THE BATTLE OF JHELUM ---- ALEXANDER VERSUS PORUS
The Battle of Jhelum fought between
Alexander the Great and Maharaja Porus is one of the most famous battles of the
world because it led to a turning point in the connectivity of India with the
West and that of the West with India.
Moreover, it showed that Alexander alone was not an extremely valorous
fighter, there was one Indian Maharaja,
too, and was known as Porus, one of the immortals in the world history of warfares.
Alexander could not set his firm
foot on India without getting rid of Darius
III who had a large part of India
under his control and also had some
Indian supporters on his side.
It is necessary to mention here that
Darius III was the last king of the Achaemenid Empire of Persia, from 336 BC to
330 BC. and Alexander had an expansionist’s dream to establish his hold on
Egypt which led to armed confrontation between him and Darius. It was during this confrontation that Darius
found himself far inferior to Alexander in the tactics of war and military power.
Recorded history tells us that in this difficult situation Darius III
approached Maharaja Porus whom he
knew to be:
Extraordinarily brave, well-built,
tall, awfully handsome, patriotic, well-wisher of the people, helpful and generous
to those who sought his help and above all a unique Indian Maharaja who
believed in throwing back the foreign aggressor rather than bending his neck before them.
To match his military power with that of Alexander, Darius wrote a touching
letter to Maharaja Porus for help at that critical juncture .
The English version of this letter reads as follows:
“Formerly I dwelt in my kingdom to
glory and power, but now I entreat thee to receive me, and to be pleased
graciously to help me, because of this mighty man of war (allusion to
Alexander), who hath come upon me; he knoweth not fear, his courage is mighty,
and his body is thick, and I never saw his like either among kings, or among
other men.
“Behold, too, he hath gained
possession of my women, who are the source of my depravity, and behold, I came
upon the Greeks in several places, but I was not able to beat them. And he hath
overcome me and put me to shame, because there was none (among us) able to do
battle against him.
“He hath taken my kingdom, and hath
carried into captivity my mother and my wife and daughter, and there is nothing
left to me but death, and it is better for me to die than to become his
servant.
“And now help me, and do thou take
heed to the love, which hath always existed between us, and then make ready for
me an army of the soldiers of the country, for (Alexander and his hosts) are
mighty men of war and are strong.
“Hasten though to help me with this
army, for I place hope and confidence in thee and I will abide on the borders
of my country until thy message shall reach me, and I will deal graciously with
those, who shall come unto me from thyself, and I will reward them abundantly
with possessions.
“If I conquer Alexander, I will send
to thee half of whatever I find with them.”
It need not be repeated here that
despite the help given by Maharaja Porus,
Darius III got defeated, lost his
life, and Alexander’s quick invasion against him resulted in his defeat..
But let us recall the precious words
of Darius to Maharaja Porus: “I place my hope and confidence in thee
(Maharaja Porus).”
It
is also pertinent to recall that it was only when Alexander destroyed the
Persian empire during the reign of Darius III that the Persian empire in India, too, came to its final end.
Alexander’s conquest of Egypt
emboldened him to take up his next expansionist adventure, so in early May 327 B.C. he recruited 5,000
Indian soldiers and marched towards
India.
It was his good fortune that his
enemies en route were weak, cowardly and disunited. He faced hardly any resistance in Swat, the
kings and chieftains of the Punjab got involved in their own local animosities
and thus became a source of undesirable support which encouraged Alexander to
keep his onward march uninterrupted.
Of all other rulers of the Punjab
and other areas, it was Raja Ambhi of
Taxila who not only passed on vital military information about the
neighbouring Maharaja Porus but also
became a supporter of Alexander just for petty gifts like Persian dresses to wear
and thirty caparisoned horses to ride on.
Marching forward inch by inch, Alexander crossed the central Hindukush,
following the main route from Balkha to Kabul and arrived in the beautiful
valley of Koh-i-Daman. Here he consolidated his position by fresh recruitments
from the neighborhood. Nicanor was appointed incharge of the city and Tyriespes was appointed Satrap of the
area.
From Hindukush Alexander moved towards Nikaia, in the
vicinity of modern Jalalabad, stayed there till the middle of November,
prepared himself for the next move, and waited for the opportune time to take
the next step. He divided his army into two commands, one under Hephaistion and
the other under Perdikkas and ordered one to move towards Gandhara through the
Kabul valley and the other to the hilly country north of the Kabul river. All the
unruly tribes on way were subdued. On the way, Alexander is also believed to
have offered a sacrifice to Goddess Athena (the goddess of wisdom and war).
Now subjugating the highlanders one by one, Alexander reached
the Indus, crossed over to Taxila, from where an envoy was sent to Maharaja
Porus, asking him to bring his tribute and meet the king at the river-frontier.
According to historian Curtius “thinking that by the mere
prestige of his name, Porus would be
induced to surrender, Alexander sent
Cleochares to tell Maharaja Porus in
peremptory terms that he must pay tribute and come to meet his sovereign at the
very frontiers of his own dominions.” The reply of the extremely patriotic and
peerlessly brave Porus was that he would comply with the second of these
demands, and when Alexander entered his realm, he would meet him, but he should
come with arms for the battle.
This is how the stage for a military showdown between
Alexander the Great and Maharaja Porus the indomitable was set along the bank of the Jhelum.
While marching towards
Jhelum, Alexander
received support from various Indian chieftains which reinforced his military
machine, but our main concern is the loyalty offered to him by King Ambhi. It is mentioned in
several historical accounts that the Macedonian General was extended
hospitality for three days; he was presented two hundred talents of coined silver,
three thousand oxen, ten thousand sheep and thirty elephants. In
return, Alexander gave Ambhi a thousand
talents out of the spoils of the
war, along with the vessels of gold and
silver and a good deal of Persian drapery. Fortified with the loyalty of Ambhi
and the submission of several other Indian chieftains, the position of
Alexander’s strength became much better.
Let us now take a Comparative
View of the military power of Alexander and Porus.
Alexander had inherited from his father an army with national
character. He had therefore at his command trained archers, infantrians,
grenadiers and cavaliers. There was also a special posse of elephant troops. This force when put together was versatile enough to be used
in different terrains against a variety of opponents.
Alexander’s army at the
time of the Battle of Jhelum comprised:
1.
Companions
consisting of choicest cavalrymen of noble families; a section of foot soldiers
numbering 1,500 which went up to 5,000 during the course of war. Every horse with its rider was encased in
armour.
2.
Hoplites:
The oblong shield which covered the whole body was called hoplon. Soldiers
equipped with such a shield formed the core of the Spartan army, which
constituted the heavy infantry : well-trained and densely massed for the war.
3.
Hypaspists.
These soldiers were not heavily armed and as such could move rapidly; had
shorter spears, longer swords lighter armours.
Their number was about 3,000 but could rise up to twice as many if the
need did arise.
4.
Phalans.
The soldiers of this variety wore a helmet, a breast plate and two long curved
plates protecting the thighs, but not covering the hip.As they marched, there emerged
a scenario of a gigantic porcupine or a
moving forest of glittering steel points. There were probably seven battalions
of such soldiers.
5.
Infantry.
According to one historical record, Alexander had 15,000 infantry with him.
6.
Cavalry.
Their number is estimated to be 5, 3000, divided into two regiments.
7.
Elephants.
As elephants also played a major role in showing the strength of the army,
Alexander had eightysix elephants of war, entrusted to Ambhi, the king of
Taxila. However, historians have not shown any role of these elephants in the
battle of Jhelum.
8.
Machines.
The war machines used at that time were primitive and were operated only in ground battles. Alexander is said to
be having machines called balists and
catapults, worked by the hand to throw stones and darts upto a distance of 300
yards.
In the Battle of
Jhelum, Alexander is also believed to have received the support of 5.000 soldiers provided to him by Raja Ambhi of Taxila.
The
Army of Maharaja Porus, a Sabharwal Kshatriya, at the time of the Battle of Jhelum
was a good match against the military forces of Alexander.
It is worth mentioning here that the people of the Punjab were tall and sturdy and had to continuously
prepare themselves for war against foreign invaders who continued to come
because it was then an easier gateway to India.
It may also be mentioned that though
to fight was the duty of Kshatriyas, people of other clans, too, became
soldiers. Kautilya stipulated that army must consist of camels and asses to
operate in dry weather on non-marshy ground. As regards soldiers, they had to
be recruited from various tribes like maula, the kinsmen and followers of the
king, bhrto, i.e. mercenary soldiers, sreni, who belonged to various warrior
clans and lived by the profession of arms, mitrabala, these were supplied by the allies, amitrabala, this
variety of soldiers was recruited from the enemy country
and lastly there was one more variety
called atavibala belonging to forest and aboriginal tribes.
In spite of the fact that the supply
of soldiers came from various clans and tribes, those belonging to the Kshatriya
clan were considered the best and the toughest .
The Hindu kings of the ancient
period of history were the followers of the scriptures and also the messages of
the epics. The Vedic Text talked of only
two types of military force, infantry (patti) and chariotry (rathins). The epics wanted this force to consist of
infantry, chariotry, cavalry and elephantry. Not only this there was also a
prescription for adding chariots, ships, spies, commissariat and scouts, a
parallel of local scouts. This type of combination was called eight-limbed.
The
army of Maharaja Porus consisted of infantry, chariots, cavalry and elephants.
Further details are as follows
According to Diodoros, Maharaja Porus
had an army of 50, 000 foot soldiers, about 3,000 horses, above 1,000 chariots
and 130 elephants. His army acted under
a unified command ,fought under one banner marked by the figure of God whom the
Greeks called Hercules, and who was identified in India with Vishnu and Ganesha.
The above strength of the army of
the Maharaja was sufficient. Resources, men, ammunition, guidance of able
commanders, were enough and there was proper cohesion and correlation among the
various parts of the army.
Further, the working of the army
involved creation of a definite hierarchy of officers. Fifty horses and 10
elephants formed a squadron under the command of a padika.
A company under a senapati consisted
of 2,000 foot soldiers, 100 chariots, 500 horses and 100 elephants. A regiment comprised 20,000 foot soldiers,
1,000 chariots, 5,000 horses and 1000 elephants. They functioned under a general called
nayaka.
The entire infantry had a special
officer called Pattyadhyaksa. To keep
such a force operative, a war-office, consisting of an elaborate bureaucratic
set-up was also put in place and it was given adequate financial support to
carry out its activities.
The infantry commanded by Maharaja Porus was the best, highly motivated
and far superior to those of the infantry of other kings. It was capable of campaigning on all kinds of
terrain and in all kinds of weather. The personnel of this infantry carried
big-sized bows as long as themselves.
Their arrows were nearly three yards in length and were tipped with bone
or iron. Their shorts were so irresistible
that they succeeded in breaking even the shields, breastplates and other strong
defences of the enemy.
The Chariots as
Kautilya said in his writings were used for the protection of the army,
repelling the enemy’s attacks, seizing and changing positions during
operations, restoring broken arrays and columns, and breaking the compact lines
of the enemy as also frightening and inspiring awe among the solders by their magnificence
and sound. The standard dimension of each chariot was 7.5 feet in height and 9
feet in width.
The cavalry of
Maharaja Porus was mainly employed to supervise the discipline of the army,
their alignment of columns and lines protection, etc. It gave preference to the
horses of Sindhu, Kamboja and Balhika country. Archers frequently used these
horses along with camels and elephants.
The elephants of war of Maharaja Porus used to march in the front,
moving without roads, shelters and landing places, penetrating through bushes
and shrubs, breaking through the lines and columns of the enemy, setting fire
to the enemy ‘s camp and quenching it in one’s own trunk , trampling and terrorizing the enemy as also destroying gates, towers, and ramparts.
Historians tell us that from the
time of the battle of Jhelum between Maharaja Porus and Alexander the Great in
326 B.C. to that of confrontation between Akbar’s general Munim Khan and the
Pathan Sultan of Bengal Daud Khan Karrani, the charge of the elephants remained
irresistible and the deciding factor in all these cases was the presence of elephants.
The Battle of Jhelum
The Battle of Jhelum is the most
important event in the life history of
our beloved Maharaja Porus who took pride in his ancient lineage, going back to
the Vedic age. It is unfortunate that
his contemporary King Ambhi was not so loyal to his motherland as he was. Ambhi, the King of Taxila, became a generous host of the invader Alexander the Great and
helped him in many ways which upset and embarrassed Maharaja Porus.
It is rightly said by modern
historians that if Ambhi and Maharaja Porus had put a united front against
Alexander , the course of Indian history would have been different. Indeed , It would have created a lasting milestone in the annals of Indian nationalism as early as those ancient times.
Historians also highlight the fact that Maharaja Porus was extraordinarily brave, had
a majestic personality, was a true patriot who could never think of letting the foreigner
Alexander to claim sovereignty over his kingdom because of his (Alexander’s ) win-win past in other parts of
the world.
As we have already noted
Maharaja Porus had rejected the proposal sent by Alexander through his envoy Cleochares
that he should surrender and pay tribute
to him as some other rulers of the Punjab had done.
The only result could
therefore be a fierce fight between the two legendary heroes Alexander the
Great and Maharaja Porus, a Sabharwal Kshtriya who could not abandon his duty of
fighting back an aggressor and thus perform
his kingly dharma.
Though the details given by the writers of ancient history
about the outcome of the Battle of Jhelum differ, one fact is indisputable and
that is the battle started in the month of May 326 B.C. and was not over before
a period of two weeks.
According to one account
when Alexander learnt that the king of Abhisara was moving his forces to assist
Maharaja Porus, he planned to stop him
and deployed his troops on the
right bank of the river Jhelum where
roaring waters of the river did not allow him to fulfil his plan. The same
account further says that on the other side of the Jhelum Maharaja Porus had strategically positioned his troops. He
had resolved either to prevent Alexander from making the passage or to attack
him when crossing. As soon as Alexander
came to know about this development, he sent back his men to knock down the
boats to facilitate their transportation to the banks of the Jhelum where they were
to be re-assembled to cross the river.
Initially, luck was not on
the side of Alexander. Porus, in spite of standing alone amongst the cowardly
compatriots, displayed rare determination to confront Alexander, the foreign
invader, and did not bother about the consequences of his combative resolve.
According to Arrian,” the
army of Maharaja Porus consisted of 30,000 infantry, 4,000 cavalry, 300 chariots
and 200 elephants. The infantry was stationed in the centre and the elephants
had been placed in front to form a sort of massive well overshadowing the flood
of waters of the river. The cavalry protected the flanks, and in front of the
horsemen were positioned the chariots. It presented too frightening a sight to
the foreign incumbents to challenge the Indian army in a head-on collision.”
V.A.Smith observes “ It
was obvious that the horses of the cavalry, the army upon which the Macedonian commander
placed his reliance, could not be
induced to clamber up the bank of a flooded river in the face of a host of
elephants, and that some device for evading this difficulty had to be sought.” The only way out of this problem was a war of wits between
the antagonists to out bid the other.
What followed was a blank
period of no engagements between the armies of Alexander and Maharaja Porus. According
to Arrian Alexander decided to steel a passage by making deceptive
demonstrations of his army units in the main camp on the opposite side of the
battle formations of Porus to keep them on their toes. Arrian further adds that
Alexander also camouflaged his
intentions and movements by leaving a strong force under Krateros in the main
camp and another with general Meleager midway between it and the place where
the river was to be crossed. Besides
this, a large number of boats, duly tagged and roped spread them on water to form an instant
bridge, had also been moved to the site secretly. This strategy enabled
Alexander to cross the river with about 11,000 selected horsemen by the bridge
of boats unnoticed by Maharaja Porus.
Maharaja Porus was
amazed at this development. His son with a force of 2,000 horses and 120
chariots could not achieve any success and contrarily got overpowered. There
was hardly any time available to Maharaja Porus to regroup his army for the
final assault. Nature, too, was not on his side. . Rain harmed him by making
the war field slippery, hindering the movements of men, horses, elephants and of advance guards.
Several historians
believe that Maharaja Porus made the
mistake of allowing Alexander’s soldiers to take the offensive with their
superior cavalry. The Indian charioteers and horseman could not stand the
onslaught of the mounted archers in the ranks of the Greeks. The Indian
infantry could no t make an effective use of their formidable weapons because the ground under their feet was
slippery. No doubt that the elephants did for some time cause havoc in the
enemy’s ranks, but a good many of them also got maddened by wounds and trampled friends
and foes alike.
The grandest scenario of
this situation was that Maharaja Porus
did not pull himself out of the battle ground and kept on fighting on a mighty
elephant until he got inflicted with a serious wound.
He was then produced
before Alexander whom we will not call a victor as he has been done in the past by many a
writer, Indian as well Greek and European. However we would like to reproduce here
that famous dialogue in which Alexander asked Maharaja Porus how he would like
to be treated and the Maharaja replied: As
a King treats another King.
Alexander agreed and by
treating the gallant Maharaja Porus generously gave him back his kingdom.
Ancient history tells us that after
the battle of Jhelum, Alexander
conquered some petty principalities and tribal territories in the adjacent
areas of the Pauravs. He also went
beyond the rivers Chenab and Ravi,and moved on to present Gurdaspur district,
and the Beas river. One of the accounts says that he “erected twelve towering
altars to mark the utmost limit of his march,. And then with a heavy heart
retraced his steps to the Jhelum.”
While Alexander was
returning to his native land there were skirmishes between his soldiers and the
local tribes in which thousands of men lost their lives and a large number of
women threw themselves into flames in
the style of the Rajputs who preferred death to dishonor and performed the ceremony,
which later on came to be known as Jauhar.
As nemesis would have
it, Alexander himself got wounded during his assault on a powerful tribe of the
Malwa region.
A large part of
Alexander’s tired soldiers started moving out of India through Afghanistan.
Some treaded through the deserts of Baluchistan, and facing many hurdles
reached Babylon. Some returned by the sea routé of the Tigris.
The end of Alexander’s
life was not far off. After returning to
Babylon, he did not survive for a long time and breathed his last in 323 B.C.
at the age of 32.
As a footnote, we would
like to add that new researchers are finding some amazing facts which do not
agree with the conventional ones but they are yet to be documented in text
books.
