भारतीय इतिहास के ६ स्वर्णिम पृष्ठ (वीर सावरकर - विदेशी आक्रान्ताओं पर विजय गाथा)

in brick-walls or else would have been crushed under an elephant’s foot. The Hindus, on the other hand, would not have avenged such brutality with any hyper-brutal retaliation, even if they had the strength and opportunity to do so. For, the virus the perverted sense of virtues had been flowing through their arteries and veins for centuries together. 592. It should be made clear at this very stage, that the ethics of war, which demanded that a charioteer must fight with another charioteer only, the sword should meet another sword alone, that the armed warrior ought not to fight with an unarmed one, till he has been armed equally, that a fallen senseless warrior was never to be attacked till he had regained consciousness etc. etc., was perhaps quite suitable for the ancient times before Mahabharat. For both the contending parties obeyed the same set of rules: both worshipped the same ethics of war. The Pandawas themselves had violated, at the instance of Lord Krishna, many of these chivalrous rules of war! But the Hindus of these middle ages forgot the lesson taught by the Bhagwat Geeta, of giving due consideration to the time, place and person or persons concerned, while obeying these rules of war. They, on their own part kept on fighting the diabolic Muslim ways of war with the same old— originally sane and civilized, but now outmoded and so highly suicidal— tactics in war. 592A. Besides this incident of Tipu’s two sons, we should like to cite another—equally shameful for the Marathas and the Hindus, inasmuch as it offers another illustration of the perverted sense of virtues of the Hindus of those times! It happened during the Battle of Kharda (1795 A.D.) against the Nizam, the last restlessly writhing remnant of the Muslim power at Delhi! The Nizam was at that time completely at the mercy of the Marathas; he would have been wiped out of existence and saved all further trouble, but for the shameless exhibition of this perverted sense of virtues, by the Marathas! 593. The Maratha forces with their excellent strategic moves had encircled the Nizam at such a desolate and dry place, that his vast army could get no food or water. The scarcity of drinking water was so acute that hundreds of Muslim soldiers drank stinking water from dirty pools, not fit even for animals. Nizam-Ali himself was almost in tears. And at this most critical moment, the big Maratha guns began to rend the skies with their thundering.