PINDARIS  , a word of uncertain origin, applied to the irregular horsemen who accompanied the Mahratta armies in

India (luring the 18th century when the Mughal Empire was breaking up; loosely organized under self-chosen leaders, each band was usually attached to one or other of the great Mahratta chieftains . Their special characteristic was that they received no pay, but rather purchased the privilege of plundering on their own account . The majority of them seem to have been Mahommedans: when the regular forces of the Mahrattas had been broken up in the campaigns conducted by Sir Arthur Wellesley and Lord Lake in 1802-04, the Pindaris made their headquarters in Malwa, under the tacit protection of Sindhia and Holkar . They were accustomed to assemble every year at the beginning of November, and sally forth into British territory in search of plunder . In one such raid upon the Masulipatam coast they plundered 339 villages, killing or wounding 682 persons, torturing 3600 and carrying off property worth a quarter of a million . In 1808-09 they plundered Gujarat, and in 1812 Mirzapur . In 1814 they were reckoned at 25,000 to 30,000 horsemen, half of them well armed . At last the evil became intolerable, and in1817 the marquess of Hastings obtained the consent of the East India Company to the organized campaign, known as the Pindari War . The Pindaris were surrounded on all sides by a great army, consisting of 120,000 men and 300 guns, which converged upon them from Bengal, the Deccan and Gujarat under the supreme command of Lord Hastings in person . Sindhia was overawed and forced to sign the treaty of Gwalior, consenting to aid in the extirpation of the Pindaris, whom he had hitherto protected . The Peshwa at Poona, the Bhonsla raja at Nagpur and the army of the infant Holkar each took up arms, but were separately defeated . The Pindaris themselves offered little opposition .

Amir Khan, by far their most powerful leader, accepted the conditions offered to him; and his descendant is now Nawab of the state of Tonk in Rajputana . The rest surrendered or were hunted down, the fate of Chitu, one of the most notorious, being to perish in a tiger's den . These military operations were followed by the pacification of Central India under the administration of Sir John Malcolm . See J . Grant Duff, History of the Mahrattas (1826) ; and Major Ross of Bladensburg, Marquess of Hastings (Rulers of India Series) (1893) .