chhatrapti Shivaji Maharaj

Borth Diad Borth Place Father Mother Religion
19 February 1630 3 April 1680 (aged 50) Shivneri Fort, Shivneri Shahaji Jijabai Hinduism

The Great Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj is considered to be one of the greatest warriors of his time and even today, stories of his exploits are narrated as a part of the folklore.The Great Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj had inspiring and endearing personality which spontaneously commanded respect, loyalty and the highest sacrifices from his devoted soldiers and peasants. Chhatrapati Shivaji Maharaj was also the staunch promoter of secularism and roused the sleeping conscience of the nation. He was the ultimate man of the father of freedom movement in Maharashtra and source of inspiration to the Hindu throughout India.


Shivaji Bhosle was born on February 19, 1630 to Shahaji Bhosle and Jijabai in the fort of Shivneri, near the city of Junnar of the Pune district. Shivajiâ's father Shahaji was in service of the Bijapuri Sultanate - a tripartite association between Bijapur, Ahmednagar, and Golconda, as a general. He also owned a Jaigirdari near Pune. Shivaji's mother Jijabai was the daughter of Sindkhed leader Lakhujirao Jadhav and a deeply religious woman. Shivaji was especially close to his mother who instilled in him a strict sense of right and wrong. Since Shahaji spent most of his time outside of Pune, the responsibility of overseeing Shivajiâ's education rested on the shoulders of a small council of ministers which included a Peshwa (Shamrao Nilkanth),a Mazumdar (Balkrishna Pant), a Sabnis (Raghunath Ballal), a Dabir (Sonopant) and a chief teacher (Dadoji Konddeo). Kanhoji Jedhe and Baji Pasalkar were appointed to train Shivaji in military and martial arts. Shivaji was married to Saibai Nimbalkar in 1640. Shivaji Maharaj turned out to be a born leader from a very young age. By the age of 16, Shivaji Maharaj managed to gather a band of fiercely loyal Maratha men and set about conquering nearby lands. Their first triumph was the capture of Torna Fort of the Bijapur Kingdom. By 1647 he had captured Kondana and Rajgad forts and had control of much of the southern Pune region. In a bid to contain Shivaji, Adil Shah sent Afzal Khan, an experienced veteran general along with an army of 40,000 men to destroy Shivaji Maharaj. Afzal Khan tried to kill him in a private meeting, but Shivaji was on his guard. He killed Afzal Khan with his bakhna and destroyed Bijapur army. The King of Bijapur made peace with him. Shivajiâ's conflicts with the Bijapuri Sultanate and his continuous victories brought him under the radar of Mughal Emperor Aurangzeb. Aurangzeb saw him as a threat to expansion of his imperial intent and concentrated his efforts on eradicating the Maratha threat. Confrontations began in 1957, when Shivajiâ's generals raided and looted Mughal territories near Ahmednagar and Junnar. However, Aurangzebâ's retaliation was thwarted by arrival of rainy season and battle for succession back in Delhi. Aurangzeb directed Shaista Khan, Governor of Deccan and his maternal uncle, to subdue Shivaji. Shaista Khan launched a massive attack against Shivaji, capturing several forts under his control and even his capital Poona. Shivaji retaliated back by launching a stealth attack on Shaista Khan, eventually injuring him and evicting him from Poona. Shaista Khan later arranged multiple attacks on Shivaji, severely reducing his holds of forts in the Konkan region. To replenish his depleted treasury, Shivaji attacked Surat, an important Mughal trading center and looted the Mughal wealth. An infuriated Aurangzeb sent his chief general Jai Singh I with an army of 150,000. The Mughal forces made considerable dent, sieging forts under Shivajiâ's control, extracting money and slaughtering soldiers in their wake. Shivaji agreed to come to an agreement with Aurangzeb to prevent further loss of life and the Treaty of Purandar was signed between Shivaji and Jai Singh on June 11, 1665. Shivaji agreed to surrender 23 forts and pay a sum of 400000 as compensation to the Mughal Empire. Aurangzeb invited Shivaji to Agra with an aim to use his military prowess to consolidate Mughal empires in Afghanistan. Shivaji travelled to Agra with his eight year old son Sambhaji and was offended by Aurangzebâ's treatment of him. He stormed out of the court and an offended Aurangzeb placed him under house arrest. But Shivaji once again used his wit and cunning to escape the imprisonment. He feigned severe illness and arranged for baskets of sweets to be sent to temple as offerings for prayer. He disguised as one of the carriers and hid his son in one of the baskets, and escaped on August 17, 1666. In subsequent times, Mughal and Maratha hostilities were pacified to a large extent by constant mediation through Mughal Sardar Jaswant Singh. Peace lasted till 1670, after which Shivaji launched an all-out offense against the Mughals. He recovered most of his territories sieged by the Mughals within four months. Shivaji died at the age of 52 on April 3, 1680, at the Raigad Fort, after suffering from a bout of dysentery. A conflict of succession arose after his death between his eldest son Sambhaji and his third wife Soyrabai on behalf of her 10-year old son Rajaram. Sambhaji dethroned the young Rajaram and ascended the throne himself on June 20, 1680.the Mughal-Maratha conflicts continued after Shivaji’s death and the Maratha glory declined greatly. However it was reclaimed by young Madhavrao Peshwa who reclaimed Maratha glory and established his authority over North India.

  1. Find a proper mentor: Life lesson to learn from Shivaji Maharaj Shri. Chatrapati Shivaji Maharaj had 3 mentors in his life. His mother, who taught him life lessons, which made him a Gentlemen. Dadoji Kondadev, who taught him all skills required for war like how to use weapons, etc. Ramdas Swami, who was a spiritual mentor to Shri. Chatrapati Shivaji Maharaj. This is the first lesson to learn from Shivaji Maharaj. Finding a proper mentor is like finding a diamond. Proper mentor will know you deeply and will help you to work on your weaknesses & foster strength. Right mentor will help you find proper strategy & will guide you to set & accomplish your goal.
  2. Respect every single woman: Societal lesson to learn from Shivaji Maharaj Once, one soldier from Shri. Chatrapati Shivaji Maharaj’s army brought the daughter in law of their rival after winning over them in a battle. He then introduce her to Shri. Chatrapati Shivaji Maharaj. But what Shri. Chatrapati Shivaji Maharaj did was worth remembering for ages. Instead of keeping that women in her cage, he asked for forgiveness on behalf of his soldier & gave her clothes & jewellery and sent her back to her troupe. Shri. Chatrapati Shivaji Maharaj used to give death as punishment to the persons for harassing women. Nowadays, we see how women are insecure in this world. Women harassment is increasing day by day. It’s becoming a daily habit to watch or read somewhere about women harassment. This is really very shameful for all of us as a human being. It’s our responsibility to protect women. We consider women as Goddess, still some of us choose to harass them. Doesn’t it lower our own value? A nation’s greatness is measured by considering how the people treat every other being present over there. But unfortunately, people are harassing people, so treating other beings well is far away. We must take some considerations in our mind regarding women. We should respect them. To value women, our mentality should be changed. Because, after all it all depends on our mentality. We do what we think in our mind. Our mentality should be change then only we can respect women.
  3. Intelligence is greater than power: In every war, Shri. Chatrapati Shivaji Maharaj had proved that intelligence is always few steps ahead of power. Shri. Chatrapati Shivaji Maharaj had used intelligence prior, & more than power every time no matter whether it was war, agreement or politics. We must use our intelligence in doing anything. Intelligence starts its working too prior than the power does. It helps us achieve those things which are beyond our sight. Intelligence administrate the power. We cannot achieve any of our goal without intelligence. Even power games like wrestling, boxing needs intelligence to make strategies & planning.
  4. Respect every religion: Shri. Chatrapati Shivaji Maharaj never did discrimination between castes, religion. He was against the caste system. He is well known for building Maratha Empire. It was greatest Hindu Empire. He build it to save Hindu religion from attacks of other Muslim empires. But he never hated Muslim religion. He neither hated any religion. He welcomed every religion in Maratha Empire. One Muslim was the leader of one of his arm force. What are we experiencing nowadays? It’s about religious war, caste discrimination, racism. The nation cannot be built if any one of these three problem is there. Nation needs peace, indiscrimination, and respect for all religion, all being in order to achieve happiness. The nation is not safe if any discrimination occurs. People must feel safe. Everyone loves their own religion, but that doesn’t mean one should hate other religion. Instead of hatred, we should foster “Unity in Diversity” culture. This is best Societal lesson to learn from Shivaji Maharaj.
  5. Be aware & prepare yourself for every battle: Best life lesson to learn from Shivaji Maharaj Shri. Chatrapati Shivaji Maharaj saw his father for first time when he was 9 years old. He took oath for building Maratha Empire at the age of 15. His 1st wife Queen Saeebai passed away too soon when their son was 2 years old. Afzal Khan (Adil Shahi dynasty) came for war, holding purpose of killing Shri. Chatrapati Shivaji Maharaj, when Maharaj was only 29. Shri. Chatrapati Shivaji Maharaj was in Mughals custody, but ran away from there with great intelligence. Exactly 11 days after coronation, mother of Shri. Chatrapati Shivaji Maharaj passed away. These are just selected incidents from Shri. Chatrapati Shivaji Maharaj’s life. There are a lot of such incidents happened in his whole life. His whole life was full of battles. Some were emotional, some were war, politics, etc. But, he never gave up. He was ready for every battle that came on his way. This is most important lesson we can learn from his life. Everyone must accept the fact that, we will have a lot of problems, emergencies, and stress in our way while achieving our goal, & we must be ready to fight these problems. We all need to make ourselves very determined for achieving goals no matter how big problems occurs on our way. We must have plans for each problem. Instead of giving up, we must take the charge and fight with such situations. It will make us strong. It will make us happier in the end. In the end when we will achieve our goals, we will realize that all those sacrifices, battles, hard works were worth it to win in life. As to conclude this, we can say that, life is full of struggles. But, we should not leave humanity behind to achieve personal growth. Everyone have to go along with the society. Everyone must respect every living being. We need to encourage ourselves to do our best to achieve our goal. We have to make sacrifices, we must not give up. Shri. Chatrapati Shivaji Maharaj taught humanity is greatest religion on earth. It should not be murdered. Respect every living being. These are the few life lessons from Shri. Chatrapati Shivaji Maharaj’s life. Indeed there are lot of lessons to learn from his life still these few are derived as a guiding tool for current situations. Click here to read more managerial & leadership lessons to learn from Shivaji Maharaj.
  6. Know everything about your competitor to win over them: Managerial lesson to learn from Shivaji Maharaj The best part of Shri. Chatrapati Shivaji Maharaj’s strategy was, he used to have deep & thorough knowledge of every opponent he was going to fight with. This made him derive his own strategy by considering strength & weaknesses of both own army & of opponent. Here’s how Shri. Chatrapati Shivaji Maharaj used intelligence more than power. In today’s world when we face our competitors whether it is business, sports, job, etc. we must know our competitor thoroughly. We should make SWOT analysis of both of us, competitor & derive our further strategies.