Rajendra Choda II (Velanati)

Rajendra Choda II was the son of Gonka II and Sabbambika.¹ His copper plates call him a general and vassal of the Chola king Rajaraja II.² P. V. Parabrahma Sastry thought his death in 1181 opened the coast to the Kakatiyas.³⁴ See Gonka II and the Velanati Chodas.

The copper plates

He is best known from a set of five copper plates.² The tahsildar (revenue officer of a taluk) of Bapatla lent them to the Government Epigraphist in 1917.² Their seal bears the legend “Sri-Tribhuvanankusa”, with the Chola tiger above and the Chalukya boar below.²

The plates call Rajendra Choda a general and vassal of the Chola–Chalukya king Rajaraja II.² They say that he killed Bhima of Kolanandu, which H. Krishna Sastri thought might be Kolanu.² They also say that Rajaraja gave him the Andhra country bounded by the eastern ocean, the Kalahasti hill, the Mahendra mountain and Srisailam.² He received it “with all the insignia of a feudatory chief”.²

While staying at Dhanadapuri, which Krishna Sastri identified with Tsandavolu, he granted the village of Inungarru to a Brahman.¹ The grant was made in Saka 1091 (Saka is an Indian way of counting years), the twenty-third year of Rajaraja’s reign.¹

Earlier readings

E. Hultzsch’s earlier edition of the Pithapuram inscription had already described a Velanati chief who killed a certain Bhima.⁵⁶ This Bhima had taken refuge on an island in a lake, which Hultzsch thought was probably the Kolleru.⁵⁶ He noted that this chief made rich gifts to the Bhimesvara temple at Draksharama.⁵⁶

Hultzsch, however, gave the records of 1163–1180 to Prithvisvara.⁷ Krishna Sastri’s reading of these copper plates moved them to Rajendra Choda II.¹ Robert Sewell’s table gives him the dates 1163 to 1180 and calls him a general of Rajaraja Chola II.⁸

Rama Rao’s account

M. Rama Rao, writing in 1930, called him “the last of the great chieftains of the Velnadu”.⁹ He wrote that the Kona country was annexed in this reign.⁹ He also wrote that the general Jellaya put down a rising of the Konidena Telugu Chodas under Kannaradeva Choda.⁹ In his view the loss of the Tripurantakam region to the Kakatiya Rudradeva began the break-up of the Velanati lands.⁹

Rama Rao named three queens of Rajendra Choda II, among them Pandamba and Akkambika, the last a princess of the Kondapadmati family.⁹ Rama Rao took Gonka III to be the son of Rajendra Choda II and Akkama, and argued that the two ruled jointly from 1170 to 1181.¹⁰

Parabrahma Sastry’s account

P. V. Parabrahma Sastry dated his reign from 1162 to 1181.⁴¹¹ He described him as loyal to the Chola king Rajaraja II while that king lived.⁴¹¹ After Rajaraja’s death in 1172, he wrote, Rajendra Choda threw off Chola rule.⁴¹¹ He made himself master of the whole seaboard from Darsi to Simhachalam.⁴¹¹

Parabrahma Sastry also cited a record of one of Rajendra Choda’s generals.¹² It records a battle with Karnata armies at Kocherlakota in 1170.¹²

In his view the Kakatiya Rudradeva could not extend his rule over the coast while Rajendra Choda was supreme at Chandavolu.³⁴ Rajendra Choda’s unexpected death in 1181, together with the civil war in the Palnadu, gave Rudradeva his chance.³⁴ See the Haihayas and Rudradeva.

Footnotes

1. Annual Report on Epigraphy, Madras, for 1916–17 (1917), Part II, para. 27, p. 120 (archive.org↗ (opens in a new tab)). ↩ ↩² ↩³ ↩⁴

2. Annual Report on Epigraphy, Madras, for 1916–17 (G.O. No. 1035, Home (Education), 10 August 1917), Part II, paras. 26–27, pp. 118–119 (archive.org↗ (opens in a new tab)). ↩ ↩² ↩³ ↩⁴ ↩⁵ ↩⁶ ↩⁷ ↩⁸

3. Parabrahma Sastry, The Kakatiyas of Warangal (1978), p. 96. ↩ ↩² ↩³

4. Parabrahma Sastry, The Kakatiyas of Warangal (1978), p. 98. ↩ ↩² ↩³ ↩⁴ ↩⁵ ↩⁶ ↩⁷

5. E. Hultzsch, “Pithapuram Pillar Inscription of Prithvisvara; Saka-Samvat 1108”, Epigraphia Indica IV (1897), p. 36 (archive.org↗ (opens in a new tab)). ↩ ↩² ↩³

6. Hultzsch, “Pithapuram Inscription of Prithvisvara” (1897), p. 37 (archive.org↗ (opens in a new tab)). ↩ ↩² ↩³

7. Hultzsch, “Pithapuram Inscription of Prithvisvara” (1897), pp. 38–39 (archive.org↗ (opens in a new tab)). ↩

8. Robert Sewell, The Historical Inscriptions of Southern India (1932), p. 399 (archive.org↗ (opens in a new tab)). Paraphrased. ↩

9. M. Rama Rao, “History of the Velnadu Chiefs”, Journal of the Andhra Historical Research Society V, pt. 2 (October 1930), p. 71 (archive.org↗ (opens in a new tab)). ↩ ↩² ↩³ ↩⁴ ↩⁵

10. Rama Rao, “History of the Velnadu Chiefs” (1930), p. 72 (archive.org↗ (opens in a new tab)). ↩

11. Parabrahma Sastry, The Kakatiyas of Warangal (1978), p. 150. ↩ ↩² ↩³ ↩⁴

12. P. V. Parabrahma Sastry, The Kakatiyas of Warangal (1978), p. 94. ↩ ↩²