Social and Political Life in the Vijayanagara Empire (A.D. 1346 – A.D. 1646) v1.c11.s2.t4.31

v1.c11.s2.t4.31

The reign of Sadāśiva Rāya was an era of the most fatal complications. Firstly, there were the incursions by the ruler of Travancore into the ancient Pāṇḍyan territory. Then there was the menace of a great danger on the Fishery Coast of the south where the Portuguese, committed to a policy of conquest for the sake of the Cross, were coming into conflict with the political and religious stability of the Hindu Empire. Thirdly, as narrated above, there was the fact of the rise of the same powerful leaders of the rival parties in the capital, whose proud demeanour with foreign ambassadors was in no small measure responsible for the spark that kindled the smouldering fires of Hindu-Mohamadan antipathy into the greatest and saddest catastrophe ever witnessed in the history of southern India. This was the last and the most extraordinary disaster in the reign of Sadāśiva Rāya—the battle of Rākshasa-Taṅgaḍi. Whether the poor monarch was in any way responsible for the subversion of the Hindu Empire cannot be determined with certainty. Although it is not possible to agree with Sewell when he says that the nobles proclaimed their independence in the anarchy which followed that great conflict,³ yet it cannot be gainsaid that the battle of Rākshasa-Taṅgaḍi shook the Hindu Empire as no other terror had done in its history. This great battle forms a subject by itself, and we intend to discuss and describe it in a separate dissertation. Meanwhile we may be permitted to recount the effect it had on the fate of the Vijayanagara Empire.⁴