From Courtly Pleasure to Unseemly Passion: The Mastani Scandal at the Peshwa’s Court in Mid-Eighteenth-Century India

British officials who negotiated with them routinely marveled at the marvelous self-possession of the Maratha Brahmans even as they inveighed against their other courtierly qualities. The well-documented case of the Peśva Bajirao I’s infatuation with the accomplished Muslim courtesan Mastani gives an instance of the failure of such socialization. While such liaisons were expected, or even approved as part of the royal style, the unexpected emotional closeness of the two led serious tension and scandal among the Brahman community to which Bajirao belonged. The correspondence around the scandal also reveals a range of familial expectations and feelings not usually exposed in documents from this period. This paper will look at this episode to study the struggles of passions and proprieties in a courtly setting.