Timeless Management Technique of Shivaji Maharaj by Ninad Bedekar

 

Management and war are two distinct things according to most of us because it doesn’t make sense. After all, war doesn’t have an HR department and an office doesn’t have a cavalry, but if you look into this you would find one thing that many words used in nowadays management are war terms turned into management terms the word logistics or personality or leading by an example are words taken from the battlefield and used in an office.

This is a summary of a lecture delivered by Mr. Ninad Bedekar who is a prominent name when it comes to history during Shivaji Maharaj at the College of Engineering in Pune  and he talks about how the techniques used by Shivaji Maharaj in those times are still relevant and useful in today's era as well. He talks about some key pointers and I will be summarizing those ideas and talk about how he explained the ideas of Shivaji Maharaj being contemporary even in today’s era.

Ninad  Bedekar at COEP Pune

He started his lecture by talking about the Westpoint academy in the united states. he said that a government official of a high level of clearance once told him that in the prestigious institution of West Point from which legendary Generals from Patton to Macarthur were graduated in that institution there are two sand models of battles from India. the first is Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj’s encounter with Afzal khan on Pratapgad and the second one is Peshwa Bajirao’s victory against Nizam ul Haq. this was classified information but what we can learn from it is even today Tactics of the Maratha Empire are still useful and contemporary.

He started his speech by talking about some key ideas that are as follows :

·        Leading by example

·        Flawless Planning

·        Stainless character 

·        Organization and empowerment
 
·        No Compromise On Core Values 

·        HRD and Retention 

·        Learning from mistakes 
(only dead man makes no mistake)
 
·        Optimism

  No one knew how Shivaji Maharaj looked in the Adilshah camp because Shivaji had a lot of looks alikes. In the Agra Incident Hiroji Farzand, a close aide to Maharaj disguised as Shivaji Maharaj and slept on his bed and acted as Shivaji until Shivaji Maharaj was safe and sound. So in the Afzal Khan meet, Shivaji could have sent a lookalike to meet Afzal khan and finish off his chapter but Afzal khan was one of the most important people in the Aurangzeb’s camp and he was also the most Strong and he was feared even by Adilshah and when Maharaj killed Afzal Khan all those people who thought Shivaji wasn’t that great of ruler instantly started respecting Shivaji and going to him for help. He made an example for his army that regardless of your strength and height you need strategy and little Diplomacy to destroy your enemy and weaken the Ultimate enemy.

Another Important Raid by Shivaji Maharaj was The attack on shahistekhan it was a prime example of the flawless Planning of Shivaji Maharaj. shahistekhan was an uncle to Aurangzeb and that’s the reason he was feared all over Pune. He lived in the prestigious Lal Mahal in Pune and he hadn’t achieved much from his time in Pune. he had won only one fort and in his 3 years in Pune. he was totally into enjoyment and fun he used to have girls over that was his life all over. He had two sons and one of his sons was getting married in Pune and so he had given all of Pune a Three day holiday and this was the perfect opportunity to kill him.

Shivaji Maharaj planned a strategy of bringing his men from every possible direction of lal mahal and then he entered from one of the doors and in an attempt of killing him Shivaji ran and was able to cut his three fingers and send him back to Aurangzeb setting an example of people who try to keep their fingers on Pune would have their fingers chopped.

Once Shivaji Maharaj was coming from a campaign in Karnataka and his fellow soldiers were troubled by some local men. They were stealing horses and also grains from Shivaji maharaj’s Camp and then Maharaj came to know about it and then Shivaji asked one of his soldier to look out for the reason of these things happening then they came to know that a women was behind this she was doing this because her husband was dead and she had nowhere else to go she did this. Then Shivaji Maharaj sent his Sardar to help the women but the sardar harassed that women and didn’t treated her well. When maharaj came to know this he was brought in front of maharaj and he was given a trial and when he was proven guilty both of his eyes were removed and was punished. This was the way maharaj used to treat people who commit crime and also maharaj rewarded the people who worked well. 

Lets go back to agra when Shivaji maharaj had his first encounter with Aurangzeb and it was one hell of a episode. At that time when Shivaji didn’t bowed down to Aurangzeb the whole court was surprised and angry but Aurangzeb’s Sister was really angry at this she and some of her entourage even Suggested that Shivaji should be killed and should not be treated as our equal. They said that why isn’t the Great Aurangzeb killing this land owner (jahagirdar). But aurangzeb refused to do that and he put Shivaji under a house arrest. Within three weeks of house arrest Shivaji arranged a amount of money as a gift for aurangzeb’s sister and all her entourage and the people who were for killing Shivaji raje early now became an ally Shivaji and were demanding his freedom from house arrest so he was definitely an amazing political strategist and how he knew whom to keep close and whom to kill at what time.

After the agra incident Shivaji Maharaj for the Next three years did a Swot Analysis of his whole Empire and after that he gained a lot of clarity about his empire and his future goals about the Expansion of Swaraj. After the Analysis he changed his capital from Rajgad to Raigad because in an attack mirza raje could easily come to the foothills of rajgad but It was impossible to do that for raigad. When Shivaji Maharaj left for Agra he only had 18 forts in his hand but in just period of three years he won more than 200 forts starting from Salher in the north to jinji in the south and it was really a very far fetched and fore sighted view because when Rajaram Raje had to take refugee the Same Jinji fort helped him in taking refugee for 8 years.

 

Once Shivaji Maharaj came to know that Marathi Language is losing its influences and needs to be rediscovered he called his foreign minister and asked him to create a book that contain synonyms for various words which were important to the swaraj for eg the word किल्ला isn’t a Marathi word but it is a Persian word so they came up with दुर्ग which is a Marathi word for fort. They named this book Rajkosh and this was first time that any king came up with a dictionary.

 

In Conclusion I would just say one thing that was quote used by Aurangzeb in his court

‘Shiva ki chaal or rahimaan doodh ki tarah saaf hai or suraj ki tarah chamakdar. Hum bhi khush naseeb hai ki hume dushman bhi shiva jaisa mila hai’

This translates as the way of living and the way of thinking of Shivaji maharaj is as clear as milk and as bright as a sun we should be happy that even we got to face an enemy like Shivaji.

 

JAI SHIVAJI !

JAI BHAVANI !

HARE HARE MAHADEV!!