Instruct: Given a question, retrieve passages that answer the question.
Query: How long did The Maratha Conquests last?
After a lifetime of warfare with Adilshah of Bijapur and Mughal emperor Aurangzeb, Shivaji founded an independent Maratha kingdom in 1674 with Raigad as its capital. Shivaji died in 1680, leaving behind a large kingdom. After Shivaji, Sambhaji took up throne and expanded Hindavi Swaraj. He built strong army as well as strong navy. Mughal emperor Aurangzeb sacrificed his throne and came to Deccan to defeat Sambhaji. The Mughals invaded, fighting an unsuccessful War of 27 years from 1681 to 1707. Shahu, a grandson of Shivaji, ruled as emperor until 1749. During his reign, Shahu appointed the first Peshwa as head of the government, under certain conditions. After the death of Shahu, the Peshwas became the de facto leaders of the Empire from 1749 to 1761, while Shivaji's successors continued as nominal rulers from their base in Satara. Covering a large part of the subcontinent, the Maratha Empire kept the British forces at bay during the 18th century, until internal relations between the Peshwas and their sardars (army commanders) deteriorated, provoking its gradual downfall.
Appian wrote: "With only 8,000 men when the war began, how many and what terrible reverses they bring upon the Romans! How many treaties did they make on equal terms with the Romans, which the latter would not consent to make with any other people! How often did they challenge to open battle the last commander sent against them, who had an army of 60,000 men!" He noted "their small numbers and great sufferings, their valiant deeds and long endurance." 
The regiment had its antecedents in the old Madras Army of the British East India Company, which was largely responsible for the British conquest of south and central India. It was raised at Madras in September 1759, as the 3rd Battalion of Coast Sepoys from existing companies of sepoys that had been raised a year earlier. The men were mostly enlisted from South India and consisted of Muslims and Hindus. The regiment was actively engaged in the wars against the French, Mysore and the Marathas. Their first major engagement was the decisive Battle of Wandiwash in 1760, which ended French colonial ambitions in India. This was followed by forty years of constant warfare against the Sultans of Mysore, and then the Marathas chieftains. In the Second Maratha War of 1803-05, the regiment fought in the Battle of Assaye under General Arthur Wellesley, the future Duke of Wellington. Its performance at Assaye was much appreciated and it was permitted to display the word "Assaye" with the device of an elephant on their colours and appointments. It was again engaged against the Marathas during the Third Maratha War of 1817-19, which decisively broke the Maratha power in India. In 1840, the regiment took part in the First Anglo-Chinese War, where it again performed well and as a reward, was authorized to bear a golden dragon wearing the imperial crown upon its regimental colours. In the latter part of the 19th century, the regiment did not see much action, although it saw active service in Burma.
The Marathas had started losing interest in the north-west. Peshwa, again and again ordered retirement of experienced Maratha generals from Punjab with their troops as he considered Deccan more important than distant Punjab. The Peshwa was alarmed by the growing French and British influence in the Deccan. When Abdali invaded Punjab for the fifth time, the Marathas didn't try hard enough to save the frontier posts and instead started planning to save Delhi from another invasion.
Chimaji Appa died in 1740. The conquest of Bassein was long cherished by the Marathas as a matter of national pride and glory. A relationship built on trust and camaraderie between Bajirao and Chimaji was the key to the meteoric rise of the Marathas during Bajirao Peshwa's reign.
With the remanned Maratha artillery silenced, Wellesley turned his attention to Pohlmann's reformed infantry. Although Maxwell had suffered heavy losses, he had rallied his cavalry and returned to the field of battle. Wellesley ordered him to charge the Maratha left flank, while the infantry moved forward as a single line to meet the centre and right. The cavalry spurred forward but were met with a volley of canister shot which struck Maxwell, killing him instantly. Their momentum lost, the cavalry did not complete their charge but veered away from the Maratha line at the last moment. The British and Madras infantry marched on against the Maratha position but Pohlmann's men, their morale low, did not wait for the attack and instead retreated northwards across the Juah. Descriptions differ as to the manner of their departure: Maratha sources claim the line marched away from the battlefield in an orderly manner on Pohlmann's orders but British accounts claim the Maratha infantry fled in an uncontrolled panic. Berar's irregulars inside Assaye, now leaderless and having witnessed the fate of the regular infantry, abandoned the village and marched off northwards at around 18:00, followed shortly afterwards by the Maratha cavalry. Wellesley's troops, however, were exhausted and in no condition to pursue and the native allied cavalry which had remained on the south bank of the Kailna and had not been engaged, refused to pursue without the support of the British and Madras cavalry.
The Imperial Maratha Conquests were a series of conquests in the Indian subcontinent which led to the building of the Maratha Empire. These conquests were started by Shivaji in 1659 from the victory at the Battle of Pratapgad. The conquests conclusively defeated and overtook the Mughal Empire in the Indian subcontinent and its vassals. It ended with the eventual fall of the Maratha Empire after the second and the third Anglo-Maratha Wars.
The Battle of Savanur occurred between the forces of the Maratha Empire and the forces of the Kingdom of Mysore from September 1786 to October 1786. Maratha general, Haripant's army decided to move to Savanur due to growing illness and lack of resources amongst his Maratha troops. His army was pursued by the forces of Tipu Sultan, who made two attacks early in September on the Maratha camp, which proved to be indecisive. On 15 September 1786, Tipu's army encamped approximately 5 miles from Savanur. On 1 October 1786, Tipu's army divided into four columns and made a surprise attack on the Maratha position. The Marathas, however, were informed by their spies about Tipu's surprise attack and had evacuated their position. The Marathas moved to a height from which they attacked Tipu's forces with artillery. Tipu ordered his troops not to fire back to deceive the Marathas into thinking that he did not possess long range guns. He did this to lure the Marathas to make an offensive. The strategy had proven to be effective, and the Marathas advanced to the Mysore position. When the Marathas had come close enough, Tipu's army unleashed a strong barrage of heavy fire on them. Tipu's heavy firing on the Marathas continued for approximately 7 hours. The Marathas were forced to retreat and Tipu Sultan entered Savanur on 10 October 1786 with support from the inhabitants of the city.
The battle started with cannonade on both sides. The Jaipur army stayed back in a defensive position as they had long range artillery, the cannonade continued till 11 O'Clock, the Marathas faced some casualties as they had light artillery and could not counter attack effectively. The Rathor horsemen of Jodhpur however grew impatient and around 4000 of them charged the Maratha army. The Marathas shot the Rathors with artillery and musket fire killing many, the Rathors however charged the Marathas and broke into the left wing, many from the Maratha side were killed, the Rathors pushed deep into Maratha lines and attacked De Boigne, forcing him to retreat after a short fight. Rana Khan upon seeing his left wing crumble, sent reinforcemnts under Shivaji Vithal, Rayaji Patil and Khande Hari, they slowly rallied the fleeing soldiers and fought "the bloodiest and most obstinate struggle of the day". The Jaipur army however did not take advantage of this opening created by the reckless charge and held their positions. The Rathors upon seeing no reinforcements, started losing morale as the Maratha reserves were now approaching them, they were finally pushed back. The right wing of the Maratha army fared better as they unknowingly killed the Mughal General Muhammad Beg Hamdani by a stray shot from the cannon. The Mughal soldiers made a charge at the Maratha right wing, but were pushed back. Upon knowing that their general was dead the Mughals did not make another attempt to attack the Marathas. The Rathors did make attempts to capture the Maratha artillery, they charged the Marathas four times but could not make any gains. The two armies held their positions till midnight and then returned to their camps. The Marathas did not make any advances as they did not know about Muhammad Begs death. Mahadji also feared that the Rajput and Afghan mercenaries in his army may change sides. There was some cannonade on both sides but both sides remained in their camps for the rest of the war.
The Maratha Empire soon allied with the British East India Company (based in the Bengal Presidency) against Mysore in the Anglo-Mysore Wars. After the British had suffered defeat against Mysore in the first two Anglo-Mysore War, the Maratha cavalry assisted the British in the last two Anglo-Mysore Wars from 1790 onwards, eventually helping the British conquer Mysore in the Fourth Anglo-Mysore War in 1799. After the British conquest, however, the Marathas launched frequent raids in Mysore to plunder the region, which they justified as compensation for past losses to Tipu Sultan.
The Mughal Empire's province Gujarat (now in India) was under attack of the Marathas since last half century. The chief Maratha houses, Gaikwar and Peshwa had made peace with each other and driven out the Mughal nobles under the emperor Alamgir II. One such noble, Momin Khan, had countered their advances and recovered Ahmedabad in 1756 lost to the Marathas few years ago. After a long siege, Ahmedabad fell again in hands of the Marathas. The Marathas levied tributes across Gujarat. In 1759, the English of the British East India Company captured Surat. Sadashiv Ramchandra was appointed as a viceroy by Peshwa in 1760 followed by Apa Ganesh in 1761. Following defeat of Marathas in the Third Battle of Panipat (1761), the nobles briefly recovered towns from the Marathas but soon had to surrender. Thus the Marathas firmly established themselves in Gujarat.
Ahmed Shah Abdali – a Pashtun – embarked on a conquest in South Asia starting in 1747. In the short space of just over a quarter of a century, he forged one of the largest Muslim empires of the 18th century. The high point of his conquests was his victory over the powerful Marathas in the third Battle of Panipat 1761. In the Indian subcontinent, his empire stretched from the Indus at Attock all the way to the outskirts of Delhi. Uninterested in long-term of conquest or in replacing the Mughal Empire, he became increasingly pre occupied with revolts by the Sikhs. Sikh holocaust of 1762 took place under the Muslim provincial government based at Lahore to wipe out the Sikhs, with 30,000 Sikhs being killed, an offensive that had begun with the Mughals, with the Sikh holocaust of 1746, and lasted several decades under its Muslim successor states. His empire started to unravel not long after his death.
There is no doubt that the single most important power to emerge in the long twilight of the Mughal dynasty was the Maratha Confederacy (1674 CE - 1818 CE). The Marathas are responsible, to a large extent, for ending Mughal rule in India. The Maratha Empire ruled large parts of India following the decline of the Mughals. The long and futile war bankrupted one of the most powerful empires in the world. Mountstart Elphinstone termed this a demoralizing period for the Muslims as many of them lost the will to fight against the Maratha Empire. Maratha empire at its peak stretched from Tamil Nadu (Trichinopoly) "present Tiruchirappalli" in the south to the Afghan border in the north. In early 1771, Mahadji, a notable Maratha general, recaptured Delhi and installed Shah Alam II as the puppet ruler on the Mughal throne. In north India, the Marathas thus regained the territory and the prestige lost as result of the defeat at Panipath in 1761. However regions of Kashmir, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and Western Punjab, were captured by Marathas between 1758 and 1759, remained in Afghan rule before ascension of Sikh power. Mahadji ruled the Punjab as it used to be a Mughal territory and Sikh sardars and other Rajas of the cis-Sutlej region paid tributes to him. A considerable portion of the Indian subcontinent came under the sway of the British Empire after the Third Anglo-Maratha War, which ended the Maratha Empire in 1818.
As the Mughal empire continued to weaken after Aurangzeb's death, the Maratha Peshwa Bajirao I invaded Mughal territories such as Malwa and Gujarat. The Mughal emperor was alarmed by Maratha conquests. In 1737, the Marathas invaded Delhi, defeated the Mughals, and then marched back to their capital Pune.
Raghunathrao and his deputy Malhar Rao were not interested in holding the position in the north for long. On their request, Peshwa had to find their substitutes. He gave supreme command of north India to Dattaji Scindia, while Jankoji Scindia was appointed his deputy. They proceeded towards Delhi separately at different times. The new Maratha commanders were not familiar with the topology, climate and political conditions of Delhi and Punjab.
The Marathas had failed to befriend the important party of Punjab, particularly Sikhs. They couldn't make any formal treaty with Sikhs, who along with Adina Beg had assisted them in their conquest of north-west. Marathas treated Sikhs as a non-entity in Punjab affairs. According to an assessment, the Sikhs were ever ready to co-operate with the Marathas, but it goes to the discredit of the Marathas that they could not make a proper confederacy with Sikhs. Kirpal Singh writes:
Besides, the political leadership of Marathas was also poor. They failed to distinguish between friends and foes in the Punjab. Ignoring all the claims of Sikh leaders, Raghunath Rao appointed Adina Beg Khan as the governor. Finding the Maratha leadership completely off guard against their political foes, many Afghans who were earlier taken captives by Marathas quickly changed their loyalty towards Adina Beg and were recruited in his army. However, later on they betrayed him and joined Abdali's forces during his fifth invasion.
Following the decline of the Mughal power, the region of Deccan saw the rise of Maratha Empire. The Nizam himself saw many invasions by the Marathas in the 1720s, which resulted in the Nizam paying a regular tax ("Chauth") to the Marathas. The major battles fought between the Marathas and the Nizam include Palkhed, Rakshasbhuvan, and Kharda. Following the conquest of Deccan by Bajirao I and the imposition of "chauth" by him, Nizam remained a tributary of the Marathas for all intent and purposes.
Following the decline of the Mughal power, the region of Deccan saw the rise of the Maratha Empire. The titullar Nizams themselves fought during the Mughal-Maratha Wars since the 1720s, which resulted in the Nizam paying a regular tax ("Chauth") to the Marathas. The major battles fought between the Marathas and the Nizam include Palkhed, Bhopal, Rakshasbhuvan, and Kharda, in all of which the Nizam lost. Following the conquest of Deccan by Bajirao I and the imposition of "chauth" by him, the Nizam remained a tributary of the Marathas for all intent and purposes.
The Maratha Peshwa Balaji Baji Rao sent his brother Raghunath Rao along with Shamsher Bahadur, Gangadhar Tatya, Sakharambapu, Naroshankar and Maujiram Bania and a large army towards Delhi and Punjab. They were accompanied by Malhar Rao Holkar of Malwa who had a long experience of North India and its rulers. The Marathas captured Delhi in August 1757. They decisively defeated the Rohillas and Afghans near Delhi in 1758. The defeat was so decisive that Najib Khan surrendered to the Marathas and became their prisoner.
This incident has a special importance in Indian history, particularly Hindu history since, after nearly seven and a half centuries when the last Hindu King of the region Trilochan Pal Shahi had been defeated by the Muslim invader Mahmud of Ghazni in 1020 C.E., Indus river came under Hindu rule due to the Maratha conquest of Punjab in 1758. This campaign of the Marathas led by Raghunath Rao is hailed as Raghu's Bharari - i.e. whirlwind campaign in Maharashtra even today.
The Second Anglo-Maratha War represents the military high-water mark of the Marathas who posed the last serious opposition to the formation of the British Raj. The real contest for India was never a single decisive battle for the subcontinent. Rather it turned on a complex social and political struggle for control of the South Asian military economy. The victory in 1803 hinged as much on finance, diplomacy, politics and intelligence as it did on battlefield maneuver and war itself.
Ultimately, the Third Anglo-Maratha War (1817–1818) resulted in the loss of Maratha independence. It left the British in control of most of India. The Peshwa was exiled to Bithoor (Marat, near Kanpur, Uttar Pradesh) as a pensioner of the British. The Maratha heartland of Desh, including Pune, came under direct British rule, with the exception of the states of Kolhapur and Satara, which retained local Maratha rulers (descendants of Shivaji and Sambhaji II ruled over Kolhapur). The Maratha-ruled states of Gwalior, Indore, and Nagpur all lost territory and came under subordinate alliance with the British Raj as princely states that retained internal sovereignty under British paramountcy. Other small princely states of Maratha knights were retained under the British Raj as well.
Marathas conquered North-west India between 1757 and 1758. Though it was short-lived, it had long-lasting effects upon the politics of the Indian subcontinent. Marathas reached Multan and Peshawar by 1758. They later lost the control of north-west India in Third Battle of Panipat, and suffered heavy damages.
The Siege of Ponda was a siege of Ponda, Goa, during the Imperial Maratha Conquests. The siege lasted from 8 April to 6 May 1675.
In Lahore, as in Delhi, the Marathas were now major players. The Maratha Empire had reached its peak, the empire's territories covered much of South Asia. By 1760, with defeat of the Nizam in the Deccan, Maratha power reached its zenith with a territory of over 2,800,000 km. The last frontier of the Marathas at this time was at Peshawar in today's Khyber Pakhtoonkhwa on the Afghanistan border.
Immediately following the loss at Panipat, the Marathas under the leadership of Madhavrao I began planning and organising for the re-establishment of Maratha supremacy. Ten years after Panipat, he sent a large Maratha army into northern India in an expedition that was meant to re-establish Maratha domination in that area and punish refractory powers that had either sided with the Afghans, such as the Rohillas, or had shaken off Maratha domination after Panipat, the result of which was the Maratha Resurrection resulting in the Capture of Delhi in 1771 and the capture of Nazibabad in 1772 and the installation of Mughal Emperor Shah Alam II to the nominal throne under Maratha suzerainty. The success of this campaign can be seen as the last chapter of the long story of Panipat.