Painting picture courtesy Christie's Auction House Sometimes, a painting begins to ask more questions than it answers. A late eighteenth-century painting, attributed to the Mandi school and catalogued as showing Raja Sansar Chand of Kangra with a courtier, has intrigued me for some time. At first glance, the identification appears straightforward enough. Two men sit opposite each other, smoking hookahs, while attendants stand behind them holding fly-whisks. One figure is dressed in red, the other in white. The scene is informal, almost intimate, and yet unmistakably courtly. But the more I looked at the painting, the less convinced I became that the red-clad figure was Sansar Chand. The reason came from looking at other portraits. Among the surviving paintings associated with the Mandi court are several portraits of Raja Surma Sen, who ruled Mandi from 1781 until his death in 1788. One such portrait shows him seated smoking a hookah, attended by a fly-whisk bearer. Another depicts ...
Kullu is globally known for its vibrant gathering of the various devatas of Kullu valley, all coming to visit the royal family at the time of Dussehra. The royal family have been hosting the idol of Raghunath ji or Sri Rama at the Raghunath temple of Kullu. These devatas, or local deities, are all invited into the Ramchandra darbar by the royal family of Kullu as per tradition. While the festival is recorded to be at least from the 16th century. However, few people know that Kullu is the oldest state after Punjab and Kangra, known in the past as Kuluta. The oldest reference to the state comes from a coin issued by a certain Virayasa, the king who had it issued, dating back to 1-2 CE, as pointed out by Parmeshwari Lal Gupta and Hutchison and Vogel earlier. References to the state comes in the Mahabharata as the tribe north of the Kuru kingdom, alongside the Trigarta and the Kashmir kingdoms.
It is however the reference in the Rajataramgini of Kalhana that we have an interesting episode mentioned, one that I would like to specify here. Around the 6th century A.D., as Kalhana records, there was a certain king Ratisena of the Cholas, who sent his daughter Ranarambha to the residence of his friend, the then king of Kuluta, and where Ranaditya, the king of Kashmir at the time 'went with joy to that not distant land' to receive her. As this incident, highlighted by Hutchison and Vogel, indicates, there were perhaps indications of a larger pan India alliance developed between the Cholas and the Gonandiya Dynasty ruling at the time in Kashmir, but also indicating a position of minor importance for the state of Kuluta. This is an interesting point of reference - little is known of the Chola kings during this period, though it is broadly accepted that the Cholas were at their lowest ebb politically for three centuries starting with the 6th century A.D. Therefore, to find a reference to the Cholas in the North Indian texts at the time is quite surprising. This Ranarambha, according to Rajatarangini, went on to become the queen of Kashmir by marrying Ranaditya. However, it was in Kuluta, a supposed feudatory of the Kashmir king, that the two met before their union.
It is however the reference in the Rajataramgini of Kalhana that we have an interesting episode mentioned, one that I would like to specify here. Around the 6th century A.D., as Kalhana records, there was a certain king Ratisena of the Cholas, who sent his daughter Ranarambha to the residence of his friend, the then king of Kuluta, and where Ranaditya, the king of Kashmir at the time 'went with joy to that not distant land' to receive her. As this incident, highlighted by Hutchison and Vogel, indicates, there were perhaps indications of a larger pan India alliance developed between the Cholas and the Gonandiya Dynasty ruling at the time in Kashmir, but also indicating a position of minor importance for the state of Kuluta. This is an interesting point of reference - little is known of the Chola kings during this period, though it is broadly accepted that the Cholas were at their lowest ebb politically for three centuries starting with the 6th century A.D. Therefore, to find a reference to the Cholas in the North Indian texts at the time is quite surprising. This Ranarambha, according to Rajatarangini, went on to become the queen of Kashmir by marrying Ranaditya. However, it was in Kuluta, a supposed feudatory of the Kashmir king, that the two met before their union.
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