Page 200 - Lohgarh

200 w Lohgarh : The World’s Largest Fort

Mohammed Dayam (Faujdar of Batala), Sohrab Khan (Faujdar of
Kalanaur), Hamir Chand Katoch (Raja of Kangra), Hari Dev (son of Raja
Dharuv Dev Jasrotia) and Arif Begh (deputy chief of Lahore) too had
joined Abdus Samad Khan. The Mughals had dug trenches all around
the Fortress of Gurdas Nangal. 7
On the north side of the Fortress Zakaria Khan (then Governor
Jammu) and Zain-ud-Din Ahmed Khan (Governor Sarhind) were leading
operations, and, on the south side the command was with the Faujdars
of Patti, Eimanabad, Batala, Kalanaur, Aurangabad-Pasrur, Gujrat as well
as the Rajput rulers of Kangra and Jasrota. 8
The number of the Mughal and Hindu hill soldiers was more than
fifty times than that of the Sikhs in the Fortress; the Sikhs were fighting
the battle for survival; they did not have any food inside the Fortress.
For a few days, some of them would come out of the Fortress and fall
upon the nearby villages in order to plunder food and cattle. In the
second week of April 1715, some Mughal units proceeded forward to
stop the Sikhs from coming out of the Fortress so that they (Sikhs) should
not be able to get food; this resulted in losses on both the sides. Several
Sikhs and Mughal soldiers were killed in these skirmishes. One day, when
a Sikh group came out of the Fortress to fetch wood for fuel, the army
of Dharuv Dev Jasrotia attacked them; as a result, most of the Sikhs
were killed and the rest ran to the Fortress to save their lives. Now, this
side too was blocked; the Mughal gun and arrow-shooting experts were
stationed all around the Fortress and if any Sikh tried to come out of
the Fortress to fetch food or anything else, he would become a victim
of these arrows and the gun shots. Several attempts were made by the
Sikhs and hundreds of them were killed.
But, in spite of being a mammoth force, the Mughal army did not
try to enter the Fortress. In fact they were afraid that the Sikhs had
several guns and cannons, and, in the early days of the siege of the
Fortress, they had also collected a lot of iron from the nearby villages
(for making guns). The Mughals got the news that the Sikhs had made
three new cannons with this iron and also had a large amount of gun-
powder. Abdus Samad Khan reported all this to the Emperor; the