Coming up..
The 262nd anniversary of British power in Eastern India..
#Buxar where British Army commanders led troops to an unlikely victory.
That battle at Buxar was being won by Shuja ud daulah.
However, even as the indolent Nawab took it easy and when his troops ~ who had nearly encircled the British army led by the King’s officer Hector Munro ~ the Awadh troops preferred to loot the English baggage than win the war…
Buxar was what cost East India its independence at a time when the Maratha power had yet to emerge from its Panipat loss.
The remaining decade of Shuja’s rule was spent as a supplicant to the British, the Diwani was granted the following year, Allahabad and Chunar forts lost and Benaras passed to the ‘topikars’.
See ‘The Mastery of Hindustan’ for a clear illustrated annotated account of the political and military moves around 23 October 1764…