History of Orissa from the Earliest Times to the British Period v1.c30.2

v1.c30.2

The earlier period of the long reign of Pratāparudra was very favourable to the expansion of Orissa, as the imbecile Maḥmud was on the throne of Bidar and the five great Musalman monarchies of the Deccan were already formed. There was, therefore, no chance of another Musalman irruption into the Kṛṣṇa-Godāvarī doāb in the near future. In the extreme south of the Indian Peninsula the Sāḷuva dynasty of Vijayanagara was fast approaching extinction and the founder of the Tuḷuva dynasty, Narasa Nāyaka, was already an imposing figure in the Empire. From 1497 to 1511 Pratāparudra could have easily conquered the Tamil districts of the coast land, if he had only exerted himself. But Orissa was fast approaching a state of political stagnation to which the great religious reformer Chaitanya of Bengal gave permanency between 1510 and 1533. Narasa Nāyaka died in 1505 and was followed by his son Vīra-Narasimha who deposed the nominal Śāḷuva emperor Immāḍi Narasimha.¹ Nunez has recorded that the death of Narasa Nāyaka was followed by a widespread revolution of the Nāyakas of the empire of Vijayanagara.² When Kṛṣṇadevarāya succeeded his brother in December 1509 or January 1510, Pratāparudra’s chance of extension came to an end, because the greatest emperor of Vijayanagara had two ambitions : the conquest of the eastern coast from Orissa and the humbling of the power of the Musalmans. The first years of the reign of Kṛṣṇadevarāya were spent in suppressing rebellions, but he very wisely invaded the southern provinces of the empire of Orissa before tackling the ’Adil-Shāhī Sulṭāns of Bijapur. The new emperor’s aims were known to his people and two inscriptions from Nagalapuram in the Chingleput district inform us that people were applying to Kṛṣṇadevarāya for things to be performed after his victorious return from the campaign against the Gajapati king.