The Colas c20.6

c20.6

Alike in their chronology and in their narration of events, these plates differ from those of Kulōttunga which will be noticed presently. These imply that Rājarāja-narēndra came to the E. Cāḷukya throne in 1018 after Vimalāditya had occupied it for seven years from A.D. 1011, thus completely vindicating the date of Vimalāditya's accession calculated by Kielhorn, 10 May 1011.⁸ But the facts that the Raṇastapūṇḍi grant of Vimalāditya is dated in his eighth regnal year, and that Rājarāja-narēndra's coronation is stated elsewhere to have occurred in A.D. 1022 should not be lost sight of. Though the grants of Vijayāditya VII and Śaktivarman II thus agree with those of the time of Kulōttunga I in ascribing a rule of forty-one years to Rājarāja-narēndra, they seem to reckon the years from a different starting point, A.D. 1018, which is four years earlier than the date usually given, in the later grants, for Rājarāja's coronation, A.D. 1022. The language of the Ryāli plates and the date of Śaktivarman II's coronation⁹ even raise a doubt if Vijayāditya waited till the natural end of Rājarāja's life or deposed him earlier. In any event, seeing that Vīrarājēndra's inscriptions before his seventh year (A.D. 1068-9) do not mention his having had anything to do with Vijayāditya, there is no room for assuming, as has been sometimes done, that he interfered in any dispute relating to the succession, on Rājarāja's death, between Kulōttunga I and Vijayāditya VII or that he helped to keep out the former.¹⁰