The Dynastic History of Northern India (Early Mediaeval Period) v1.c20.115.3

v1.c20.115.3

Thus Rājyapāla was a contemporary of the Candella Vidyādhara and the Kacchapaghāta Arjuna, and therefore alive at the time of Maḥmūd's second expedition against Kanauj when Nanda (Gaṇḍa ?), the father of Vidyādhara was still the Candella king.² So far as facts were available at the time, Prof. R. C. Mazumdar, I think, was right in describing as "gratuitous" the attempt to harmonise Niẓām ud-Dīn's account with the epigraphic evidence, by supposing Vidyādhara the destroyer of Rājyapāla to be the crown prince of Nanda (Gaṇḍa ?). But since he wrote I have come across the following account of these incidents in the Arabic history *Ta'rīkh ul-Kāmil* of Ibn ul-Athīr (died A.D. 1234): "In this year, 409,³ Yamīn ud-Daulah started on an expedition towards India, and he made larger preparations than he had done before. The reason of all this preparation was that when he had conquered Kanauj and its ruler, called the Rāy, had fled away ....and Maḥmūd returned to Ghazna, Bīdā (بيدا) the accursed, who was the greatest of the rulers of India in territory and had the largest armies, and whose territory was named Kajurāha (کجوراهه), sent messengers to the Rāy of Kanauj, who was named Rājaypāl (راجیپال) rebuking him for his flight and the surrender of his territories to the Musalmans. A long quarrel ensued between them, which resulted in hostilities;