The Aravidu Dynasty of Vijayanagara, Vol. I v1.c13.20

v1.c13.20

Although the system was not completely new, in asmuch as we find some Palaiyakarans in the southern country before the enthronement of Visvanatha ²; nevertheless to him was due its institution as a permanent and efficient body for the administration of the country and for the defence of the capital, to which they had to pay their tribute annually. Moreover, the fact that Tamil and Telugu chiefs were indiscriminately appointed Palaiyakarans, was supposed to foster the necessary union for establishing a lasting peace between both the subjects and their foreign rulers. This was by far the most important political event of the time, in spite of the fact that it fomented ambitions in these petty chiefs and weakened the royal authority of Madura, of which they were too independent from the very beginning. Had they been more systematically attached to, and dependent on, the central power, Madura might have been saved from many of the troubles caused by the Palaiyakarans.