Social and Political Life in the Vijayanagara Empire (A.D. 1346 – A.D. 1646) v1.c7.s1.48

v1.c7.s1.48

But before the narrative of the break-up of the Muhammadan power in the extreme south is taken up, it is worth while to say something about the effect of the Muhammadan conquest on the people of southern India. In A.D. 1318 the news of the inhuman punishment meted out to the last of the Yādavas, Haripāla,¹ must have caused widespread consternation in the Hindu world. This terror was heightened by the tidings of the fall of the famous temple at Madura. The entry of the Mlechchhas, as the Muhammadans were called in those days, into Madura marked at once the height and decline of their dominion in southern India. The immediate result of the destruction of the temple was the shifting of the famous deity of that ancient city. The person into whose hands the custody of the image was given was no less than the renowned scholar Vēdānta Dēśika.² The Muhammadan conquest of Madura naturally had very bad consequences for the Hindu population. The *Pandyan Chronicle* relates that the proper tutelary deity of Madura went into the Malayāḷam country. Then the wall of the temple, the fourteen towers on it, and the streets inside were destroyed. The shrine of the god, the small choultry, and the great choultry escaped.³