182 THE FALL OF THE MOGHUL EMPIRE

two centuries of Moghul power, was too successful not to invite repetition, and upon the assassination of Nadir in 1747, Ahmad Shah, the chief of the Ab- dali tribe of Afghans, after founding a powerful king- dom at Kandahar, soon found his way into the Panjab. This first attempt was strenuously resisted in 1748, and the battle of Sirhind saw the Afghans driven back by Indian troops as they were never repulsed again; but Ahmad Shah did not abandon his design. The empire of Delhi was at its weakest; the old nizam was dead, and the factions at court were internecine. The new emperor, also named Ahmad, who succeeded Mohammad in 1748, was so sorely beset by the Rohillas that he, or rather his vizir Safdar Jang, nawab or viceroy of Oudh, the first to combine the offices of nawab and vizir, was reduced to the necessity of calling the Marathas to his aid. Holkar and Sindhia enabled the vizir to bring the Rohillas to submission, but the Deccan wolves indemnified themselves liberally for their help, by levying chauth throughout the conquered dis- tricts. Even Bengal had been forced to submit to their blackmail, and the Marathas were now in a position to dictate terms at Delhi. Indeed, the empire of Aurangzib had lost the power of resistance. Not a province of all the wide dominion that still nominally owned the Moghul 's sway was really under his control, except the upper Doab and a few districts about the Sutlaj. The Panjab was in the hands of the Afghans, Rafdar Jang was practically sovereign at Oudh and Allahabad, and Ali Verdi Khan held Bengal. Afghans