The Position of Women in Hindu Civilisation, from Prehistoric Times to the Present Day c11.s3.14

c11.s3.14

Inscriptions testify to several queens and princesses taking an active part in the administration. This was particularly the case with the Deccan. Thus Vijayabhaṭṭārikā, the senior queen of king Chandrāditya of the Chālukya family, was ruling over a portion of the Bombay Deccan by the middle of the 7th century. We have got a charter given by her in the 5th year of her reign (*I.A.*, VII, p. 163). In 786 A. D. we find Śīlamahādevī, the crowned queen of the Rāshtrakūṭa king Dhruva, making a land grant on her own authority (*E. I.*, XXII, p. 98). Obviously she felt that being the crowned queen, she had an inherent right to issue routine administrative orders without any reference to her husband; or, the latter may have expressly invested her with certain ruling powers, including the important power of making land grants. Mailādevī, a queen of Someśvara Chālukya, was governing the extensive province of Banavāsī in 1053 a. d. Ketalādevī, another queen of the same king, was the governor of the *Agrahāra* of Ponavad. Akkādevī, an elder sister of Jayasimha III, was ruling over the district of Kinsukad in 1022 a. d. Kumkumadevī, a sister of Vijayāditya, was ruling over a portion of Dharwar district in Karnatak in 1077 a. d. Lakshmīdevī, the chief queen of Vikramāditya VI, was in charge of the administration of 18 religious endowments¹. Guntur district was being governed by a queen at the time of the vistit of Marco Polo towards the end of the 13th century a. d. We have already referred to the great influence which Rajput wives and mothers used to excercise over the internal and external policies of their husbands and sons. They often used to show remarkable originality and presence of mind in the face of grave danger. Thus it was queen Padminī who suggested the device which secured the release of her husband.