6. Suppression of the Pindāris. Death of Chitu
The result of the Pindāri raids was that Central India was being rapidly reduced to the condition of a desert, and the peasants, unable to support themselves on the land, had no option but to join the robber bands or starve. It was not until 1817 that Lord Hastings obtained authority from home to take regular measures for their repression; and at the same time he also forced or persuaded the principal chiefs of Central India to act vigorously in concert with him. When these were put into operation and the principal routes from Central India occupied by British detachments, the Pindāris were completely broken up and scattered in the course of a single campaign. They made no stand against regular troops, and their bands, unable to escape from the ring of forces drawn round them, were rapidly dispersed over the country. The people eagerly plundered and seized them in revenge for the wrongs long suffered at their hands, and the Bhīl Grassias or border landholders gladly carried out the instructions to hunt them down. On one occasion a native havildar with only thirty-four men attacked and put a large body of them to flight. The principal chiefs, reduced to the condition of hunted outlaws in the jungles, soon accepted the promise of their lives, and on surrendering were either settled on a grant of land or kept in confinement. The well-known leader Chitu joined Apa Sāhib, who had then escaped from Nāgpur and was in hiding in the Pachmarhi hills. Being expelled from there in February 1819 he proceeded to the fort of Asīrgarh in Nimār, but was refused admittance by Sindhia’s commandant. He sought shelter in the neighbouring jungle, and on horseback and alone attempted to penetrate a thick cover known to be infested with tigers. He was missed for some days afterwards and no one knew what had become of him. His horse was at last discovered grazing near the margin of the forest, saddled and bridled, and exactly in the state in which it was when Chitu had last been seen upon it. Upon search a bag of Rs. 250 was found in the saddle; and several seal rings with some letters of Apa Sāhib, promising future reward, served more completely to fix the identity of the horse’s late master. These circumstances, combined with the known resort of tigers to the spot, induced a search for the body, when at no great distance some clothes clotted with blood, and farther on fragments of bones, and at last the Pindāri’s head entire with features in a state to be recognised, were successively discovered. The chief’s mangled remains were given over to his son for interment, and the miserable fate of one who so shortly before had ridden at the head of twenty thousand horse gave an awful lesson of the uncertainty of fortune and drew pity even from those who had been victims of his barbarity when living.[8]