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OCTOBER, 1917]
THE HISTORY OF THE NAIK KINGDOM OF MADURA
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saved the Nawab and turned disaster into success. The ranks of Anwaru'd-din's army became sorely thinned. His howdah fell into the enemy's hands. Never did the Nawab sustain so serious a disgrace in the hands of such petty chiefs. Baigaru Tirumala saw this and argued that the disgrace of the Nawab, inasmuch as the refractory chiefs were his subordinate Polygars, was his own disgrace. He, therafore, took a leading part in the campaign and ultimately succeeded in shattering the Polygar levies.
Anwaru'd-din's Murder of Bangaru Tirumala.
The hope of the Baigaru Tirumala to secure, by means of his services, the gratitude and the favour of Anwaru'd-din Khan was, however, not destined to be realised. As we have already seen, Anwaru'd-din had his own designs on the Naik Kingdom and the sanction he gave for pensions to Bargiru and his crowned son was evidently intended to be a final disposal of the question. The little lingering doubt he may have had was shattered by the heroism which Bangaru displayed on his own behalf in the affair of Kalahasti. The Nawab admired his valour, but with the feeling of admiration was combined the feeling of fear. He felt that the restoration of such a man would hardly conduce to the strength of his own position. He, therefore, issued secret orders to his men to remove the regent for ever from his path of ambition. And the murder was perpetrated in a singularly mean manner. In the late war, Baugáru had received two wounds of a deadly nature and the Nawab, with a pretended solicitude, sent his own men to dress his wounds and administer medicine. The physicians were then instructed to mix poison with the medicine, so that the patient died within an hour of his taking it.
Vijaya Kumara's Flight to Sivaganga.
Thus perished the only man who could, if any man at all could have done so, secured the revival of the Naik power. There is something pathetic, something melancholy, about the figure of this ill-fated prince. Born of a younger line and excluded from the throne by # combination of circumstances, he fought without success for the exercise of his power; and when he at lergth got it by the moderation or the death of his rival, he and the king and kingdom, whose destinies were in his guidance, became the victims of a formidable foreign power. Even in the court of the Nawab he did not lose faith either in the fortunes of himself and his royal son or the honesty of the Nawab, and in that faith he was so firm that he himself took part in the settlement of his country, forgetting or little thinking that, by his loyal assistance, he was only rousing jealousy in the heart of Anwaru 'd-din and thus digging his own grave. Never in the annals of Indian history do we find such simplicity and trust repaid by ingratitude and treachery. As for the nominal king of the Nâik dominions, Vijaya Kumâra, he was in a peculiarly hard and embarrassing position. Deprived of his crown and kingdom, of his father and guardian, himself a boy of inexperience, he was in the midst of enemies, the very destroyers of his power and father. Life was no longer safe at the Nawab's
