Political History of Ancient India, from the Accession of Parikshit to the Extinction of the Gupta Dynasty c21.s3.1

c21.s3.1

According to the evidence of the *Ārya-Mañjuśrī-mūla-kalpa*, confirmed by epigraphic testimony, the immediate successor of Mahendra, *i.e.*, Kumāra Gupta I, was Skanda Gupta. In an interesting paper read at a meeting of the Asiatic Society of Bengal, Dr. R. C. Majumdar suggested that after Kumāra's death, which apparently took place while the struggle with the Pushyamitras was still undecided, there was a fratricidal war in which Skanda Gupta came off victorious after defeating his brothers including Puru Gupta, the rightful claimant, and rescued his mother just as Kṛishṇa rescued Devakī.¹ Dr. Majumdar observed that the omission of the name of the mother of Skanda Gupta in the genealogy given in the Bihār and Bhitarī Stone Pillar Inscriptions indicated that she was not the chief queen and Skanda 'had no natural claim to the throne'. The rightful heir of Kumāra was Puru Gupta, the son of the *Mahādevī* Anantadevī.