North Indian Inscriptions

POLITICAL HISTORY

the Vākāṭaka Mahārāja Rudrasēna I and the Gupta Mahārājādhirāja Samudragupta.¹ Now, this Rudrasēna was a son of Gautamīputra with whose name no royal title of any kind has been coupled. Gautamīputra, we are further informed, was son’s son to Pravarasēna I. About this Pravarasēna we are told not only that he was a Mahārāja but also that he belonged to the imperial (samrāḍ) Vākāṭaka family or clan. And quite in keeping with it has been mentioned the fact that he celebrated four aśvamēdhas. There can therefore be no doubt as to the Vākāṭakas having attained to the imperial rank in the time of Pravarasēna. This receives confirmation, if any is required, from the fact that the Vākāṭakas are nowhere described as samrāḍ-Vākāṭakas in the time of any prince of this line after Pravarasēna I. It will thus be seen that the Vākāṭaka rulers from the time of Rudrasēna I onwards occupy a subordinate position, namely, that of the Mahārāja, whereas in their own copperplates the Gupta sovereign, Chandragupta II, has been actually styled Mahārājādhirāja in consonance with his imperial position. Again, what we have to note about this family is that there is a break in the line between Pravarasēna I and Rudrasēna I. It is true that the name of Rudrasēna I’s father has been mentioned, namely Gautamīputra, but he receives no royal title at all. Further, the father and grandfather of Gautamīputra have not been even so much as named. The conclusion is irresistible that after Pravasēna I the Vākāṭakas lost their kingdom and remained destitute of power for three generations till Rudrasēna I, who belonged to the fourth, became a Mahārāja. The title Mahārāja, about this time, that is, three generations prior to Samudragupta, was in a transitional stage.

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Its significance had not yet become fixed. It could be assumed by an imperial ruler, or a feudatory chieftain. Thus Pravarasēna was, no doubt, a Mahārāja, but that he was a suzerain is proved by the appositional phrase samrāḍ-Vākāṭakānām, which occurs in all Vākāṭaka charters. Similarly, Rudrasēna I or his son Pṛithivīshēṇa I has been styled Mahārāja, but that they were subordinate princes is indicated by the appositional phrase shrinking up into Vākāṭakānām with the prefix samrād- dropped invariably. It will thus be seen that when, after the overthrow of the Vākāṭaka supremacy after Pravarasēna I, the Vākāṭakas again rise to power in the fourth generation, they are, not suzerains, but feudatories. How could they have been brought to power again ? And to whom, again, could they have remained subordinate ? The only plausible reply is that as, after Pravarasēna, Rudrasēna first became a ruler and as Rudrasēna was a contemporary of Samudragupta, it was this Samudragupta who was responsible for raising him and the Vākāṭakas to power. This inference is strengthened by the fact that in the Allahabad pillar praśasti Samudragupta is credited with having re-established some royal families that were shorn of power. We do not know whether Chandragupta’s daughter Prabhāvatiguptā was married to Rudrasēna II, son of Pṛithivīshēṇa, in the time of Samudragupta. There is nothing inherently impossible in this supposition. On the contrary, it is a most likely one, because his Ēraṇ inscription speaks of his possessing not only many sons, but many son’s sons. Nevertheless, even supposing that this event took place after the demise of Samudragupta, this much cannot be denied that the two royal families must have already been on terms of great intimacy, as a marriage alliance took place between them practically in one generation from the rise of the Vākāṭakas to power. This probably explains why Harishēṇa refrained from giving specific instances of the royal families reinstated by Samudragupta. Of all such families the Vākāṭaka was the most prominent. And if he had named it, that would surely have reminded the Vākāṭaka Rudrasēna I of the imperial power which his family once enjoyed and of the subordinate position it now held, notwithstanding the fact that it was restored to some power at all by Samudragupta. The ancestral dominions of the Vākāṭakas, again, comprised the western half of Madhya Pradesh, Berar and Mahārāshṭra, thus practically the
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¹ See in this connection the view of S. K. Bose who for the first time successfully tackled this synchronism (IC., Vol. II, pp. 53 ff.).