Modern Cholas: Part 2

In Part 1, we saw how the Rashtrakutas decided to teach the upstart Parantaka Chola a lesson. They defeated the Cholas in battle and plundered Tamil Nadu. The Cholas retreated to the Kaveri Delta and remained quiet for the next 25 years.

The Rashtrakutas had been the most dangerous gang in India for the preceding 200 years. However, right around this time, a warlord from their northern frontier defeated the Rashtrakuta King and ransacked their capital. This severely weakened the dynasty and created a power vacuum south of the Vindhyas. The Cholas had nothing to do with the fall of the Rashtrakutas; they simply took advantage of it.

The period following the fall of the Rashtrakutas—covering the reigns of Uttama, Rajaraja, and Rajendra Chola—marks the peak of Chola Inc. This era was characterized by the accumulation of immense wealth through two primary revenue streams:

• Plunder: Without the Rashtrakutas, there was nobody to stop them. They plundered in all directions. They moved north to loot Gangavadi and Rashtrakuta territory. On the northeastern flank, they traveled up the coast as far as Bengal, looting along the way. The ocean ceased to be a barrier; they crossed the Indian Ocean on trading ships to plunder Indonesia and Malaysia. To the south, they raided Pandya territory and Sri Lanka. To the west, they plundered Chera territory and reached the Arabian Sea. Each of these raids brought back enormous amounts of wealth to the Chola warlord and his retainers.

• Protection Racket: The Cholas set up the most efficient system in millennia to extract "protection money" (aka land revenue) from Tondai Nadu, Nadu Nadu, and the Kaveri Delta. Prior to Uttama Chola, if a farmer produced 100 sacks of rice from his one-acre plot, he paid 10 sacks to the local warlord as protection money and another 10 to the local Nadu assembly (think state government or union dues) for basic services like canal building. Over the reigns of the next three kings, the Cholas successfully dismantled these centuries-old Nadu institutions and local loyalties to the warlords. Instead, they established a highly efficient revenue secretariat that cut out the middlemen and directed the entire 20 sacks of rice into the Chola coffers. The closest modern-day analogy is the way the Indian central government replaced state-level VAT with a centralized GST.

• Customs and Licensing Fees: This is best explained with the 500 guild. This was a multinational guild of merchants with its own flag, private armies and code of conduct. They paid the king customs tax whenever their ships entered the port. Further, they paid the king regular payments for setting up markets in towns.  But, it is very unclear who controlled whom.  It might not be a stretch to view the Cholas as the military arm of the guild. When they raided Chera terittory they burnt the ships and that likely helped the traders in the guild. Cholas raided Sri Lanka based on intelligence from a trade. After the raid, the merchants of the 500 exploited the pearl fisheries and paid handsome custom duties to the Cholas. For the Indonesia raid, the merchant ships likely carried the Chola army. Long after the armies were gone the merchants were still there harvesting camphor from Indonesia and importing it into India. 

Reinvesting the Profits

The money collected through taxes and plunder was primarily invested in three ways: building better infrastructure to harness the Kaveri River, maintaining a large permanent army, and constructing massive temples. I use the word investment rather than expense because these choices grew the two core revenue streams.

The first two investments are pretty obvious. Better water infrastructure meant the same acre of land produced more sacks, increasing the overall pie; the Cholas got more rice, and the farmer kept more for himself.

A larger, permanent army was a major factor in sidelining small warlords and the Nadus to directly collect all of the land revenue. If anybody resisted, the Velaikkara regiment would come knocking the next morning. Furthermore, with a permanent army, looting and plundering were always "in season." You dont need to take a break during harvest or sowing season. We have already seen how the plundering helped the 500 merchant guild extend the business and fill the Chola coffers with customs duty. In fact, the likely driving force for crossing the Bay of Bengal and harassing Indonesia was to dominate the sea routes with China. 

The temples are the most interesting investments. Sembiyan Mahadevi renovated nearly 20 temples, and Rajaraja another 50. Rajaraja built the massive Thanjavur Periya Kovil, and his son, Rajendra Chola, tried to one-up him with an even larger temple at his new capital, Gangaikondacholapuram. To be honest, I find the "temple as an investment" argument that historian Anirudh Kanisetti lays out to be somewhat tenuous. As we will see, the benefits were long-term, indirect, and intangible, and it is unclear if these were ROI-positive purely from a monetary perspective. The Cholas most likely patronized temples because they truly believed it brought them closer to God—or, perhaps these large temples were vanity projects designed to immortalize their names.

Whether intended or not, these temples did positively contribute to the Chola revenue streams in a few different ways:

1. Centralizing Power: Imagine a set of villages far from Thanjavur. They had no idea who this Chola warlord was. For centuries, they had known only their local warlord and had paid their dues to him. That warlord might have "kissed the ring" and given a portion of his take to the Cholas, but how could the Cholas cut him out entirely? The answer was to build a temple. On the temple walls, they would inscribe a Meikirti—a public record of the various kingdoms that the Cholas had raided. The temple created a splash, announcing the Cholas' presence. The Meikirti sent a message: you should take our protection rather than the local warlord’s.

2. Improved Tax Collection: Temples likely made tax collection easier. First, it probably generated goodwill with the local villagers, who felt they received something in return for their taxes. Second, I suspect people were happier paying taxes toward temple maintenance than toward abstract land revenue.