Page 117 - Lohgarh

Mughal Action Against the Sikhs w 117

upon his followers, “This disheartened and frightened the Emperor and
he issued instructions that no Hindu should be allowed to enter the
area around his camp. He was so scared of the Sikhs that he commanded
that even Hindu generals, who were a part of his own army, who had
always been loyal to him, should not be allowed to come near him. So
much so that, now, he was afraid of his own loyal Mughal soldiers. He
decided to keep himself away from the battle zone and moved his camp
near Qaimpur village, i.e. 12 kos (about 38 kilometres) away from
Lohgarh. Hadi Kamvar Khan, who was accompanying the royal caravan,
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writes: ”I saw that the camel-riding Rajput soldiers were present in the
whole area. Thousands of them were there, but the Emperor was
accompanied by just four sons and a few courtiers only.” It means that
the Rajput rulers were fully ready to react to any untoward incident,
and, had Bahadur Shah taken any wrong step, he too would have been
eliminated. Certainly the Mughals were demoralized, because of heavy
casualties inflicted from the hands of the Sikhs. Banda Singh Bahadur,
accompanied by Sikh soldiers, was highly motivated to fight and resist
the Mughals. Coming out of the 52 Fortresses with great, enthusiastic
and inclination, they raised the cry of “ Fateh Darshan” and “ Sachcha
Padshah” and threw themselves upon the fire of artillery of Mughals
and frightened them. They launched rank-shaking assaults of the
imperial entrenchment, and every day many were killed. A large number
of soldiers from both sides were killed daily.
An Imperial officer, Mirza Rukn, came from the van and reported
that fighting and killing of the Mughals was going on at the passages
leading to the satellite Fortress of Lohgarh. Rustam Dil Khan Bahadur
on reaching a Fortress called Sudhawala surrounded it, believing that
Banda was inside that building. But the information was wrong as Banda
Singh Bahadur was sitting under that tent on that hillock and from there
he was watching the actions of his devoted followers. No General of
the Mughals could reach near Banda Singh, as he was so swift and moved
from one satellite Fortress to another like a light. He was himself
monitoring some weak defenses of the Sikhs and accordingly providing
them the reinforcement.