throughout the route to pay respects
to him. Evidently, the Hindu population groaning under the inhuman Muslim
reign, looked upon him as their new ray of hope.
Shivaji had written a long letter
to Raja Jaisingh of Rajasthan, who as a commander of Aurangzeb's army had
descended on the south to subdue the former. In it, Shivaji had appealed
to him to take up the role of freeing Hindusthan from the Muslim yoke while
he himself would join him as his junior partner. But Jaisingh was too strongly
yoked to the Mughals to heed this higher appeal of patriotism.
Later on, Raja Chhatrasal from Bundelkhand
(presently in Madhya Pradesh) came to Shivaji to fight under him for acquiring
swaraj. But Shivaji advised him to go back and build a powerful Hindu force,
so that they could launch a multi-pronged Hindu attack on the Muslims.
More than any other incident, as
the successors of Shivaji, the Peshwas had carried the Hindu (bhagawa)
flag right up to Kabul and ultimately crippled the Mughal seat of power-which
had remained unchallenged for several centuries-never to rise again. They
had rightly grasped the life mission of Chhatrapati Shivaji.
Swami Vivekananda once remarked
that Shivaji was an ideal Hindu king born to establish Dharma on the lines
of Shri Ram and Sri Krishna.
Finally, what was the signifance
of the elaborate ceremony performed in the coronation of Shivaji? Firstly,
as we have already noted, it denoted the all-India Hindu character and
thrust of the new kingdom. More importantly, till then many of the Hindu
chieftains were rajas-a mere title conferred upon them by some Muslim emperor.
Even Shivaji's valiant father was one such. None of them except those from
Mewar and Bundelkhand were kings in their own right. Even these two did
not have the vision of establishing an all-India Hindu kingdom.
However, Shivaji's case was totally
different. Even as a small raja under the Bijapur Sultan, he had challenged
the Delhi ruler by attacking the latter's strongholds in the south. He
was the first to recognise the supreme importance of sea warfare and built
forts on the western sea-front meant for plying ships. Recognising the
impending threat of conversion, he warned the English missionaries and
beheaded four of them for disobeying his command. His son Sambhaji and
the later commanders continued with Shivaji's tradition and strove to dislodge
the hold of English and Portuguese missionaries on the western coast.
More than any other step by Shivaji,
the developments following his passing away and the unbelievably inhuman
martyrdom of Sambhaji denoted the vision and mission that Shivaji had bequeathed
to posterity. Finding that the dreaded Shivaji was no more, Aurangzeb himself
descended on his kindgom and over-ran it forcefully. But soon enough, the
whole area seemed to be on fire. Every house became a fort and every able-bodied
youth a soldier of Hindavi swaraj. New commanders displaying unparallel
heroism and ability in guerilla warfare rose up to launch fierce attacks
on the enemy's force. One, Dhanaji, pierced right upto Aurangzeb's royal
tent, but as luck would have it, the latter was away, so Dhanaji carried
away the golden insignia on his royal tent! In spite of a four-year long
struggle with a vast army and able war veterans, Aurangzeb succumbed to
the attack to eat the dust of swaraj and was buried at Aurangabad in south,
now named Sambhaji Nagar. Along with him lay forever buried the glory and
power of the mighty Mughals. It also heralded the saffron morning of the
rising sun of swaraj.
