महाराणा कुम्भा (हरविलास सारदा - मेवाड़ साम्राज्य के अद्वितीय विजेता, निर्माता व विद्वान्)

Maharana Kumbha. Giripura (Dungarpur) and put its ruler Gayapāla to flight. He humbled the pride of the Muhammadans at Sārangapur and imprisoned several young women of the Lord of Pārasikas (Muhammadans). The unfortunate loss of the fifth slab renders the account of Maharana Kumbha incomplete. The fact that some of the slokas are common to this and the Chitor Kirtistham- bha Inscription (no. 14 below), as also the fact that both bear the same date, show that both of them were composed by the same poet. This inscription gives a more detailed account of Kumbha, while the Chitor Kīrtisthambha Inscription is brief. These two are the most important of all inscriptions of Kumbha's time. 17. The Chitor Kīrtisthambha (Tower of Victory) Inscription of Magsar Bad 5th, S. 1517 (A. D. 1460). It was engraved on several stone slabs, of which only two are now in existence, first and the last but one, containing slokas 1 to 28 and 168 to 187 respectively. A photo transcript of these 181

Maharana Kumbha. two slabs is published in Cunningham's Archæological Survey Report, Vol. 23, Plates 20 and 21. Several more slabs were in exis- tence in A.D. 1678, when a Pundit copied the inscription engraved on them, in a book of 22 leaves on Fagan Bad 7th, S. 1735 (A.D. 1678). This copy is in Mahamahopadhyaya P. Gauri Shankar's possession. The first two verses are devoted to the praise of Siva and Ganesa. The description of the family of Bappa commences from verse 3. Verses 4—8 are devoted to Bappa who is said to have been a great warrior, a leader of the princes and a devotee of Siva. In his family was born, Hammir who destroyed his enemies. He was very liberal and was called Vishamdhāti Pan- chānana (a lion in vigorous attacks). He captured his enemy's fortress Chelvāta (Jilwārā) (verses 9—20). His son was Kshetrasinha who destroyed the army of the Yavanas (Ami Shāh, alias Dilāwar Khān Ghori of Mālwā) near Chitor and imprisoned Ranamalla of Idar (verses 21—29). His son was Lakshasinh who liberated Gayā from the Muhammadans. He weighed himself against gold and captured Vardhamanagiri (Badnor) from the Mevas 182

Maharana Kumbha. (Mers; verses 30—39). His son was Mokal (V. 40). After this, 193 verses are devoted to the description of Rana Kumbhakarna's reign and the number of the verses again begins with one. Rana Kumbha brought the image of Hanu- mana from Māndavyapura (Mandor) and established it in the fortress of Kumbhalgarh. He exacted tribute from the country of Sapādalaksha (Sāmbhar) and brought from there the image of Umā. He levied taxes from the salt mines at Dindvana (Didwana in Jodhpur State), took the town of Naraina (in Jaipur State) and conquered the whole kingdom of Mudafar (Muzaffar Shah). He re- populated the town of Vasantapur near the holy fountain of Vasishtha (i.e., Mt. Abu) and built there seven tanks. He built to the east of the temple of Eklinga, a Mandapa known as Kumbhamandapa. He with his cavalry attacked Gokarnagiri and the kingdom of Arbuda (Mt. Abu), on the peak of which he built the fortress of Achaldurga (Achalgarh); 183

Maharana Kumbha. he erected there the grand Vishnu temple of Kumbhasvāmī, and near it, built a tank. This crest-jewel of kings built four other tanks on Mount Abu. He subjugated Muhammad, destroyed the town of Nagapur (Nagor) with the lofty mashiti (masjid), built by Peroz (Firoz), imprisoned several young Muham- madan women and took possession of the treasure of Shams Khān while fighting in the country of Jāngal. He laid waste Khandela and erected the lofty temple of Kumbhaswami at Chitor. Near it, he also erected another temple of Adivarāha, dug a tank called Ramakund, erected the lofty Kirtisthambha and constructed a road for chariots from the the bottom of the fort to its top. At Chitor, he constructed Rāmarathyā (Rampol gate), Hanumanagopura (Hanumanpol), Bhairav- ankavisikha (Bhairavapol), Mahalakshmirathyā (Mahalakshmipol), Chāmundapratoli (Chamun- dapol), and Tararathya (Tarapol; VV. 1—42). (Verses 43—124 were missing even at that time, A.D. 1678.) He (Kumbhakarna) built Rājapratoli (Rājpol=the palace gate) with an ornamental Torana (V. 125). He built the fortress of 184

Maharana Kumbha. Kumbhalmeru (Kumbhalgarh) with four gates on the top of Vindya mountain, constructed there the temple of Kumbhasvāmī in honour of Vishnu, and near it, built a beautiful lake. On the top of the fortress, he set up the image of Ganēsa brought from one of his enemies' fortresses. (VV. 126—146). He was called Rājguru, Dānaguru, Śailaguru and Paramaguru of Kings. He killed several of his enemies to take revenge of his father's death. He was versed in the four Vedas, composed Sangītarāja, Sūdaprabandha and four dramas. He wrote commentaries on Chandīshataka and Gīta Govinda. He was the head of poets, princes, and skilled in playing on the lute (vīnā). In dramatic composition, he was a Bharat and followed the rules of Nandīkesvara, while composing poems in praise of Siva. He destroyed the combined armies of the lords of Mālwā and Gurjrat in war and captured several elephants. He assumed the titles, Asvapati, Gajapati and Narapati. He was the son of Sobhāgyadevi, and husband of Kumbhaladevi. He built a new Visikhā (gate) on the 13th day of the 185

Maharana Kumbha. dark half of Kārtika, Samvat 1507; Kumbhal- meru on the 13th day of the dark half of Chaitra, Samvat 1515; Kirtisthambha on the 10th day of the bright half of Māgha, Samvat 1505, and Achaldurga on the 15th day of the bright half of Māgha, Samvat 1509. (VV. 147—187). In the family of Bhrigu was born Somnāth. His son was Narahari whose son was Kesáva also called Jhoting. Jhoting’s son was Atri, who composed a part of the Prasasti. His son Mahesh, who was highly honoured by Kumbhakarna, completed the Prasasti on Monday the 5th day of the dark half of Mārgasirsha, Samvat 1517 (A.D. 1460). 18. The second Kumbhalgarh Inscription of Magsar Bad 5, (Monday) V. S. 1517 (A.D. 1460). Of this inscription, the first slab containing 64 slokas, alone remains; the remaining slabs are lost. The first slab con- tains a part of an account of Maharana Kumbha. It says that the account is con- tinued in subsequent slabs. The slab is in the Museum at Udaipur. (Unpublished). 19. Inscription dated the Vaisakh Sud 186

Maharana Kumbha. 4th, V.S. 1518 (A.D. 1461) engraved on the pedestal of the magnificent brass image of Adinātha in the Achalgarh Jain temple at Abu. It records that while Maharajadhiraja Kumbhakaraṇa was ruling at Kumbhalmeru, the image was made at Dungarpur during the reign of Rāwal Somadāsa and brought to Abu by the Sangha (community) of Tapa- gachchha. It was set up by Sā Sābha, his wife Karanādē and their sons Sālā and Mālā. The consecration ceremony was performed by Lakshmīsāgarasuri of Tapagachchha. COINS. Maharana Kumbhā struck gold, silver and copper coins. Ferishta (Briggs' Translation, Vol. IV, page 221) mentions gold coins of Kumbhā. In the Mamādeva temple in the fort of Kumbhalgarh, there is an image, of the size of a man, of Kuvér, treasurer of the gods, with two attendants pouring coins from bags into plates. One plate is full of circular coins and the other square ones, which shows that Maharana Kumbha's coins were of two varieties, circular and rectangular. The coins that have come to light so far are only copper 187

Maharana Kumbha. ones. They are of five kinds, all square or rec- tangular in shape. The Obverse contains the name of Maharana Kumbhakaran, and the Reverse either Kumbhalmeru or Eklingji. The biggest of them, has the year V.S. 1517 (A.D. 1460.) OBVERSE. $\qquad$ REVERSE. सामने की तरफ़ $\qquad$ दूसरी तरफ़ १ [OBVERSE:] श्रीकुंभल मेरु महा ▫️⮑ ➔ राणा श्री कुं भकर्णस्य [REVERSE:] श्रीएकलिं ग | श्री | स्य प्र | | ला दात १५१७ २ [OBVERSE:] राणा श्री कुं | श्री | भ कर्णस्य [REVERSE:] श्रीकुंभ लमेरु ▫️⮑ ➔ ३ [OBVERSE:] राणा श्री कुंभकर्ण [REVERSE:] श्री कुंभ लमेरु ४ [OBVERSE:] राणा कुं- भकर्ण [REVERSE:] श्री कुंभ लमेरु ▫️⮑ ➔ ५ [OBVERSE:] कुंभ कर्ण [REVERSE:] एक लिंग 188

CHAPTER XVI. ———— KUMBHA AS A SOVEREIGN. Of the various Rajput clans, who have ruled or are ruling in Rajputana, only the Chauhans, the Guhilots (Sisodias) and the Rathods ever fought for the liberties of their country and played prominent parts in the history of Rajputana during the last 800 years. And of these three, the Chauhans of Ajmer alone achieved Imperial position, and became supreme rulers of India during the twelfth century of the Christian era. The Guhilots (Sisodias), after the decline of the Chauhans, achieved suzerain power in Rajputana and enjoyed a position, achieved by no other Rajput clan. When the first Afghan invasion of India took place in 1191 A.D., it was the Chauhan Emperor Prithviraj who fought against the invader Shahbuddin Ghori. And later, when Babur invaded India, it was the Sisodia king, Maharana Sānga of Mewar, who, as the most 189

Maharana Kumbha. powerful king of his time in India, headed the confederacy of the Rajput kings of Rajputana and the Pathan Sultan of Delhi, and opposed the Turk invader. Thus, the Chauhans as the Imperial Power in India, and the Guhilot Maharana of Chitor as the suzerain power in Rajputana, led the opposition, when the Afghans and the Turks first came to conquer India. The Rathods came to Rajputana in the thirteenth century A D. and rapidly spread in its western parts. They had several times to fight against the Afghan Sultans and Turk Emperors of Delhi in defence of their country, and materially helped in bringing about the fall of the Turk empire in India. The Kachhwāhas of Jaipur were minor chieftains till the middle of the sixteenth century, and only came into prominence under Raja Bhagvandas in Akbar's time. They were the first amongst the Rajputs to accept Turk suzerainty: and they never took up arms against the Emperors of Delhi. 190

Maharana Kumbha. While the Rathods, and sometimes the Deoras (Chauhans) of Sirohi, fought against the Turk emperors of Delhi, it was the Maharanas of Mewar, who continually opposed the Turks, never bowing their head to them. They sacrificed their all to preserve their indepen- dance and self respect. Maharana Kumbha was not only one of the greatest of the Maharanas, but was the real founder of the greatness of Mewar. Maharana Kumbha reigned from A.D. 1433 to A.D. 1468. The period marks the consolida- tion of the power of Mewar, which under the great Hindupati Maharana Sanga and the immortal Pratap, shone so brilliantly in the following century when the great adventurer from Samarkand invaded India, and his grand- son Akbar, the greatest of the Mughal emperors of India, founded a magnificent empire in this country. The period also marks the rise of the Rathod Power, which later becoming famous in history as the Lākh Talwar Rathodān, played a prominent part in the foundation and the consolidation of the Mughal empire during the reigns of Akbar, Jahangir and Shah Jahan; 191

Maharana Kumbha. and which eventually helped in giving the death stroke to that empire during the time of Aurang- zeb and his successors The popular couplet हथनापुर हलचल मची, पड़ी सितारे गल्ल । धुंवां आंबर ढाकया वै रूठा रिड़मल्ल ॥ "There is consternation in Delhi : anxiety pre- vails in Satara (amongst Marhattas). The sky has become overcast with gloom ; for, the Rathods have been offended." illustrates the power, the Rathods wielded in India during the 18th century. Maharana Kumbha, was a great sove- reign, a great military commander, a great builder and a great scholar. Rarely has the world seen such a combination of qualities in one man, each of which would stamp a man, great. It is wonderful how a great sovereign like Maharana Kumbha, constantly engaged in warfare from almost his childhood, could find time and opportunities to become a great poet and dramatist, a master of the science of music, and write commentaries on Gita Govind—one of the master-pieces of lyric literature in the world—and books like Chandi Shataka and Sangit Ratnakar, and a treatise 192

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Maharana Pratap.

Maharana Kumbha. on the architectural art of building Towers of Victory (Kirtisthamba). Contemporary European history does not furnish an example of a great monarch who was also a great administrator, a great general, a great builder, a great poet, and a great author. India, with its great historic past, the home of religion, science and philosophy, where great ethical truths and cultural traditions have so deeply permeated the life of the common people, has been in a favourable position to give to the world great men. Amongst the Rajput sovereigns of Raj- putana, Kumbha occupies a most prominent position. His natural abilities and his achievements place him in the forefront among the great rulers not only of Mewar, but of the whole of India. The best known Maharanas of Mewar are Maharana Sānga, Maharana Pratap and Maharana Raj Singh. Now, Maha- rana Pratap stands by himself. He is beyond compare. He lived in times so different from those of Kumbha or Sanga, that no compari- son between him and the other Maharanas is possible. Pratap had, as his enemy, one of the 193

Maharana Kumbha. greatest sovereign of all times in Asia or Europe, and had had ranged against him not only the whole might of Akbar's empire, but also the knowledge and resources of the kings of Amber (Jaipur), Jodhpur and Bikaner. Yet he triumphed over this powerful combination and succeeded in preserving the independence of Mewar and the liberties of his people. For sheer intellectual ability, however, Kumbha takes the first place amongst the Maharanas of Mewar. If we consider his great work for the defences and the embellish- ment of Mewar, he again stands easily the first. As an ever-victorious monarch, he stands unrivalled amongst the kings of India of the last thousand years. Sāngā also was a great sovereign, and triumphed over all his enemies except Babur. Maharana Raj Singh had to fight the Moghal empire in India at its zenith, and succeeded in defeating the attempts of Aurangzeb to reduce Mewar to submission. But the heroic and successful fights the Maharanas were able to put up against the Moghal Emperors were 194

Maharana Kumbha. in no small measure due to the immensely strengthened defences of Mewar, effected by the foresight and wisdom of Maharana Kumbha. Kumbha was in every respect, the equal of Sāngā, and in some respects, his superior. If Kumbha or Sānga's elder brother Prithviraj, had been in Sanga's place to lead the Indian opposition to Babur, Babur would, in all probability, have ended his days in Kabul. If Kumbhā is not so well known to readers of history, it is because important Persian histories which began to be written only with the advent of the Moghals (Turks) in India have given little attention to events that occurred before Babur came to this country. And the English histories, which are based entirely on Persian histories, only repeat what the latter have recorded. Sāngā's fame rests chiefly on the accounts given of his character and his ex- ploits by the memoirs of Babur and Humāyun, and the histories written by writers who hovered round the Moghal Court. Kumbha has not had that advantage. The Rajputs had produced men as great and as remarkable as Kumbha, before the latter 195

Maharana Kumbha.

appeared on the scene. The great Chauhan Emperor Visaldeva,¹ the uncle of the famous Emperor Prithviraj, who flourished in the 12th century of the Christian era, besides being a great sovereign and a great military commander, was also a great scholar. He conquered the whole of Upper India, carried his arms right up to the Himalayas, making Delhi a tributary to Ajmer, which then became the capital of the Indian empire. In his inscrip- tion on the famous Siwalik Pillar, originally erected in Gurhwal by Emperor Asoka— who according to Mr. H. W. Wells, the author of the Outline of History, is the greatest monarch of all times—and which now stands in the Firoz- shah ka Kotla at Delhi, Emperor Visaldeva states that he had freed Hindustan of all in- vaders from the North West. He was not only a great king and a great commander, but also a scholar and a dramatist, as is proved by his drama Harkeli Nātak, parts of which engrav- ed on black basalt slabs, are preserved in the Rajputana Museum, Ajmer.

¹ For an account of Emperor Visaldeva, see my article on him in the Vedic Magazine and Gurukul Samachar of Aswin, V. S. 1969, Vol. IV, pp. 292-97, and my book, Ajmer : Historical and Descriptive, page 154.

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Maharana Kumbha The great Parmār sovereign, Raja Bhoja of Dhārānagri, who flourished in the eleventh century of the Christian era was a great general, a great scholar and a great sovereign.¹ ¹ The eminent orientalist, Mr. K. P. Jayaswal, in his article on the Udaipur temple of Malwa in the Modern Review for June, 1932, p. 604, says about Raja Bhoja :— "The most famous king of the eleventh century in India was Bhoja of the Parmār dynasty, who was king of Malwa from 1010 to 1050 A.D. His undertakings were gigantic: he surveyed the whole of Sanskrit and Prakrit literature and had encyclopædias on art and sciences compiled, books on literary art criticism written, vast anthologies prepared, books on the art of poetics, on astrology, astronomy, music and architecture composed, and Hindu law re-stated. In this survey of national culture, he took part personally more than what Napoleon did in the preparation of Code Napoleon. Bhoja was one of the greatest scholars of his time, he had his own theories on poetics. He was a very keen art-critic, and composed very fine verses extempore. "In the domain of kingship, he was the best general of his time. As in Napoleon so in Bhoja, literary taste and soldierly ability were united. In the history of Hindu law, Bhoja is a landmark : with him the Mitakshara law, which reigns to-day, arose. As an architect and builder, Bhoja was one of the greatest men. He conceived the idea of turning the parched hills of the Vindhayas in Malwa into a green paradise and succeeded in doing so. His lake which, on expert calculation, covered 260 square miles, changed the climate of Malwa. In Muhammadan times when the lake was still existing, there came into vogue the saying, 'I wish, I enjoyed the night of Malwa and the morning of Benares. The nights of Malwa have ceased to be of that charm with the destruction of the lake. The lake was named 'Bhoja- pala; pal, in the language of Malwa, even to-day means the embankment of an artificial lake. Bhoja-pal is now pronounced as Bho-pal." The well known Hindi couplet ताल तो भोपाल ताल और सब तलैयां हैं । गढ़ तो चित्तोड़ गढ़ और सब गदहैयां हैं ॥ "Lakes : There is only one lake, the Bhopal lake : others are ponds of water. Chitorgarh is the only fort; others are mere fortified places," shows that the people held the Bhopal lake to be the king of the lakes of the world. 197

Maharana Kumbha. Three great personalities emerge from the events that crowd the life of the first half of the- fifteenth century of the history of Mewar. The dominating personality of the period was the great Maharana Kumbha. During his time, two other remarkable men appeared on the scene; 1. Rao Chonda, the founder of the House of Saloombar and progenitor of the Chondawats of Mewar; who in his life, illus- trated qualities, that illumine history and ennoble Rajput traditions; and 2. Rao Ranmal of Mandor, whose son Jodha founded Jodhpur and laid the foundations of the Rathod Power, which during the later Mughals was one of the principal forces to be reckoned with in Indian history. Great as Kumbha was, Rao Chonda also was a remarkable man. His nobility of mind and chivalrous character not only distinguish him from the ordinary run of chieftains in Rajputana, but have placed him amongst the noblest of Rajputs in India. Like Sri Ram Chandra of Ayodhia, one of the noblest of mortal men, and, according to the Hindus, “the perfect man,” Chonda, springing from 198