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The Indian Analyst
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North Indian Inscriptions |
AN INSCRIPTION OF THE DYNASTY OF VIJAYAPALA The inscription refers itself to the king Vijayapāladēva, who is styled Mahārājādhirāja, with two of his predecessors mentioned therein ; but it is silent about his dynastic name, which we shall consider below. The object of the inscription is no record the grant, by the said Vijayapāladēva, of the village of Agasiyaka, for defraying the expenses of the worship of Gōhaḍēśvara, which is evidently a local name of Śiva, in the Iṅgaṇapadra dakshiṇapathaka. The of the bright half of Āshāḍha of the (Vikrama) year 1190, which for the Northern Vikrama, current, would correspond to Sunday, the 26th June, 1132, A.C., and for the expired, to Thursday, the 15th June, 1133 A.C.[1] The date cannot be verified. As stated above the donor of the grant is the Mahārājādhirāja, Paramēśvara, the illustrious Vijayapāladēva. He is said to be the successor of the Paramabhaṭṭāraka, Mahārājādhirāja, Paramēśvara, the illustrious Tihuṇapāladēva, who again was the successor of the M.P., the illustrious Pṛithvipāladēva alias Bharṭripada (ll. 2-3).[2] The record does not specify the name of the family to which these princes belonged, but all the three names are to be found in the same order in another inscription dated in Saṁvat 1212 (1155 A.C.), which was discovered by G. H. Ojha in the former Ḍūṅgarpur State (now a district of the same name) in Central Rājasthān.[3] The only difference shown by both these inscriptions is that whereas the later one gives the name Tribhuvanapāla in its Sanskrit form, the former gives the name in its Prakrit form as Tihuṇapāla. Ḍūṅgarpur is about hundred miles or 160 kms, due west of the find-spot of the present inscription, and the two inscriptions taken together indicate that the kings mentioned in the present inscription ruled independently, as shown by their titles, over the central parts of Mālwā and Rājasthān in the middle of the twelfth century A.C., or, to be more precise, in the second quarter of that century.
The grant of a village in the locality which formed a part of the Paramāra kingdom at that time by a king who styles himself as a Mahārājādhirāja clearly indicates that he may have wrested a part of the Paramāra kingdom in the last days of Naravarman whose last year is known to be 1133 A.C.,[4] which is, curiously enough, also the year of the present grant. We know that Naravarman had to sustain a reverse in his last days at the hands of the Chandēlla Sallakshaṇavarman on the east[5] and the Chaulukya Jayasiṁha Siddharāja on the west of his territories ; and an unpublished inscription from Ujjain also shows that Mālwā was annexed to the Chaulukya kingdom in V.S. 1193 or 1136 A.C.[6] From all these evidences, we may conclude that Vijayapāladēva, who may presumably be taken to have entered the service of the royal Paramāra house as governor in the region around Iṅgnōdā, declared himself independent when the Paramāra kingdom was on its wane during the last years of Naravarman. It is significant to note here that after the Kadambapadraka grant of Naravarman which was issued in V.S. 1167, or 1110 A.C.,[7] we have no epigraphical record of the king till his death ; and it is also worth noting that the princes of Vāgaḍa which was then governed by one of the junior branches of the Paramāras, also suffered with them, giving an opportunity to Vijayapāla to include that part too in his kingdom, as shown by the record found in the Ḍūṅgarpur region.
But the Ṭhākardā inscription too is equally silent as to the name of the house to which
these kings belonged ; and G. H. Ojha, in his notice thereof in the Report of the Rājputānā
Museum, suggests that possibly they may have been the descendants of the Pratīhāra kings of
Kanauj.[8] But we have no evidence in support of this conjecture, and I am inclined to agree
with D. R. Bhandarkar who took them to belong to the Kachchhapaghāta house of Gwālior,
taking the name Pṛithvīpāla of both these inscriptions as synonymous with Mahīpāla mentioned
[1] For the southern V. expired, it would corr6espond to Tuesday, 3rd July, 1134 A.C. | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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