In spite of the efforts of Shivaji, his Empire did not last long. It was a military organisation like that of Rajit Singh and Alaud-Din Khilji and was destroyed within a decade of his death. There were many causes responsible for it some of them were follows:
Like Babur, the Reign of Shivaji was very short and throughout all this period he had to fight against the enemies and consequently he had no time to consolidate his position. The Maratha
Society was such as could be reformed by the patient and sustained efforts of selfless workers for years. There were constant disputes among the Marathas with regard to the distribution of Watan or hereditary land.
When Shivaji became supreme, he had to decide those cases and while doing so, he gave decisions against certain parties. These parties became his enemies and joined hands with his enemies. This fact gave a riot of trouble to Shivaji all his life.
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The large number of castes in Maharashtra in the 17th century also created dissensions among the Marathas and stood in the way of their solidarity. The Brahmins hated the non-Brahmins and were themselves sub-divided into Desh Brahmins, Konkan Brahmins and Chitpavan Brahmins. The Brahmins quarreled among themselves.
Moreover, the success of Shivaji brought about the supremacy of Hindu orthodoxy. The upper classes put emphasis on ceremonial purity, and this created a division between the rich and the poor. According to Jadunath Sarkar, “Shivaji’s political success sapped the main foundation of that success. In proportion as Shivaji’s ideal of a Hindu Swaraj was based on orthodoxy, it contained within itself the seed of its own death”.
According to Rabindra Nath Tagore, “A temporary enthusiasm sweeps over the country and we imagine that it has been united; but the rents and holes in our body social do their work secretly; we cannot retain any noble idea Song. Shivaji aimed at preserving the rents; he wished to save from Mughal attack a Hindu society to which ceremonial distinctions and isolation of castes are the very breath of life. He wanted to make this heterogeneous society triumphant over all India! He wove ropes of sand; he attempted the impossible.
It is beyond the power of any man, it is opposed to the divine law of the universe, to establish the Swaraj of such a caste-ridden, isolated, internally torn sect over a vast continent like India.” Moreover, no well-considered attempt was made to educate the people of Maharashtra and to improve their intellect and character. The ignorance of the masses was a great obstacle in the way of the success of the Maratha nation.
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To quote J.N. Sarkar, “There was no attempt at well-thought-out and communal improvement, spread of education or unification of the people, either under Shivaji or under the Peshwas. The cohesion of the people in the Maratha State was not organic but artificial, accidental and, therefore, /precarious. It was solely dependent on the ruler’s extraordinary personality and disappeared when the country ceased to produce supermen among its rulers.”
Moreover, I a government of personal discretion am uncertain and has a fatal effect on administration. “However well-planned the machinery and rules might be, the actual conduct of the administration was marred by inefficiency, sudden changes of personal and official corruption, because nobody felt secure of his post or of the due appreciation of his merit.”