Battle of Talikota and FALL OF MIGHTY VIJAYNAGAR EMPIRE

The classic case of horde of dogs killing a lion. Vijayanagar was, to some extent, consciously represented by its sovereigns as the last bastion of Hinduism against the forces of Islam. Vijayanagara Empire the most unassailable and prosperous empire in South India for the next two hundred-odd years thus stood as the sweeping and insurmountable political Vindhya shielding the entire South India from the relentless and barbaric depredations of Muslim armies. If Abhijata (pristine) Hinduism continues to survive in whatever form in South India today, the entire credit for it still rests on the shoulders of this Empire for building such a sturdy foundation way back in the mid14th Century CE. One can still witness the numerous evidences of this grandeur in the temples built during that era (some of which continue to flourish even today), in Dharmic rituals, endowments, holdovers of administrative concepts, in the arts, in the way festivals are celebrated (Mysore Dussera being the greatest and world-renowned example) and so on. The period during which the foundations for the Vijayanagara Empire were laid by the Intrepid Harihara and Bukkaraya (known as the Sangama Brothers) under the spiritual guidance of Maharshi Vidyaranya was truly happening and exciting. Not only did they lead from the front but inspired countless others to do the same. The glory that was scripted by the Tapas of Maharshi Vidyaranya and ably executed by the intrepid gallantry of Harihara, Bukka and Kumara Kampana’s exploits culminated more than two hundred years later in the sweeping desolation of Hampi. The cataclysm of Hampi is the eternal warning of the deep and fundamental values of culture and civilisation, of history, of reason, of common sense, and of the stupor induced by prosperity. And this is the warning that Hampi will tell every “tourist” who will pause and listen to that cautionary voice behind this desolation.

Under Vijayanagar rule, temples, which exhibited such singularly imperial features as huge enclosures and entrance gateways (gopuras), emerged as major political arenas. Monastic organizations (mathas) representing various religious traditions also became focal points of local authority, often closely linked with the Nayaka chieftaincies. A fairly elaborate and specialized infrastructure underlay these diverse local and regional religio-political forms. Vijayanagar the city was a symbol of vast power and wealth. It was a royal ceremonial and administrative centre and the nexus of trade routes. Foreign travellers and visitors were impressed by the variety and quality of commodities that reached the city, by the architectural grandeur of the palace complex and temples, and by the ceremonial significance of the annual Mahanavami celebrations, at which the Nayakas and other chiefs assembled to pay tribute. The shifting patterns of alliances among Vijayanagar and the sultanates, the occasions on which a rival party of nobles or a claimant to the throne of Vijayanagar would enlist the aid of a Muslim sultan, and the employment of both Hindus and Muslims in the sultanates and in Vijayanagar.

The Battle of Talikota (23 January 1565) was a watershed battle fought between the Vijayanagara Empire and the Deccan sultanates. The Hindu Vijyanagara empire had multiple Muslim sultanates in the neighbourhood. They were Ahmednagar, Bidar, Berar, Bijapur and Golconda The battle took place at Talikota, today a town in northern Karnataka, about 80 kilometres (50 mi) to the southeast from the city of Bijapur.. The Muslim Sultanates to the north of Vijayanagara united and attacked Aliya Rama Raya's army, on 23 January 1565, in an engagement known as the Battle of Talikota. The armies clashed on the plains near the villages of Rakkasagi and Tangadigi (it is also known as the Battle of Rakkasa-Tangadi).The Vijayanagara army was winning the battle, state Hermann Kulke and Dietmar Rothermund, but suddenly two Muslim generals of the Vijayanagara army switched sides and turned their loyalty to the united Sultanates. They captured Aliya Rama Raya and beheaded him on the spot, with Sultan Hussain on the Sultanates side joining them. The beheading of Rama Raya created confusion and havoc and in the still loyal portions of the Vijayanagara army, which were then completely routed. The greatest factor was the betrayal of the Vijaynagara Army by two Muslim commanders (Gilani Brothers). At the critical point of the war, Muslim officers in the Vijayanagara army launched a subversive attack. Suddenly Aliya Rama Raya found himself surprised when the two Muslim divisions in his ranks turned against him. The defeat of Vijayanagara Empire, followed subsequent destruction and looting which became short lived before the successors of Rama Raya. The Sultanates' army  plundered Hampi and reduced it into ruins. The battle spelled the death knell for the large Hindu kingdoms in India, ending the last great southern empire in India. A victorious army, along with hordes of robbers and jungle dwellers, fell upon the great city, looting, robbing, murdering, and pillaging the residents. With axes, crowbars, fire, and sword, the victorious armies went about the task of bringing to rubble the city of Vijayanagara, which never recovered from the onslaught. The Forgotten Empire, concludes thus – "With fire and sword, with crowbars and axes, they carried on day after day their work of destruction. Never perhaps in the history of the world has such havoc been wrought, and wrought so suddenly, on so splendid a city; teeming with a wealthy and industrious population in the full plenitude of prosperity one day, and on the next seized, pillaged, and reduced to ruins, amid scenes of savage massacre and horrors beggaring description." Even after Muslim sultanates defeated the armies of the Vijayanagara empire in the 1560’s C.E., devastating the royal city and sacred sites, Hinduism remained the strongest religion of the Indian continent. The ruins of Hampi are a testimony to the plunder and pillage which followed after that, bringing an end of the glorious chapter of the great Hindu empire of South India. The battle spelled the death knell for the large Hindu kingdoms in India, ending the last great southern empire in India. The grand Hampi was reduced to a wasteland. Even today, it is known by the tragic Kannada moniker, Haalu Hampi (Ruined Hampi). And this is how Hampi was reduced from being the global centre of awesome wealth and refined culture to merely becoming a tourist spot.

The extremely gifted Queen of Kumara Kampana, poetess extraordinaire, Gangadevi who gives us a valuable account of the condition of the period: -

 “O King! The city, which is called Madhurapuri for its honeyed loveliness, has now become the city of cruel beasts; it now lives up to its earlier name of Vyaghrapuri, the city of tigers because humans don’t dwell there (anymore). Those temples of Gods, which used to reverberate with the sacred melody of the mridangam, now echo the dreadful howls of jackals. In the Brahmin Quarters [Agraharams] of our city, huge columns of smoke emanating from the scared Yagnas used to rise up and reach the skies amid the sacred Vedic chants but alas! today those selfsame Quarters send up wretched stenches of meat roasted by the Turushkas; the Vedic chants are today replaced by the beastly cacophonies of drunken hoodlums. During the days of Pandyas, our women used to bathe in [river] Taamraparni, whose waters turned white from the sandal-paste applied to their breasts. My lord! Now she’s coloured only in red from the currents of blood flowing into her from all the cows slaughtered by its wicked occupiers all over the country. O King! I cannot bear to look at the countenance of those Dravida ladies who were bounteously endowed with beauty. Ravished horribly by the scourging Turushkas, these delicate women now sport lifeless lips and exhale hot breaths, and their abundant tresses that have come undone are painful to the eyes. I don’t have the words to describe the suffering and dishonour painted on their faces, which know neither redemption nor protection.”

One account says that it took twelve days to count the dead bodies that lay in the region from “Ali Kandi” to Vijayanagara and pegs the number of people killed at Ten Lakh.

 “The warriors of Islam chased them and slaughtered everyone in sight. An area spanning about twenty miles was littered with dead bodies, the earth bloody. The victorious soldiers of Islam took untold riches in the form of coins, jewellery and slaves: both male and female”.

Nizam Shah immediately chopped off Rama Raya’s head, affixed it to the tip of a spear and had it paraded outside. The sight of the slain Raya’s head propelled a full-blown retreat of the Vijayanagara army. However, they were unable to flee very far. The morale of the Muslim army which had redoubled after Rama Raya’s death now reached a feverish heat of murderous passion when it spotted the Hindu army retreating. The Sultans thanked Allah for this grand victory and remained at the scene of the battle for twenty days. Once the battle wounds had healed, they marched to Hampi vowing vengeance. They decimated the tall, grand buildings, temples, expansive houses with their equally vast private gardens that housed animals and exquisite birds, and burned everything in sight and plundered Vijayanagara’s wealth with unimpeded abandon. Perhaps for the first time in its history, South India witnessed the savage and thorough extent of the practice and ultimate success of Jihad. In the six months that the Bahamani coalition was camped in Vijayanagara, every single house, temple, building and habitation “in a radius spanning twenty leagues was burned down.”

At the time of Battle of Talikota, Sadasiva Raya was the ruler of Vijaynagar kingdom. But he was a puppet ruler. The real power was exercised by his minister Rama Raya. Alia Rama Raya, the son-in-law of Krishnadevaraya. Rama Raya was a valiant commander, a tactful and fearsome warrior who had led several successful campaigns under Krishnadevaraya. He was also an able administrator and a skilful diplomat. Rama Raya was also endowed with a fatal flaw: an unquenchable thirst for power, haughtiness and overconfidence in his own abilities. He was also given to excessive sensual indulgence.  

The administration of the kingdom sporadically achieved a relatively high degree of centralization, although centrifugal tendencies regularly appeared. The central administration had both a revenue and a military side, but the actual business of raising taxes and troops was mostly the responsibility of the provincial governors and their subordinates. The central government maintained a relatively small body of troops, but it assigned a value to the lands held by the provincial governors and determined the number of troops that were to be supplied from the revenues of each province. This administrative plan led to the development of the “nayankara” system, in which prominent commanders received land grants and privileged status, becoming Nayakas (local lords or governors). The system, which has been characterized as a kind of military feudalism, worked well enough when the central authority was strong but provided territorial bases for the Nayakas to build semi-independent hereditary holdings in times of imperial weakness Anarchy spread during that time. Aliya Rama Rayas' practice of nominating family relatives to key positions of the former kingdom, instead of loyal officers, fuelled family feuds and rebellion. On the whole, however, the device was not successful, because succession rivalries, as in the Muslim kingdoms to the north, tended to produce filial disloyalty to the throne and even rebellion. Polygar (Palyagar) system (local chieftains), which had been so successful earlier, became the source of break-away factions. The Nayaks of Tamil-speaking regions; Gingee, Madurai Nayaks, and Tanjore Nayaks exercised their independence, Tirumala Deva Raya having to tacitly accept the independence of those Nayakas to keep their friendship in an hour of impending invasions from Bijapur. The various progressive reforms of the Vijayanagar army suggest also that efforts were made to transform at least one aspect of the state in order to make it more competitive with its Muslim and other rivals.  Although Rama Raya’s efforts toward centralization were not entirely successful, it was his military policies that ultimately led to disaster. There were rebellions when he replaced many members of the old nobility with relatives and close associates, but they appear to have been no more serious than many other rebellions of previous periods under similar circumstances. Indeed, judging on the basis of the number and size of the military campaigns that Rama Raya was able to launch outside Vijayanagar in later years, it would seem that his internal control was relatively secure. Rama Raya has been criticized for allowing Muslims to hold important positions within his administration, and, although his final defeat at Talikota was at least partly attributable to the defection of two of his Muslim generals. As early as 1535 he had hired 3,000 Muslim soldiers from Bijapur, and he later tried to make the Vijayanagar state apparatus more like that of the neighbouring Muslim states. In short, he was building a state that would be as competitive as possible in that time and place. Rama Raya’s military successes and his skill in diplomacy, together with his arrogance in the knowledge that Vijayanagar was stronger than any one of the sultanates, led to the Muslim alliance against him. He tried to crush the power of Deccan sultanates by creating difference amongst them. However, the Deccan sultanates got a hint of his plan and formed an alliance against Vijayanagar kingdom. Soon, they attacked the kingdom and looted and destroyed everything after entering the capital. The Vijayanagara empire, possessing such military power, a vigorous economy, powerful religious traditions, and natural defensive features, fell to the Muslim sultanates after only two centuries is puzzling. Overconfidence and arrogance may have been the reason for the down fall of the Vijayanagar empire and the sack of Vijayanagara.

Its Consequences

1.    The battle of Talikota ended the prominence of Viajaynagar kingdom in South Indian politics. The Battle of Talikota did not result in the destruction of the kingdom of Vijayanagar, although the capital city never fully recovered from the ravages it suffered. Rama Raya’s brother Tirumala established a new headquarters at Penukonda and attempted to rebuild the army. Bows, arrows and javelin of Deccan Sultanates were far superior to those of Vijayanagara’s. 

2.    The Kingdom of Mysore, Nayakas of Vellore, Nayakas of Keladi in Shimoga declared their independence from Vijayanagar. Much of the south and southeast was lost, however, as the Nayakas of Madura, Thanjavur (Tanjore), and Jinji effectively asserted their independence. Rebellions and banditry arose in many areas. Tirumala appealed to Ni?ām Shah of Ahmadnagar for aid against a Bijapuri invasion that reached Penukonda. He then joined with Ahmadnagar and Golconda in a campaign against Bijapur. Tirumala accepted the new states of the Nayakas of the south, retained the allegiance of Mysore and Keladi, and appointed his three sons as governors of the three linguistic regions of his kingdom—Telugu, Kannada, and Tamil. In 1570 he had himself crowned and thus officially inaugurated the Aravidu dynasty, the fourth and last dynasty of Vijayanagar.

3.  The Muslim Sultanates of Deccan could not gain much out of this victory because they soon engaged themselves in fighting among themselves and fell easy prey to the Mughals.

Causes of Vijaynagar’s defeat

1.    Vijaynagar lost the battle because of lesser number of cavalry as compared with Deccan Sultanates. while the Vijayanagara armies had relatively lesser number of cavalry on horseback and depended on commanders riding war elephants making them slower on battlefield, the Sultanate armies had many more swift Persian horses used by key sections of the army and commanders. That gave the them an edge. Second, all of the three main commanders of the Vijayanagara army, including Aliya Rama Raya, had been elderly, whereas the Sultanate armies had younger commanders.

2.    Aliya Rama Raya’s conduct of war and lack of leadership: - A supremely overconfident Rama Raya continued to remain unperturbed. Adil Shah conferred with his allies and sought their permission to conduct the war by stealth. Adil Shah ordered his men to adopt this strategy: pretend to attempt crossing the river at a few points and then turn back and then actually try to cross the river from a different place. When the Vijayanagara army witnessed this, they realised that the enemy’s attempts were futile and abandoned their existing positions, thereby falling neatly into the enemy’s trap. Adil Shah’s strategy proved hugely successful. The Bahamani army quickly tied up the canons with strong chains. In his cocksure certainty that this was a minor battle, Rama Raya had not even made a Plan B, forget a contingency plan. Neither did he learn any lesson when he saw that he was outwitted. He led from the front and ordered his army to randomly attack the Bahamani force. There was no strategy, no discipline.Even worse, he didn’t heed the advice of his ministers who had pleaded with him to to mount a horse. Instead Rama Raya sat in his throne on the elephant. He bombastically motivated his soldiers with the war cry

3.    The Deccan sultanates had more sophisticated weapons in comparison to Vijaynagar kingdom. While the Vijayanagara infantry depended on bows made of bamboo, the Sultanate armies used crossbows made of metal, which proved more accurate, gave greater distance, and, ultimatley, more lethal. In addition, the Vijayanagara army felt overconfident, using seven foot long spears and javelins while the Sultanate armies used fifteen foot long spears while riding horseback, giving them a clear advantage.

4.    The Deccan sultanates were better in artillery warfare. the Sultanate armies had a much better prepared artillery division manned by gunners from Turkestan, at that time considered the best at artillery warfare, while Vijayanagara depended on less well trained European mercenaries. They used a monster cannon at rama raya where by his elephant was blown off and he was greviously injured. They called it the “malik-e-maidan” This was erected by Ibrahim Adil Shah II. This cannon was built by a Turkish officer in the Ahmednagar kingdom. The inscriptions on the cannon say that it was cast by Muhammad bin Hasan Rumi in 1549. Aurangzeb added an inscription after he conquered the city, recording his victory. The muzzle is shaped like a lion's head with the jaws open and sharp teeth digging into an elephant, It was named after the Battle of Talikota of 1565 in which the Vijayangar Empire was routed. The Malik-i-Maidan is stated to be the largest piece of cast bronze ordnance in the world. With a diameter of 1.5 meters, and weighing 55 tons, this is a giant! It is a huge gun made from bell metal caused havoc at the Battle of Talikota in 1565. 

5.    The biggest reason of Vijaynagar’s defeat was the betrayal of two key commanders in Vijaynagar kingdom known as Gilani brothers. historians agree that the betrayal by two key Vijayanagara commanders, the Gilani brothers, who had thousands of soldiers under their command, stood as the biggest reason for the defeat. Those commanders had defected from the Adil Shahi kingdom and later had been employed by Aliya Rama Raya. The Gilani brothers fled the battlefield at a key juncture. They were the main commanders and joined Rama Raya after defecting from the Adil Shahi kingdom some time ago. They were poached by Deccan Sultanates; this fact has been strongly supported by the writings of two European travelers, Frendricci and Frenchman Anquetil Du Perron, who visited Vijayanagar in 1567 C.E.

Kannada country lost its united identity for the coming four centuries, through the creation of smaller states such as the Kingdom of Mysore, Keladi Nayakas, Nayakas of Chitradurga, the latter two eventually merging with the Kingdom of Mysore. For the Sultanates and Muslim rulers of the south, victory seemed temporary, as they continued to engage in squabbling and fighting amongst themselves which ultimately resulted in their capitulation to the Mughals and later the British Empire. Some Kannada-speaking regions became part of Hyderabad Karnataka ruled by the Nizam of Hyderabad and Bombay Presidency governed by Maratha chieftains all of whom came under the British umbrella.

The key lessons learnt from this most tragic episode in Hindu history after the third battle of Panipat are as follows:-

1.    The leaders should be humble visionary and a strategist and extremely alert and never be arrogant, morally decedent, despite being personally Valliant and brilliant. The leader is a deciding factor in any conflict, statecraft or organisation.

2.    Never sacrifice meritocracy for sycophancy or dynastic rule or appointment. Nepotism and favouritism kill the vigour of the army or organisation and promotes incompetence and factionism. 

3.    Strong centralised rule is more stable against the external aggression, country should be abreast of latest essential military technology and good battlefield preparation and good alert intelligence and shouldn’t underestimate any threat.

4.    Pseudo-secularism and inclusion of the enemy forces and even people from opposite ideology and belligerent all-inclusiveness can do you terminal harm and damage. All defectors from the opposite cam should be treated with caution and limited disguised suspicion as possible infiltrators and spies.

5.     Rama Raya was beheaded by same Ali Adil shah whom he nurtured for ages and protected him from his enemies, you should be careful of the type of people you should trust and help.

6.    Prepare your next generation to lead and take command and not restrict the leadership to only aging and geriatric group, next chain of unbroken command would have very clear succession strategies and in kinetic situation this helps immensely. Not even the most gifted warrior or leader is immortal. The younger generation is very fast to take initiative and agile and adaptive.

7.    Never let you enemies unite against you, this has been a disaster for all autocrats in all centuries right upto world war 2. This is what did in Hitler, Napoleon, Rama Raya. You should ally with one enemy and destroy others and use diplomacy and deception.

8.    Use of strategy, foresight, deception and tactical innovation is an art of war and politics and in life and must never be forgotten and one shouldn’t succumb to enemies deception and let your guard down. Always plan in advance for any contingency. 

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