Qualla: Second Battle of Panipat

Second Battle of Panipat: Introduction

Wed, 25 Mar 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit 1602-03 artist, Public domain. Twenty-two battles without a single defeat. That was Hemchandra's record when he rode his war elephant Hawai onto the plains of Panipat on November 5, 1556. Born to humble circumstances in Rewari, he had risen from market trader to chief minister, from chief minister to commanding general, and finally to self-crowned emperor -- taking the ancient title Vikramaditya after seizing Delhi just weeks earlier. Across the field stood an army nominally led by a thirteen-year-old boy named Akbar, whose guardian Bairam Khan had done the real work of marshaling the Mughal forces. The flat, sun-baked ground between them had already hosted one battle that shaped an empire thirty years before. It was about to host another.

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Image: 1602-03 artist | Public domain

Second Battle of Panipat: An Empire in Pieces

Wed, 25 Mar 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit DEMIS Mapserver, पाटलिपुत्र (talk), CC BY-SA 3.0. The roots of the battle reach back to 1540, when Sher Shah Suri chased the Mughal emperor Humayun out of India and established the Sur Empire. Sher Shah proved a formidable ruler, but his death in 1545 at Kalinjar set the dynasty on a downward slide. His successor Islam Shah held...

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Image: DEMIS Mapserver, पाटलिपुत्र (talk) | CC BY-SA 3.0

Second Battle of Panipat: The Guns That Never Arrived

Wed, 25 Mar 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Ramesh lalwani, CC BY-SA 3.0. Akbar and Bairam Khan marched south to reclaim Delhi, but they caught a stroke of fortune before the battle even began. Ali Quli Khan Shaibani, sent ahead with ten thousand cavalry, stumbled upon Hemchandra's artillery train moving under a weak guard. The Afghan escorts abandoned...

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Image: Ramesh lalwani | CC BY-SA 3.0

Second Battle of Panipat: Elephants Against Arrows

Wed, 25 Mar 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Gagangaurav14, CC BY-SA 3.0. Hemchandra opened the battle aggressively, loosing his war elephants against both flanks of the Mughal line. The initial charge was terrifying -- armored beasts crashing through cavalry formations -- but the Mughal soldiers who survived the rampage did not retreat. Instead, they ...

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Image: Gagangaurav14 | CC BY-SA 3.0

Second Battle of Panipat: One Arrow, One Empire

Wed, 25 Mar 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Kankar, Public domain. Hemchandra pressed his advantage, moving his elephants and cavalry forward to crush the Mughal center. He was, by most accounts, on the verge of victory. Then a Mughal arrow -- fired by no one in particular, aimed at no one in particular -- struck him in the eye. He collapsed unc...

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Image: Kankar | Public domain

Second Battle of Panipat: What Remained at Panipat

Wed, 25 Mar 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Sudhirkbhargava, CC BY-SA 3.0. Hemchandra's head was sent to Kabul and displayed outside the Delhi Darwaja. His body was gibbeted at a gate in Purana Quila, the same fortress where he had crowned himself barely a month before. His patron Adil Shah Suri was defeated and killed by a rival in April 1557, ending a...

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Image: Sudhirkbhargava | CC BY-SA 3.0