Treaty of Purandar

Topic: The Marathas · NCERT: Class 8, Ch 3 "The Marathas"

Meaning

The Treaty of Purandar (1665) was the peace that Shivaji signed with the Mughal general Jai Singh at Purandar fort, near Pune. Under it, Shivaji gave a large part of his kingdom and most of his forts to the Mughals, and his son Sambhaji entered Mughal service.

It marks the lowest point of Shivaji's struggle against Aurangzeb. It shows how the Mughals finally beat his hill-fort strategy. It also led straight to his visit to Agra and his famous escape.

Explanation

Background: why Aurangzeb sent Jai Singh

• Shivaji kept humiliating the Mughals in the Deccan.
• In a night raid he attacked the camp of Shaista Khan, Aurangzeb's viceroy in the south. Shaista Khan lost fingers, his son was killed, and he pulled his force back [2].

• Then Shivaji sacked Surat, the richest Mughal port. He did this as retaliation for Mughal attacks on his lands [2]. He took treasure worth almost one crore rupees.

• Aurangzeb changed his tactic. He did not send another Mughal noble. He sent the Rajput general Jai Singh (Jai Singh I of Amber, a Kachhwaha Rajput).

• Jai Singh knew hill warfare. He did not chase Shivaji's fast guerrilla bands. He laid siege to the forts one by one and cut off their supplies.
• Guerrilla warfare means small groups of fighters who use speed, surprise and knowledge of the land to beat a bigger army.
• Forts were the safe bases of this system. Once the forts were squeezed, the system could not work.

The siege and the surrender

• Jai Singh's army besieged Purandar fort, near Pune, in the Sahyadri hills.
• Shivaji conceded defeat, which means he accepted that he had lost. He came to terms at Purandar in 1665.

Main terms

• Land and forts. Shivaji surrendered a sizeable part of his kingdom. The textbook figure is 23 forts. He kept only about 12 forts and the land around them.
• Sambhaji. His son Sambhaji entered Mughal service. Standard accounts say Sambhaji was given a mansab, a Mughal rank that fixed a noble's pay and the number of troops he kept.
• Help against Bijapur. In standard accounts, Shivaji also agreed to help the Mughals in their war against Bijapur, the Adil Shahi Sultanate of the Deccan.

Results

• The road to Agra. After the treaty, Shivaji was persuaded to visit Aurangzeb's court at Agra (1666).
• At the court he was insulted: he was made to stand among lower-ranked nobles.

• Then he was put under house arrest.

• The escape. Shivaji sent out large baskets of fruits and sweets as gifts. When the guards stopped checking them, Shivaji and Sambhaji escaped hidden inside the baskets.

• Recovery. Aurangzeb never captured him again. In the following years Shivaji won back the lands and forts he had lost under the treaty.
• So the treaty ended up as a short-term Mughal gain. It did not end Maratha power.

Time, place and evidence

• Period: 1665, during Aurangzeb's reign (Mughal Empire) and Shivaji's rise in the Deccan.
• Place: Purandar fort, a hill fort near Pune in the Sahyadri (Western Ghats) of present-day Maharashtra.
• Key people:
• Shivaji, the Maratha leader
• Jai Singh I, the Rajput general on the Mughal side
• Aurangzeb, the Mughal emperor

• Sambhaji, Shivaji's son, who was sent into Mughal service

• Evidence:

• English traders at Surat wrote about Shivaji's campaigns as they happened. These factory papers are printed as "English Records on Shivaji (1659–1682)", held in India's national digital collection [6].
• The Surat raid that came before the treaty was reported in the London Gazette.
• Persian court chronicles and Maratha accounts also describe these events.
• The fort-based defence that Jai Singh broke still survives on the ground. Twelve Maratha forts are on the UNESCO list as "Maratha Military Landscapes of India", India's 44th World Heritage property [4][5].

Don't confuse with

• Treaty of Purandhar (1776): a separate treaty between the Marathas and the British, signed during the First Anglo-Maratha War [7]. The 1665 treaty was between Shivaji and the Mughals. They share a name only because both are linked to Purandar.
• Afzal Khan episode (1659): Afzal Khan was a general of Bijapur, not the Mughals. Shivaji won that encounter at Pratapgad [2][3]. At Purandar he lost to a Mughal general.
• Shaista Khan vs Jai Singh: both were sent by Aurangzeb. Shaista Khan (a Mughal noble) was driven out by Shivaji's night raid [2]. Jai Singh (a Rajput general) succeeded and forced the treaty.
• Treaty of Salbai (1782): the treaty that ended the First Anglo-Maratha War between the Marathas and the British. It has nothing to do with Shivaji.

Prelims Hooks

• Treaty of Purandar, 1665: Shivaji vs the Mughal side led by the Rajput general Jai Singh. It was not Shaista Khan and not Afzal Khan.
• Under the treaty, Sambhaji entered Mughal service and Shivaji gave up 23 forts, keeping about 12.
• Trap: the Treaty of Purandhar, 1776 was Maratha–British, not Shivaji–Mughal [7].
• Chronological order: Afzal Khan killed (1659) → night raid on Shaista Khan → first sack of Surat → Treaty of Purandar (1665) → Agra visit and escape (1666).
• Purandar fort is near Pune in present-day Maharashtra.
• Afzal Khan served Bijapur (Adil Shahi). Jai Singh served the Mughals [3].

Mains Points

• Why Shivaji lost at Purandar. His strength was guerrilla warfare from a chain of hill forts [4].
• Jai Singh did not fight in the open. He besieged the forts one by one.
• Once the bases fell, Shivaji's fast bands lost their shelter.

• So the treaty shows both the strength and the weak point of the fort system.

• Setback and recovery. Purandar (loss of forts, Sambhaji sent into Mughal service) followed by the Agra insult and escape shows a leader who could accept a bad treaty, survive and then rebuild. He later won back his forts, and his kingdom outlasted Aurangzeb's attempts to crush it.

• Mughal use of Rajput nobles. Sending Jai Singh, a Rajput general, shows how Aurangzeb relied on Rajput commanders for hard campaigns. The way Shivaji was treated at Agra after the treaty shows that the Mughals failed to win over the Marathas as allies. This is useful for GS-I answers on Mughal decline and the rise of regional powers.

Related concepts

• Battle of Pratapgad
• Wagh nakh
• Guerrilla warfare
• Shaista Khan
• Sack of Surat
• Escape from Agra

Read more

• Against Bijapur and the Mughals: the famous episodes