Yamuna Bai
Yamuna Bai, d. 1814, Mahratha princess. One of the three widows of Mahadji Scindhia (d. 1794) she was involved, along with the other two in the bitter ‘widows war’ with his successor, Daulat Rao Scindhia. The war started in March 1798, when the widows threatened to march in force to Pune to appeal to the Peshwa for proper allowance which Daulat Rao had withheld. It temporarily ended in August 1799 when their terms were accepted, but it again erupted in January 1800, when she was stabbed by a hired assassin though she managed to survive. She along with Lakshmi Bai, another widow, sought refuge with Jaswant Rao Holkar of Indore, and the war ended by being engulfed into a bigger contest between Scindhia and Holkar which ultimately ended in the fall of the Mahratha independence.
