Social and Political Life in the Vijayanagara Empire (A.D. 1346 – A.D. 1646) v1.c13.s3.32

v1.c13.s3.32

We have already mentioned the great care which Billappa Nāyaka and Keṅgappa Nāyaka, the sons of Hanumi Nāyaka, bestowed on the question of granting a dharma-śāsana to Liṅgaṇṇa, younger brother of Appā Bhaṭṭa, a Brahman, in A.D. 1565.³ The settlement of the temple disputes in Tiruvoṛṛiyū in A.D. 1368, in A.D. 1371, and, finally, in the reign of Harihara Rāya II; the case which Achyuta Rāya decided in connection with the equitable distribution of lands between the Varadarāja and Ekāmbaranātha temples; the laudable manner in which Tirumalli Nāyaka ended the dispute as regards the rights of one of the priests of Kāmēśvara temple; and the opinion which Billappa Nāyaka and Keṅgappa Nāyaka received from the old residents of the Saṇte-Bennur-sīme, —all these prove that the Vijayanagara monarchs did not mete out a rough-and-ready justice, as has been asserted in some quarters; but that, on the contrary, they solved knotty points of etiquette and privilege, left untouched or decided unfavourably by their own officials; and that they allowed their subjects the right of appeal, even though it was against the decision of powerful temple authorities, and, sometimes, of the officers of the Crown. To a certain extent their judicial procedure is not incompatible with the following regulation of Śukrāchārya: "The king must personally inspect every year the grāmas, puras, or cities, and dēśas or districts, and provinces, and must know which subjects have been pleased and which oppressed by the staff of officers, and deliberate upon matters brought forward by the people".¹ Neither the compilers of the Sukranīti nor the monarchs of Vijayanagara were unaware of the oppression which the officials of the State caused to the people.