Vijay Ashar wrote: Date: Sun, 17 Sep 2006 12:06:43 -0700 (PDT) From: Vijay Ashar Subject: Lessons from Our History To: Setoo GGroups , VRI CC: shrinivas.tilak@gmail.com, mukul.asher@gmail.com, nandakumar@giissingapore.org, "Dr. Durgesh Samant" , venkatramansundari@rediffmail.com, kak@ece.lsu.edu, fgautier@sify.com, ravisydney@yahoo.com, aparnaiyer@gmail.com, "Dr. S. Swamy" , vrnparker@yahoo.com, mallya@yahoo.com Is this an accurate account of relatively recent history of South India's Imperial kingdoms? (around early 14th century, the same period referred to by the Pope in the recent worldwide outrage by the inflamed Islamic world against his quoted remarks). If so, what lessons have been learnt by today's rulers in India and by the Hindu Society from this shameful chronicle of betrayals by the Hindu kings against one another motivated by selfish jealousy and internicine rivalry? Very little, judging from the ludicrous appeasement of Muslim and Christian votebanks by our treasonous ministers at the Center and in various States. Tragically, India's history is once again in the danger of being repeated by the refusal of its populace, of its intellectuals and of its leaders to learn the bitter lessons of its history. I suggest you google the pages on the reign of Allauddin Khilji to get a good idea of how Islamic rule was able to penetrate its influence and suzerainty well into South India by playing upon petty rivalries of otherwise brave and powerful Hindu kings. Most of our educationists in schools and colleges even today refuse to teach the correct history of India during the Islamic and colonial periods, let alone emphasising on the lessons to be learnt. vijay ================================================== PAGES FROM HISTORY: FOUR KINGS AND A SULTAN Posted by: "Star Of Mysore" Star Of Mysore indvoice Sat Sep 16, 2006 1:16 pm (PST) PAGES FROM HISTORY: FOUR KINGS AND A SULTAN By Prof. A.V. Narasimha Murthy, former Head, Department of Ancient History & Archaeology, University of Mysore. Four versus one is the real picture of South India about six hundred years ago. These four were the four dynasties namely, the Yadavas of Devagiri, the Hoysalas of Dwarasamudra, the Kakatiyas of Warangal and the Pandyas of Madura. These were represented by Yadava Ramachandra, Hoysala Ballala III, Prataparudra and Sundara Pandya. The other one is Alauddin Khilji. These four were individually powerful and possessed a vast and efficient army consisting of large number of horses, elephants and swordsmen. Sometime back foreigners had paid glorious tribute to the strength of the Indian army. But such strong four kingdoms collapsed like a house of cards before the Muslim invaders. They lacked political foresight but were fired with mutual jealousy and hatred and even when the enemy was on their threshold, they did not anticipate danger from him. On the otherhand, they lacked unity and were happy at the humiliation of the others and some of them even went to the extent of sending invitation to Alauddin for invading their neighbour and shamelessly gave full co-operation and active assistance against their own neighbours. Perhaps this is the greatest tragedy in South Indian history. Due to conflicting sources it may be difficult to be very precise in understanding these events. Muslim invasion Alauddin had heard of the great wealth of the Yadava King Ramachandra of Devagiri. Alauddin wanted huge amount of money to realise his ambition of becoming the Sultan of Delhi. And naturally, his target was South India in general and temples in particular. For the first time, the Muslims invaded Devagiri in 1276 AD, and defeated Ramachandra. He purchased peace by paying tribute consisting of 600 maunds of pearls, 2 maunds of diamonds, sapphire and emerald, 1,000 maunds of gold and silver, 4,000 pieces of silk and gave his daughter in marriage to the Sultan. After this, instead of strengthening his position against the invaders, he began wars against the Hoysalas and other minor powers. Noticing this, Alauddin invaded Devagiri again and took Ramachandra as a prisoner and took him to Delhi and sent him back after he agreed to be faithful ally of the Sultan. Encouraged by this, Alauddin planned an invasion against Prataparudra of Warangal. He was unmindful of the invasion of Alauddin. But he was happily rejoicing in the defeat of his neighbour Ramachandra. Alauddin's army first came to Devagiri and sought help from Ramachandra against the Andhras. He was too happy to render any assistance to the Muslim army. His entire administration was placed at the disposal of the Sultan and offered choicest food, entertainment, gifts etc. Ramachandra himself went for some distance with the army. Officers, who were familiar with the route to Warangal were sent with the army with instructions to provide food, fodder, entertainment and shelter to the entire Muslim army. Under the dynamic leadership of Malik Kafur, the Muslim army defeated king Prataparudra and plundered Warangal. Kafur carried 'a thousand camels groaning under the weight of gold, silver, diamonds, pearls, sapphires, besides 100 elephants and 7,000 horses. On hearing the defeat of the Kakatiya king, Yadava Ramachandra felt very happy because what he could not achieve was accomplished by the army of Malik Kafur. Hoysala Ballala III The next target was Hoysala Ballala III. Again this time too, the Muslim army camped at Devagiri. Ramachandra adorned the city of Devagiri to receive the Muslim army. He ordered all things needed for the army to be kept ready. If they required the feathers of Sirmugh for their arrows, efforts were made to obtain them so that every Turki soldier might kill huge soldiers of the Hoysalas. Further, he deputed his Minister Parasurama Dandanayaka to guide the Muslim army through the forests upto Dwarasamudra. As usual, Hoysala Ballala III was defeated and became a prisoner. Dwarasamudra was plundered and temples ravaged. It is said that Ballala agreed to surrender every thing precious in his kingdom and requested to allow him to retain his sacred thread. With a broken heart, Ballala made Belur his capital. Infatuated with these victories, the Muslim army thought of going into interior of Tamil country. Kannanur, the southern capital of the Hoysalas was ransacked. At this time (1310 AD), a tempting offer and an invitation to Kafur came from the Pandyas of Madura. Two brothers Vira Pandya and Sundara Pandya, fought between themselves for the Pandya throne. Vassal of Sultan Sundara Pandya was defeated in the battle. He immediately took refuge under Alauddin and requested him to get the Pandya throne. Sultan took the side of Sundara Pandya and defeated Vira Pandya and the former became a vassal of Sultan. Kafur returned to Delhi with a rich booty. At the political plane, all the South Indian powers were fully defeated, leading to utter chaos because the Sultan could not effectively control these powers sitting at Delhi. The chaotic condition was put an end to by the birth of Vijayanagara empire. Thus the four were reduced by one. Had the four united together and fought against the invaders, the course of South Indian history would have been quite different. But alas ! That was not to be. History repeats itself, they say. After another three hundred years ruling powers behaved in the same fashion to be reduced by another foreign power. We refuse to learn from history. Thus there is something pathetic with the fall of the builders of Devagiri fort, Belur temple, Warangal torana and the huge stone mandapas with lofty pillars.