The First Fort — Torna

A promise is a beautiful thing — but a promise must be kept. Last night, in the hidden temple, the boys swore to build swarajya. Tonight they take their very first real step out of dreaming and into doing: they win a fort of solid stone.

High on a mountain south-west of Pune stood an old, giant fort — the tallest hill-fort in all the region, so huge that people came to call it Prachandagad, "the massive fort." Its older name was Torna. And in 1646, when Shivaji was still only about sixteen, he and his Mavlas took it. Now — pause and think about how daring that was. This fort belonged to the Sultan of Bijapur. To walk in and take it was to say, out loud and for everyone to hear, "this land is ours now." It was their very first fort, and the first solid brick of swarajya.

The old stories tell a wonderful tale about what happened next: while the men were repairing the crumbling walls, they dug up a hidden pot of gold coins — buried treasure! (Is it true? We cannot be sure — it's a beloved legend more than a proven fact — but it is a lovely story, and Rajgad certainly did get built.) With gold and grit and stubborn work, Shivaji strengthened Torna, and then, on a nearby peak, he built up a mighty new fortress of his own: Rajgad, "the king's fort," with its great stone bastions and three broad shoulders of rock. Rajgad would be his home and his capital for the next twenty-six years — longer than any other place he ever ruled from.

Rajgad was not just a fort — it was a whole city in the mountains. It had three great machis — long, broad shoulders of rock, each walled for defence — named Padmavati, Sanjivani and Suvela, and at the very top stood the citadel, the Balekilla. Up there were a palace, a temple to the goddess, water tanks and granaries, and room enough for thousands of people. Building a town that high, on such sheer and wild ground, was an enormous task! But Shivaji was not only a fighter; he was a fine builder and planner too — and he began all of this before he had even turned twenty.

But something even more remarkable happened around this very same time — and it reaches all the way back to a secret we planted on the night he was born.

Do you remember the thin crescent moon over Shivneri, and Jijabai's wish that swarajya would grow like it? Well, the young Shivaji now made himself a royal seal — a Rajmudra — to stamp on his letters and orders, the way a king puts his mark on his commands. And around the edge of that seal, in beautiful Sanskrit, he had these words carved:

"प्रतिपच्चंद्रलेखेव वर्धिष्णुर्विश्ववंदिता, शाहसूनोः शिवस्यैषा मुद्रा भद्राय राजते""Like the crescent moon of the first night — ever-growing, honoured by the world — this seal of Shahaji's son Shivaji shines for the good of the people."

There it was — the crescent moon of his birth-night, turned into his very own royal mark! And read the words again, because they are a tiny promise all by themselves: the seal does not say "bow before me." It says the rule will keep growing, that it is honoured by the world, and that it shines for the good of the people. Even his stamp was about service, not showing off.

And here is the boldest part of all. In those days, every royal seal in the Deccan was written in Persian, the grand court-language of the sultans. But this sixteen-year-old deliberately chose Sanskrit, written in the Devanagari letters of his own land. It was a quiet, dazzling act of courage — like announcing, without shouting a single word: this rule belongs to this soil, and to its own people.

And this is not just a story — historians can hold the proof in their hands. Shivaji's oldest surviving letter carrying this very seal is dated January 1646 — the same season he was taking Torna. So the fort and the seal arrived together, both saying the same brave thing at once: swarajya has begun.

And with that, our first act is complete. Look how far we have come in six nights: the dream was born (Swarajya), the dreamer was named (Shivaji), he was taught (by Jijau), he found his brothers (the Mavlas), he swore the oath (Raireshwar) — and now, tonight, the dream is planted in stone and stamped in Sanskrit. A boy has become a builder of forts. Tomorrow, a new act begins, and the young lion starts, at last, to roar.

But before we go, look at that seal once more. Persian was the language of the sultans' courts and of their power — to make your seal in Persian was to say, "I am one of them." To choose Sanskrit, in Devanagari, was to declare, "I am different; this kingdom belongs to this soil, this language, this people." Without drawing a single sword, through one small seal, he showed tremendous courage. That is why tonight's coin is not just a stamp — it is the first official announcement of a free dream.

Torna and Rajgad still stand tall in the Sahyadri today, and thousands of people climb them every year. Stand on one of Rajgad's three machis and you understand at once: from here, a young man ran a whole swarajya. And in 2025 the whole world recognised their worth, when twelve great Maratha forts — Rajgad among them — were inscribed together as a UNESCO World Heritage Site. On the foundation a sixteen-year-old laid, the whole world now looks on in admiration.

Goodnight — tonight's badge: the Rajmudra, the crescent-moon seal that grows.