NATURE OF CHOLA STATE

PRIYANKA PANDEY

CLASS – 2A

ROLL NO. 086

MR. VIJYANT SINGH

INTRODUCTION

The characteristics of the early medieval period of the south Indian State is defined differently by
various scholars of distinct schools based on conceptual models. The models disagree on the nature of
the relationship between royal administrative organs, however defined, and intermediate or local Power
– Holders. The important contributing models are that of Imperial State model by K.N. Sastri , Marxist’s
Indian Feudalism Model of R.S. Sharma , the Segmentary State Model of Burton Stein and the
Integrative State model of B.D. Chattopadhyaya . These models focus on the relationship of state
institutions with local and intermediate arenas of power and their relationship with forms of production
and control of resources in agrarian world.1 The history of early medieval south India has to depend
upon the inscriptional data so discussion can only be tentative. The four centuries of cola rule saw the
disappearance of the last vestiges of earlier tribal society leading to various changes like Emergence of
stratified society , breakdown of communal property , feudalisation of landed relations and steady
growth of kingly power accompanied with deliberate policy of centralisation , elaborate bureaucracy ,
standing army , recording of land rights for revenue collection territorial reorganisation and control of
temple and Brahman villages.2 Around 10,000 inscriptions of cola period allow the statistical analysis
which is not possible in other areas of south India due to scarce and fragmented evidence.

The writings of pioneering scholars such as Nilkanta Sastri represented a major initiative in weaving
together the scattered data from diverse sources into a larger historical narrative. However, this narrative
was to glorify the kingdom of Cola which was represented as a highly centralized empire and
bureaucratized with a clear hierarchy which facilitates control even over the vast and diversified
geographical terrain which was under the rule of the Cholas. The cola state managed to balance the
function between centralised bureaucracy and active local assembly which foster a life sense of
citizenship and high efficiency of the level which never achieved before. Sastri also quick to identified
the cola state like Vijayanagar. He is not just the ruler but even the military head. His interpretation of it
as a military confederacy of many chieftain co- operating under the leadership of biggest among them.
He focused on conflict among the chiefs as a factor to legitimize the rule and helped in centralization
state system. Although Sastri does go into the divisions of clusters of villages which form the Nadu and
the Nadus which form Vallanadu, he basically comes back to state that all of these territorial units were
ultimately controlled by the kind because of the high degree of central authority.

The contradiction in this conception was not noticed until BOURTON STEIN made a criticism of it. He
took the idea of the segmentary state from southall’s discussion of alur society of east Africa. The basic
segments of this political system was nadu under the leadership of chiefs . The sovereignty was dual
(political and ritual) , under this system there are numerous centres of which one has primacy as a source
of ritual sovereignty but all exercise actual political control over a segment . Stein divided the zones into
central , intermediate and peripheral zones. Stein asserts that effective territorial sovereignty of the
cholas was confined to only to the central zone (rich core of kaveri delta) and beyond that region cola
sovereignty was more ritual (peripheral) which was supported by spencer and hall . There is little

1
Heitzman, J. (1995). State Formation in South India, 850-1280. In h. kulke, The State In India, 1000-1700 (pp.
162-194). New Delhi: oxford university press.

2
Subbarayalu, Y. (2012). South India Under The Cholas. (pp. 248) New Delhi: oxford university press.
chance of bureaucracy as locality institutions provided most of the administrative functions required at
the time. He denies the existence of any regular tax transfers from localities to the central government.
There is substantial evidence to assert that the king’s government could and did collect taxes from most
localities. He questions on the ground that most taxes were in kind. There were opposing groups within
nadus like agricultural – non-agricultural groups , locally dominated landed groups – subordinate ones ,
locality castes – newcomers . Many of these opposition took the concrete form in right and left caste
groupings . Stein does not concede any possibility of distinguishing officials from chiefs. The adikaris
(superior officials of the cola government ) were only lesser chief and didn’t have any administrative
functions. So power of officials was based upon their ties with dominant peasantry from which they
themselves originated. He also denied the existence of a Chola standing army, arguing that military
power was distributed among various groups including peasants, merchants and artisans.3

According to HERMANN KULKE , The multiplicity of local and regional power is the result of the
extension of monarchical state society into areas and communities tribal, non-monarchical polity.
Hermann Kulke has questioned Stein’s concept of ritual sovereignty. According to him, in a traditional
society, particularly in India, ritual sovereignty seems to be an integral part and sometimes even a pace
maker of political power. These inscriptions were documents of a systematic ritual policy which was as
much a part of the general “power policy” as for instance, economic or military policies. A key of the
segmentary state theory was also the so called Brahaman peasant alliance at the nadu. The peasant is
always known to have been exploited by the Brahaman and Kshatriya combination. The creation of
Valanadu (larger than the na

du but smaller than a mandalam) by RajaRaja and kulottunga I is an indicator of the administration
innovation and hence direct intervention by the Cola Central authority. Subbarayalu classified the cola
empire into four periods formative period (985) , the imperial period of expansion and
consolidation(985-1070) , the gradual revival of chief (1070-1178) , disintegration of cola kingdom
(1178-1270). He concludes that “segmentary idea can be applied to first phase with its communal
property , large vestiges of tribal society and small kingdoms and at imperial stage there was a private
property , well – stratified society and powerful monarchy. Feudalization followed along with decline of
kingly power”. Southall asserts that direct comparison between pre – state society of alurs and south
Indian society under colas particularly in the nadu regions , appears to be irrelevant . Southall on one
side have agreed with Richard fox and stein in their definition of cola and rajput polities as segmentary
states and on the other hand suddenly accepts Kathleen gough’s controversial definition of cola state in
terms of Asiatic mode of production.4

From about 5th century onwards , nadu was a micro region as a basic unit of agricultural community
formed in nadu called nattar. Initially it was composed of vellala peasantry but from 11 th century they
began to appear in tamil inscriptions as periyanadu(big nadu) to denote to supra nadu assembly.
Subramanyam Aiyer was the first person to study them and he asserts that these were formed under the
aegis of government and carried out the administrative functions of the state . he was criticized by

3
Subbarayalu, Y. (2012). South India Under The Cholas. (pp no.248-55) New Delhi: oxford university press.

4
kulke, H. (1995). Introduction. In H. Kulke, The state In India (1000-1700) (pp. 27-30). New Delhi: oxford
university press.
burton stein who formulated that periyanadu (supra local institutions) integrated more ancient local
bodies and didn’t replace them. Periyanadu grew into new ruling class and periyanadu associated with
merchant groups. The problem with stein that he was not able to comprehend the proper meaning of
their formation and confused periyanadu with perilmai - nadu. According to K.R. Hall , it was created
by cultivators to defend their interests against centralizing activities of chola monarch and he supported
stein for segmentary model. According to R.Champaklakshmi , periyanadu is different from nadu and
they served as a guild of agriculturists or of dealers in agricultural commodities. N. Karashima and
Subbarayalu in their recent studies concluded that number of hill tribes such as palli and surudiman
recruited to cola army during 11th century , gained power and came down to plains becoming peasants in
and after 12th century , organizing themselves into nadus , they started to form supra – local institutions
to establish their power against traditional nadus of vellalas . By forming periyanadu , vellalas tried to
defend themselves against the oppression of the state and those who cultivated land in Brahmin villages
sometimes formed organizations called perilamai – nadu against Brahmin as well as official oppression.5

RS SHARMA implied the feudalism model in south Indian state system. According to him, under
segmentary state system core areas were controlled by central kingship and peripheral areas were ruled
by many rulers thus, each ruler has its own rituals . Numerous gods and sects were not united by
homogenous rituals imposed by central kingship but by the priests who were granted lands in central
and marginal areas. migration of brahmanas in early medieval times introduced an uniformity in ritual at
regional , sub – regional and local levels. Influence of temples and brahmanas in cola kingdom didn’t
vary much from core to periphery. Brahmans were mainly landlords and shudras were mainly peasants.
Ritualistic and ideological propaganda of the Brahmans backed by agricultural knowledge and
technology which they brought from north India to the peasants made them acceptable . but their
constant presence in the granted village and their efforts to collect various types of due strained mutual
relation . There is an inscriptions dated back to 11th – 13th centuries tell about the peasant protest against
brahmana domination not only in Karnataka but also in tamil nadu.6

Earliest state formation in kaveri basin was linked with advances in agriculture and urbanism . Decline
of towns coincided with increasing number of land grants. So, these land grants indicate legitimate
authority of cola king to collect taxes from the plots of land. Immunities and privileges attached to
devadana , brahmadeya , agrahara and other grants – which shows that there arose many other feudal
pockets with fiefs , benefices and subinfeudation. The 11th century onwards trade and commerce
flourished but state still had its basis of income from agricultural surplus. In 11th , 12th , 13th centuries
collection by both led to excessive surplus collection so there was protest in various forms. All this led
to a category of rich peasants (NATTARS in tamil nadu) who played an important role in assessment
and collection of revenue which suggests their accommodation in power structure. Politically, this
development was characterized by a continuous process of fragmentation and decentralization caused by
the widespread practice of granting land to vassals and officials who established themselves as
independent potentates. Socially, in this period there was a gradual decay of the economic and social

5
N. Karashima and Y. Subbarayalu. (2004). the emergence of the periyanadu. International Journal of Asian
Studies, 87-103.

6
Sharma, R. (2003). segmentary state and the Iindian experience. In D. Jha, feudal order: State, Society, and
Ideology in Early Medieval India (pp. 137-172). New Delhi: manohar.
status of the Vaishyas and Shudras. These two Varnas eventually became indistinguishable from each
other, while the Kshatriyas and Brahmins became akin to the feudal lords of Europe. A. SOUTHALL ,
on whose formulation of segmentary model stein elaborated the state system of early medieval of south
India , defines the segmentary state as one in which sphere of political suzerainty and ritual suzerainty
are different.

JAMES HEITZMAN AND SUBBARAYALU called cola state as early state (as defined by Henri J.M.
Claessen and Peter Skalnik). It is defined as a centralised socio – political organisation for the regulation
of social relations in a complex stratified society divided into atleast two basic strata or emergent classes
namely the rulers and the ruled , whose relations are characterised by political dominance of the former
and tributary obligations of the latter , legitimised by a common ideology of which reciprocity is the
basic principle. The ideology of the early state is based upon the concept of reciprocity all the categories
of subjects provide the sovereign with goods and services while the sovereign for his part is responsible
for his subjects’ protection , law and order and bestowel of benevolences. The priesthood supports the
state ideology.7 The Cola polity was an 'early state' in the sense that its agrarian base and the political
power of its elites were at an early stage of expansion. According to Subbarayalu , many of these
characteristics may be recognised in the cola state like pivotal role of the king , complex stratified
society divided into at least two basic strata – the ruler and the ruled , full time government functionaries
doing more than one task , revenue from both tax and tribute and government tending towards the
centralisation.

There were two main policies of royal political unification- one was characteristics of ritual segmentary
state through which cola kings attempted to unite disparate and fairly autonomous local leaders under a
single , mediating agency through ritual means. And second was tightening of royal control over local
resources through recruiting elites into more bureaucratic tax collection agency and implementation of
tax collection. Due to development of kaveri river delta as agricultural tracts was important feature
underlying the hegemony of cola kings who further initiated the irrigation projects for agricultural
expansion. It expanded the imperialism in less riverine tracts and in peripheral areas. Impact of cola state
was to provide number of leaders within agrarian society of Tamil Nadu.8

KATHLEEN GOUGH (Marxist scholar) considers the cola state as an Archaic State which is second of
three stages within the state level of socio – cultural evolution (early state , archaic state and modern
industrial nation state). According to Gough early state and archaic state were characterised by a social
formation which marx called the “Asiatic Mode Of Production”. He also includes feudalism ,
particularly of western Europe and japan as a special type under the archaic state stage. To avoid the
usual criticism that the AMP MODEL implied a stagnant society , Gough suggests that a modified and
refined model of AMP would allow greater social change , social stratification and commodity
production which are actually evidenced in tanjavur area (central part of cola state). There was an AMP
in the hindu kingdoms of most of southern India prior to foreign conquest.9

7
Subbarayalu, Y. (2012). South India Under The Cholas.(Pg no. 257)New Delhi: oxford university press.

8
Heitzman, J. (1995). State Formation in South India, 850-1280. In h. kulke, The State In India, 1000-1700 . New
Delhi: oxford university press.

9
Subbarayalu, Y. (2012). South India Under The Cholas. (Pg. No. 255) New Delhi: oxford university press.
Another model proposed by B.D. Chattopadhyaya was called the integrated polity model. In this model,
he interprets the early medieval period as a ‘period of state formation’ not disintegration. It means the
transformation of pre-state polities into state polities, thus the integration of local polities into structures
that transcended the bounds of local polities. This integrative development was based on and
accompanied by a series of processes like peasantization the emergence and spatial extending of ruling
lineages by processes called Kshatriya; interspersing the dynastic domain and its hinterlands with
network of royally patronized religious institutions and land assignments to officials, etc.. Moreover,
state formation implies that there was an existence of resources capable of generating surplus.
Chattopadhyaya further argues that while land grants were important in country, they did not represent a
complete breakdown of imperial authority. He further argued that land-grants gave too much importance
under the Indian Feudalism model while other factors such as the frequent invasions and continuing
authority of the kings had been ignored.10

Kesavan Veluthat, who proposed the approach of 'south Indian feudalism' have undertaken a detailed
analysis on the political structure of early medieval south India and visualized it as a pyramidically
organized hierarchy. It was more similar to European feudal structure with the king at the top, with the
feudatory chieftains immediately below him, the local groups such as nadu, sabha, and nagaram, and the
tenants and cultivators below these groups, and finally the landless labour at the bottom. Veluthat
emphasizes that it is almost similar to lord-vassal relationship or Europe which include the
characteristics of the military obligation of the chiefs to the overlords, their obligation to attend the
overlords courts for the protection they received from the overlord, the annual tribute they paid to the
overlord and so on. According to him, there existed a decentralized State during the pre-Rajaraja period,
which was centralized during the period of Rajaraja I and it again became decentralized during the post-
Rajaraja I period. He supported Subbarayalu for increasing number of nadus from 9th century onwards
but opposed Burton stein who pointed out that it was the new recognition of cola overlordship but
According to him earlier nadus were settled in fertile areas and later nadus were in less fertile areas.11

In his early studies, Noboru Karashima analysed the nature and pattern of landholding shows the
emergence of private land holding initially in brahmadeya villages and then in non-brahmadeya villages.
With response to segmentary and peasant state model of Stein, Karashima's analyzed the contemporary
revenue terms and titles, and stated that there was a certain degree of centralization during the middle of
the Chola period. Now revenues were collected from peasants and there were state officials even at the
local levels. Efforts were made by these kings to build up a centralized administrative network to
integrate the state politically by destroying the barriers between nadus and incorporating them into the
imperial administration especially its middle period under rajaraja 1 , rajendra 1 and kulottunka 1. He
rejects the theory of south Indian feudalism particularly during the Chola as he regards the Cola period

10
Chattopadhyaya, B. (1995). Political Proccesses and the Srructure of polity. In H. Kulke, State In India 1000-
1700 (pp. 195-233). New Delhi: cambridge university press.

11
Veluthat, k. (2003). the role of nadu in the socio-political structure of south India(600-1200AD). In D. JHA, the
feudal order: State, Society and Ideology in Early Medieval India (pp. 179-197). New Delhi: Manohar.
as one when the formation of a centralized state reached a certain degree of completion, and therefore
feudalism could have come into existence only after the decline of Cola rule.12

CONCLUSION

The early medieval history of south Indian state has been debated for a long time . initially the
centralized theory was acceptable by every historians without raising any contradiction. It was only
burton stein who initiated a contradiction against this most widely acceptable view. Feudalism model
although a widely acceptable model lacks a thorough analysis of various segments. Segmentary model
has able to cover variation in early medieval south India by burton stein but he was not able to defend
his facts by appropriate evidences and he also ignores several facts to make his arguments correct.
Bureaucratic model of B.D. Chattopadhyaya tries to criticize both fragmentation and segmentation
model but still it’s a static theory that asserts that there has been a process continued from ancient times
to that date without any change in state authority.

Bibliography
Chattopadhyaya, B. (1995). Political Proccesses and the Srructure of polity. In H. Kulke, State In India 1000-1700
(pp. 195-233). New Delhi: cambridge university press.

Heitzman, J. (1995). State Formation in South India, 850-1280. In h. kulke, The State In India, 1000-1700 (pp.
162-194). New Delhi: oxford university press.

karashima, N. (2003). Private landholding in late cola period. In D. Jha, feudal order: State, Society, and Ideology
in Early Medieval India. New Delhi: manohar.

kulke, H. (1995). Introduction. In H. Kulke, The state In India (1000-1700) (pp. 27-30). New Delhi: oxford
university press.

N. Karashima and Y. Subbarayalu. (2004). the emergence of the periyanadu. International Journal of Asian
Studies, 87-103.

Subbarayalu, Y. (2012). South India Under The Cholas. New Delhi: oxford university press.

Veluthat, k. (2003). the role of nadu in the socio-political structure of south India(600-1200AD). In D. JHA, the
feudal order: State, Society and Ideology in Early Medieval India (pp. 179-197). New Delhi: Manohar.

12
karashima, N. (2003). Private landholding in late cola period. In D. Jha, feudal order: State, Society, and
Ideology in Early Medieval India. New Delhi: manohar.