November 23rd, 1655.
Dakshin Bharatiya Empire, Arabian Sea, off the coast of Balochistan
Updated from freewёbnoνel.com.
Ten kilometres off the shore of Ormara Port in the region of Balochistan, a naval fleet commanded by Gangadhar was stationed. Fifty to sixty frigates, along with hundreds of sloops that could form multiple battle groups, could be seen stationed in this region like a pack of wolves before the start of the hunt.
As for why they were inactive on the waters of the Arabian Sea, it was because orders had yet to be received for the commencement of the battle.
Gangadhar was intently staring at the weird-looking ship in front of him, which had two hulls and masts with an unusual object made of glass and wood placed in the middle of it. He was waiting for a miracle that he was told would happen.
Early in the morning, Vijay boarded a frigate and set sail for the farthest corner of Bhuj, where the upper part of the Gulf of Kach meets the Arabian Sea. His aim was to establish a communication channel with the battlefield, as the number of available catamarans was insufficient for a connection from Karnavati or even Dwaraka.
Thus, after careful consideration of security measures, Vijay insisted that the chosen location be both the nearest and safest point to the region of Balochistan.
With all these matters considered, Vijay chose a place only 100 kilometres from the city of Bhuj, which was naturally blocked by hills in the north, preventing the Mughal forces in the region of Sindh from interfering with the communication channel if they found out.
The only problem with the place chosen by Vijay was that reaching the city from where he chose was very difficult due to the harsh terrain and the lack of roads. For this reason, Vijay had opted to take the naval route.
A temporary military camp was set up immediately at the chosen location to be the main transit station, and Vijay also named the place Narayan, remembering a town by that name in the upper reaches of the Gujarat coast, precisely where he was now in his past life.
It has been 17 days since Vijay ordered 500 Dhristi class catamarans, and since the deadline was four months, seventy catamarans have been produced in the last few weeks. Although these 70 catamarans could not be used as a coastal defensive wall across the western coast of the subcontinent, they could be used as a communication link between Narayan and Ormara.
The Drishti Class Catamarans were stationed seven kilometres apart from each other instead of the designed five kilometres because there were not enough ships to reach the port of Ormara, which was at least 400 to 450 kilometres from Dwarka, much less the farther Karnavati which wasn’t even a coastal city.
Thankfully, due to clear skies and sunny weather, the range of heliograph was increased, making the heliograph communication between Gujarat and Balochistan possible with only 70 ships.
The Dhristi class catamarans, all 70 of them, soon took their positions from the area of the military camp at Narayan to the port of Karachi, serving as the relay station, and finally to the port of Ormara, which is the intended destination.
While this channel is already established, in the span of the next few weeks, more catamarans will be constructed, which will be used to extend this network to the port of Gwadar and then to the port city of Makran.
This would achieve information transfer over distances of 500 to 600 kilometres or more within a few hours at most and a few minutes at least, significantly increasing the speed of information transfer between locations and enhancing the military’s situational awareness.
*Klink Klink Klink*
Using the stakes, the heliograph was carefully installed on the wooden tower that had been constructed in the military camp of Narayan, which would act as the transmission and receiver tower for heliograph communication.
The tower is 80 meters in height, constructed from the strong timber of the Banyan tree, which is already one of the tallest naturally growing trees in Bharat, with a maximum height of 24 meters.
With the device installed, the technician wiped his head with a towel and swiftly adjusted the mirror so that its light would hit the catamaran stationed seven kilometres across the Arabian Sea.
On the ship named BNV Communication Ship 1, upon seeing the beam of light that was shot towards them, the heliograph operators and notekeepers quickly understood the intention. They made adjustments to their own ship, aligning the heliograph to pass the light beam to the next ship seven kilometres away, which had already crossed the border of Gujarat.
This process was repeated 68 more times until the final catamaran at the coast of the port of Ormara received the signal. Gangadhar, alerted by the beam of light in the distance, got up from his seat and eagerly awaited the first communication as he clenched the railing of the battleship he was on in anticipation.
The operator at the BNV Communication Ship 70 stationed at Ormara responded to the beam of light as per protocol, rapidly opening and closing the blinds of the heliograph to confirm the establishment of the connection. Observing this blinking effect, the BNV Communication Ship 69 which was 7 km away from Ship 70, followed suit, mirroring the action.
This initiated a domino effect, with all the ships in the communication channel rapidly blinking the heliograph at each other. Finally, with supersonic speeds the beam reached the signal tower at Narayan, the origin point of the signal.
Both Vijay and Gangadhar, who were intently staring at the heliograph at both ends of the connection 450 kilometres apart, were very pleased with the positive response of the heliograph.
In preparation for the final test, Vijay, remembering the conversation he had with Gangadhar, quickly wrote down the Kumar code (Morse code) on a piece of paper and handed it to the operator. The operator then began to input the code into the heliograph, sending out a sequence of dots and dashes at varied intervals.
This code immediately zoomed through the 70 catamarans within an hour and was immediately received by the last ship at Ormara Port.
seeing this, "Whoa!" cheers broke out with the successful transmission of the signal within the crew, and Gangadhar, who was the one with the most anticipation, quietly sat down on his seat with a large smile on his face. Even his eyes were filled with joy. In this joy, he did not even scold his crew who were acting out of order.
A few minutes later, his decrypter, who had received the Kumar code report from the notekeeper, immediately converted the Kumar code to Bharati text, but there was a problem.
"XA5621 is the message I received, your Excellency. Could there be any mistake somewhere?" The decryptor asked with a hint of doubt, feeling that there might be a problem with the communication system as these words were illegible.
Contrary to his belief, the smile on Gangadhar’s face did not fade but widened as soon as he heard the words that travelled through the heliograph. He was beaming with excitement as he clenched his fist in joy.
How long did it take to receive this message? Five hours? Three hours? Two hours? Or maybe less? It was simply unimaginable, and no one had to travel from one place to another for this message to arrive, thanks to the ingenious design of His Majesty and the miracle of the light.
Despite understanding the principle, Gangadhar still had trouble wrapping his head around this new device. Just a few days ago, a clipper was the fastest method for news to travel, and even that would take 10 to 12 hours to reach the port of Mumbai from the city of Karnavati. And now he received the message within an hour. How could this not heavily question his worldview?
But still, he had to accept what he witnessed in front of him, The secret code, which only he and His Majesty had discussed prior to dispatching from Mumbai, was now right in front of him, in his own hands, and it could be no coincidence.
Hence, he accepted the technology and its ability to communicate at a very fast speed for what it is worth.
Then Coming out of his disbelief, remembering the decryptor’s question, he shook his head and responded, "There is nothing wrong with the message; it is as intended."
Hearing the answer given by His Excellency, the admiral, and seeing his confident face, the decryptor let go of his worry and went to his quarters until the task called for him again.
Gangadhar then sent a code, which was his confirmation about the receiving of the signal. "Encryptor, send the code XA3312." The encryptor, although not understanding what these random collections of words and numbers meant, immediately did his duty and converted these Bharati words into Kumar code and sent it through the heliograph.
In a similar fashion, Vijay received the code, thereby finally confirming the establishment of the connection.
Vijay had a smile on his face as he, for the first time, issued the actual military orders: "Start the operation. Long live Bharat."
Upon receiving the message, the Admiral immediately mobilized the fleet and set sail. The fleet split into two separate battle groups, one heading towards Gwadar and Makran, and the other proceeding to land on the coast of Ormara. This time, the fleet acted as transportation ships, carrying 60,000 troops.
These 60,000 troops were actually those who had participated in the Battle of Gujarat and were stationed there. in the meantime, In their place, 60,000 troops commanded by Kiran Poojari, who stood guard at the Northern Defense Frontier, were arranged to be stationed at Gujarat.
In place of the 60,000 troops missing from the Northern Frontier, the police force, which had completed half of its recruitment training of fifty thousand officers out of the hundred thousand, filled in for the 60,000 police officers who moved to the front lines as defensive soldiers.
Overall, although there was still a shortage of police within the Empire, in case of emergency, Vijay had ordered Vinod, the Prime Minister, to establish neighbourhood defence forces composed of civilians to maintain order in each town. To prevent these neighbourhood defence forces from becoming too ambitious, Vijay ordered that they should not be allowed to use any weapons, only batons.
With this, the Empire utilized the maximum human resources available without resorting to drastic measures.
As a recap, before the Battle of Gujarat started, the empire had 216,000 troops. Out of these, 80,000 went to the Gujarat battlefield, 96,000 were stationed at the Northern Defense Frontier, and 40,000 were stationed in the Ahom kingdom.
After the Gujarat battle, considering the 8,000 soldiers who died in battle and the 7,146 soldiers who died due to injury, the remaining strength of the Gujarat Army was 64,854, which is a reduction of 19%.
Similarly, out of the 96,000 troops at the Northern Defense Frontier, accounting for the 12,000 who died in battle and the 11,651 who died of injury, there are 72,349 soldiers who are battle-ready, which is still a reduction of 24% of combat strength from before.
Finally, the troops stationed in the Ahom kingdom remained relatively unchanged, as they were not required to migrate to another battlefront.
Under Yogendra Singh, who commanded 40,000 troops, the casualties included 3,000 deaths during battle and 3,467 due to injury, 33,533 troops were left as combat-ready forces, which is a reduction of 16.16%.
Unfortunately, these troops were not enough to resist the heightened combat readiness of the Mughal Empire in the Bengal region With the new mobilisation of Mughal groups stationed in the Bengal Region.
Unfortunately, due to Bengal not being the main target, the Empire could not shift its resources to the Ahom Frontier. At the same time, This information should not be known to the Mughal Empire. Therefore, the Ahom kingdom was requested to take on this burden by employing 20,000 more troops from their end.
Out of the 50,000 troops Ahoms had before the battle, only 38,256 survived after casualties by the cause of war, injuries, and diseases. These remaining troops are still stationed at the border, being combat-ready at all times.
Along with these 38,256 soldiers of the Ahoms, adding the 33,533 Bharatiya soldiers and 20,000 new soldiers employed by the Ahom kingdom, the strength of the Ahom Defense Frontier should be able to resist the aggression of the Mughal Empire from the region of Bengal with 90,000 troops.