The Pandyan Kingdom from the Earliest Times to the Sixteenth Century c16.25

c16.25

Rather early in his reign the king went on an expedition against the Travancore country (Malaināḍu) and one of the chief incidents in the campaign was probably the capture of Kollam (Quilon). Some records of the king from the Tinnevelly district confirm the conquest, rather the reconquest, of Malaināḍu, and give the titles *Cheranai-veṉra* and *Kollam-koṇḍa*.² That Kulaśēkhara continued to be in undisputed possession of the Śōṉāḍu and Toṇḍaimaṇḍalam is proved by the presence of many of his inscriptions in all the important places in these districts. In spite of Kulaśēkhara's claim to have conquered the two Kongus, no records of his are found in the Kongu country. On the other hand, a record from Tinnevelly (No. 29 of 1927) mentions³ that Kulaśēkhara built a *prākāra* wall of the Tinnevelly temple from the booty collected after defeating the Kēraḷa, the Chola and the Hoysala kings. Another inscription mentions that the king was in his camp at Kaṇṇanūr in his fifteenth year.¹ We also find records of Kulaśēkhara's co-regent Jaṭāvarman Sundara Pāndya (acc. A.D. 1276) in the Kongu country, and later still, early in the fourteenth century, the Muhammadan historians tell us of a Pāndya ruler with his headquarters at Kalūl (Karūr).² All these facts leave little room for doubt that the Kongu country was more or less effectively controlled by the Pāndya rulers till the end of Kulaśēkhara's reign.