Studies in Cola History and Administration c12.91

c12.91

We read the meaning of the Uttaramērūr inscriptions somewhat differently from Venkayya who was the first to interpret these difficult epigraphs, and from others who, sometimes with less excuse, have unquestioningly reproduced his statements. We do not think that there is any evidence in these records to show that village government in Uttaramērūr was going to rack and ruin before the reforms of the twelfth and fourteenth years of Parāntaka. We are unable to agree that the king’s government had on such occasions more than a general right to remonstrate with the assembly through an officer specially deputed for the purpose. We are inclined to ascribe both the demerits of the first settlement and the merits of the second rather to the assembly than to the king’s government. And we seek the cause of the breakdown of the first settlement, not in the caste of the king’s officers, but in the intrinsic defects of the system of representation devised on the first occasion. These defects were remedied by two improvements which, above all, distinguish ‘B’ from ‘A’. The attempt to secure representation for the śēris as such is given up, and the kuḷumbu is directly linked to the vāriyam. Secondly, the lot is employed twice in each election, to decide the order in which the kuḍumbus are taken up for the choice of representatives as well as to choose the member for the year from among the eligible candidates of each kuḍumbu. These improvements simplified the whole procedure by removing the confusing uncertainties of the earlier rules. Such are some of the main differences. Of the details, the translations of the records that follow will give a better idea than any summary of the results of this long discussion.