The Rashtrakutas and their Times c7.s1.5

c7.s1.5

It is no doubt true that a few records of the later Cālukya dynasty, viz., the Kauthem plates of Vikramāditya V(3), Yewoor(4) and Nilgunda(5) plates of Vikramāditya VI, and Sonavade(6) and Miraj(7) plates of Jayasiṃha refer to a Rāṣṭrakūṭa dynasty said to have flourished earlier than that of the Cālukyas of Badāmi. We are told in these records that after ruling for 59 generations at Ayodhyā, the Cālukyas migrated to the south and ruled there for 16 generations. Then their glory was eclipsed for a time owing to the ascendancy of the Rāṣṭrakūṭas. But soon there arose the valiant Jayasiṃha, who conquered the Rāṣṭrakūṭa king Indra, the son of Kṛṣṇa, and reestablished the fortunes of his family. If this version of history be true, no doubt we have evidence for the existence of a Rāṣṭrakūṭa dynasty, ruling prior to c. 500 A.D., somewhere in central Mahārāṣṭra or northern Karṇātak. But there is ample evidence to show that the defeat of the Rāṣṭrakūṭas, attributed in these records to Jayasiṃha, is not based upon any reliable tradition. In the first place, the records in question are full of mythological details; a Cālukya dynasty ruling for 59 generations at Ayodhyā is not known to sober history. The most conclusive reason, however, for ignoring the theory, that Jayasiṃha had really defeated a Rāṣṭrakūṭa king Indra in c. 500 A.D., is the fact that not a single record of the early Cālukyas of Badāmi refers to this incident. This silence will appear the more significant when we remember that the Cālukya records mention a number of petty rulers like the Kadambas, the Mauryas, the Naḷas etc., who were supplanted by the early rulers of the dynasty. It is inexplicable why the Cālukya rulers of Badāmi should have conspired to condemn to oblivion the most significant achievement of Jayasinha, whom they were claiming as the founder of their dynasty. Fleet's theory in this respect appears as the most plausible one; the defeat of Rāṣṭrakūṭa Indra, son of Kṛṣṇa, attributed to Jayasinha in c. 500 A.D., is probably due to the fact that the historians of the later Cālukyas, like some of their present-day successors, believed that history repeats itself. They knew that Taila II, the founder of the later Cālukya empire, had defeated Rāṣṭrakūṭa king, Indra IV, the (grand-) son of Kṛṣṇa III; they attributed an exactly similar feat to the founder of the early Cālukya dynasty as well. Coins of a king Kṛṣṇa have been discovered in the Central Provinces which seem to belong to a fairly early date. But there is nothing to connect the king Kṛṣṇa of the coins with Kṛṣṇa, the father of Indra, said to have been defeated by Jayasinha. The Kṛṣṇa of the coins may be perhaps the Kalachuri ruler Kṛṣṇarāja, whose grandson Budharāja was defeated by Mangaliśa. (8)