Administration and Social Life under Vijayanagar c5.21

c5.21

Thus the administrative and social history of Vijayanagar is of great interest. South India has not, however, been islamised to the same extent to which North India has been, and it continues to preserve the old form of Hinduism intact without allowing alien influences to act on it to any very large extent. This preservation of Hindu religion, literature and art, which are peculiar to South India and “differ widely from the more familiar forms of the north,” has been due to the Vijayanagar empire. Owing to the constant menace of Muhammadan invasions, Hindu society had to be reorganised and a certain amount of hardening and defining of the rights and duties of the various castes and communities of the Hindu society was felt necessary. As Dr. S. K. Aiyangar truly says, “it may safely be said that for good and for evil the present day Hinduism of South India retains the form that it received under Vijayanagar which ought to be given the credit of having preserved Hinduism such as it is.”⁵