हिंदीOn this day
Photo: Ankur P · CC BY-SA 2.0
Warrior

Baji Prabhu Deshpande

Held the pass while Shivaji reached Vishalgad

d. 13 July 1660

Baji Prabhu, deshpande of Hirdas Maval, held the narrow pass of Ghod Khind with a few hundred Bandal men against the pursuing Bijapuri army on 13 July 1660, so that Shivaji could reach Vishalgad. He kept fighting until the guns from the fort told him his king was safe. The pass has been called Pavan Khind, the holy pass, ever since.

01From foe to sworn man

Baji Prabhu was a Chandraseniya Kayastha Prabhu who kept the records and revenue of Hirdas Maval for the Bandal Deshmukhs of Rohida. When Shivaji took Rohida, the Bandals and Baji Prabhu fought against him. Shivaji saw what kind of man he was, kept him on, and Baji Prabhu became one of his most trusted officers. He was well past his youth by 1660, a heavy, strong man with a reputation for the sword.

02The escape from Panhala

In March 1660 the Bijapur general Siddi Jauhar shut Shivaji up in Panhala. The siege ran through the monsoon. On the night of 12 July, the full moon of Ashadh, in heavy rain, Shivaji slipped out with about six hundred men towards Vishalgad, some sixty kilometres away. Tradition says a barber named Shiva Kashid, who looked like the king, went out by another gate in a palanquin to draw the enemy, and was killed when the trick was found out. By morning Siddi Masud’s horse was on the trail.

Panhala Fort
Place · c. 1178–1209, Shilahara king Bhoja II; later Bijapur and Maratha worksPanhala FortThe great Shilahara fort above Kolhapur, where Siddi Jauhar trapped Shivaji in 1660, and from which he slipped out on a rainy night while Baji Prabhu held the pass behind him.Read →

03Ghod Khind

At Ghod Khind, a gorge where only a few men could pass abreast, Baji Prabhu stopped with about three hundred Bandal Mavalas and sent Shivaji on. Through the morning of 13 July they threw back charge after charge. Baji Prabhu was wounded again and again and kept on his feet. His brother Phulaji fell beside him. When the signal guns sounded from Vishalgad, he is said to have died content. Shivaji had to cut through the Suryarao Surve blockade below the fort to get in.

Battles

Battle of Kolhapur

Seven weeks after Pratapgad, Bijapur sent a second army under Rustam Zaman and Afzal Khan’s son Fazal Khan. Shivaji met it in the open near Kolhapur and broke it.

28 December 1659 CE

Battle of Pavan Khind

Besieged in Panhala for months by Siddi Jauhar, Shivaji slipped out on a stormy night and made for Vishalgad. Baji Prabhu Deshpande stayed behind in a narrow pass to stop the pursuit.

13 July 1660 CE

Places

Panhala FortStanding
Cholas and the Southern Seas

Panhala Fort

The great Shilahara fort above Kolhapur, where Siddi Jauhar trapped Shivaji in 1660, and from which he slipped out on a rainy night while Baji Prabhu held the pass behind him.

Rohida Fort (Vichitragad)Ruined
The Mughal era and the resistance

Rohida Fort (Vichitragad)

The hill fort above Bhor that was the seat of the Bandal deshmukhs of Hirdas Maval. When Shivaji took it in 1656, the Bandals’ record-keeper Baji Prabhu Deshpande, who had fought against him, came into his service.

VishalgadRuined
The Mughal era and the resistance

Vishalgad

The Sahyadri fort Shivaji reached on the night of 13 July 1660 after escaping the siege of Panhala, while Baji Prabhu Deshpande held the pass at Ghodkhind behind him. The samadhis of Baji Prabhu and his brother Phulaji are on the fort.

Pavan KhindStanding
The Mughal era and the resistance

Pavan Khind

The narrow gorge, once called Ghod Khind, where Baji Prabhu Deshpande and his Bandal Mavalas held back the Bijapur pursuit on 13 July 1660 until Shivaji reached Vishalgad. Shivaji renamed it Pavan Khind, the hallowed pass.