The Colas c24.40

c24.40

It may be doubted if the *praśasti* of Rājēndra mentions the historical facts recorded in it in the order of their occurrence, and considering the fact that the *praśasti* can be traced to the seventh year of Rājēndra, a.d. 1253, when Rājarāja was still alive, we may conclude that in a few years after he became heir apparent, Rājēndra had gone some way to realise his ambitious programme of recovery. The evidence of Hoysaḷa inscriptions renders it even probable that he entered on this task earlier than 1246. The *praśasti* says that Rājēndra avenged the humiliation put upon the Cōḷa power and that by his prowess he enabled Rājarāja to wear two crowns for three years.⁶⁸ In some redactions, the *praśasti* also states that Rājēndra was expert in cutting off the crowned head of the Pāṇḍya,⁶⁹ while an inscription from Tripurāntakam,⁷⁰ dated in the fifteenth year, contains the more sober claim: *iruvar pāṇḍyar muḍittalai-koṇḍaruḷina*. Rājēndra is also said to have plundered the Pāṇḍya country. It is clear that Rājēndra gained some success against the Pāṇḍyas and that the second crown he claims to have bestowed on the Cōḷa ruler was the Pāṇḍyan crown.⁷¹ The Pāṇḍyas had carried fire and sword into the Cōḷa country twice in twenty years and had been the cause of the rebellion of Kōpperuñjiṅga and his imprisonment of Rājarāja. Rājēndra’s anxiety to strike the first blow at them was therefore quite natural. But when did he get his chance, and why did the effect of his success not last for more than three years? And who were the two Pāṇḍyan kings who had to own defeat at his hands? Now it seems hardly likely that Rājēndra achieved anything against the powerful Māṟavarman Sundara Pāṇḍya I. But after his death, until the accession of Jaṭāvarman Sundara Pāṇḍya I in A.D. 1251, the Pāṇḍyan kingdom was held by weak rulers, and it is quite possible that Māṟavarman Sundara Pāṇḍya II (acc. 1238) was the king who was compelled for a time to acknowledge the Cōḷa overlordship. The identity of the other Pāṇḍya, perhaps co-ruler with Māṟavarman Sundara II, remains obscure. We are perfectly justified in assigning these events to the reign of Māṟavarman Sundara II, because he is known to have been a weak ruler, and in his reign, as in the earlier part of the reign of Rājarāja III Cōḷa, the influence of the Hoysaḷas on the affairs of the kingdom is visibly on the increase.⁷² This may be due to the same cause, the Hoysaḷa protection afforded to its ruler against the aggressions of a more active and powerful neighbour. Vīra-Sōmēśvara is called, in some Mysore records, *Pāṇḍya-kula-samrakṣaṇa-* *dakṣa-dakṣiṇa-bhuja*,⁷³ (the king) whose right arm is expert in protecting the dynasty of the Pāṇḍyas. About the same time, Sōmēśvara is said to have defeated Rājēndra on the field of battle and to have protected him when he sought refuge.⁷⁴ It is probably these facts that account also for some expressions found in Rājēndra's inscriptions.⁷⁵