THE REGIONAL KINGDOMS OF EARLY MEDIEVAL INDIAencroach upon Shrivijaya’s sphere of interest in Malaya, sent a chariot as a
present to the Chola ruler in order to protect his own royal fortune
(atmalakshmi). It is difficult to decide whether the king of Cambodia felt
threatened by the emerging power of the Cholas or by their Southeast
Asian rival in Shrivijaya. There was obviously an increasing competition
for trade and trade routes that was stimulated by the Chinese embassies.
The Cholas and the Southeast Asian rulers probably vied with each other
for shares of the market. Rajendra’s inscriptions indicate that Chola
relations with Shrivijaya and Cambodia were friendly in the period from
1014 to 1019. The reasons for the Chola expedition of 1025 against
Shrivijaya can, therefore, only be explained if more relevant sources are
discovered. But this military venture was certainly the climax of a period of
intense competition. It was obviously ‘a continuation of diplomacy by
other means’, to quote the famous dictum of the Prussian general Karl von
Clausewitz.
Rajendra’s exploits in the Gulf of Bengal and in Southeast Asia did not
lead to permanent annexations of territory there. But the influence of the
Cholas and of South Indian merchants was felt in Southeast Asia
throughout the eleventh century. In 1068 to 1069, after Shrivijaya had
again sent an embassy to China, the Chola fleet intervened once more in
the affairs of the island empire. A Chola inscription recorded that their
troops conquered a large part of Malaya ‘at the behest of the king who had
asked for help and to whom the country was returned’. It seems that the
Cholas had taken sides in a dynastic struggle, supporting the claims of the
legitimate ruler. The Chinese got a wrong impression of this whole affair
and mentioned the Cholas as tributary princes of the Shrivijaya empire in
the Chinese imperial annals in subsequent years. Perhaps they were
deliberately misled by ambassadors of Shrivijaya. The misunderstanding
was corrected only in 1077 when the Chola ruler, Kulottunga I, dispatched
an embassy of seventy-two merchants to China. A Tamil inscription of
1088, unfortunately badly damaged, provides evidence for the presence of
a South Indian merchants’ guild in Sumatra at that time.
In the following year the ruler of Shrivijaya sent two ambassadors to the
Chola court and at their request Kulottunga specifically reconfirmed the
donations made to the monastery at Nagapatam, which had been
established in 1005. Diplomatic relations with Cambodia were also
resumed. The king of Angkor, presumably Suryavarman II, the builder of
Angkor Vat, sent a precious jewel to Kulottunga who then donated it to
the temple of Chidambaram in 1114. Even the Burmese king, Kyanzittha
(1086–1113), wrote a letter on golden leaves to a Chola prince. All these
bits and pieces of information show that Kulottunga’s long reign (c. 1070–
1120) was a time of peaceful diplomatic relations with Southeast Asia
which must have enabled the great merchant guilds of South India to
conduct their international business undisturbed.