History of the Qaraunah Turks in India c11.9.1

c11.9.1

The Sultanate of Madura was established in 1335 A.D. and Muhammad was prevented by unforeseen circumstances from arresting the progress of this revolutionary movement in the South.² The new sovereign struck coins in his name and began to organise his resources to wage war against the hostile chiefs, who enclosed his dominions on all sides. This was not all. In 1336 A.D. the foundations of the kingdom of Vijayanagar were laid by Vidyāraṇya, and Hari Hara I became the first ruler of the dynasty.³ Tradition says that two brothers Bukkā and Hari Hara, who were employed in the service of the king of Warangal at the time of the destruction of that kingdom by the Muhammadans in 1323 A.D., fled with a small escort and found shelter in the mountainous region of Anāgoṇḍi.⁴ This tradition finds a partial corroboration in Barani who says that ‘one of the relations of Kanyā Nāyak (referring to Hari Hara) whom the Sultan had sent to Kambālā, apostatised from Islam and broke out into rebellion.’⁵ This view is confirmed by Ibn Batūṭah, who in his account of Bahā-al-Din Gashtāsp’s rebellion says, that the captive princes of Anāgoṇḍi embraced Islam, and probably he loosely uses the word princes for all those dignitaries who were captured during the war.⁶ The Portuguese chronicler, Nuniz,⁷ relates the circumstances under which Hari Hara was entrusted with the country round Anāgondi as an imperial vassal by Muhammad Tughluq.