Colombo, September 5: The US government, through the Ambassadors Fund for Cultural Preservation (AFCP) recently announced a grant of US $265,000 to conserve the Kandyan Kings’ Palace and upgrade the Archaeology Museum located within the Sacred Temple of the Tooth complex in Kandy. One hopes that this is a harbinger of efforts to restore the town to the glory it was meant to have when Sri Lanka’s last king, Sri Vikrama Rajasinha, finished constructing his “cosmic” city way back in 1812.
Sri Vikrama Rajasinha (who ruled from 1798 to 1815) was painted by the British and Lankan detractors as a cruel despot. But according to historians Paul E.Peiris and GananathObeyesekere, he was exceptionally hard only on rebels and conspirators and that such harshness was not uncommon those days. Obeysesekeresays in his book The Doomed King: A Requiem for Sri Vikrama Rajasinha, the king was an obsessive builder with a creative, public spirited mind. He spent much of his time after 1804 to making Kandy a “cosmic” or “celestial” city, a monumental task he completed in 1812.
As a devout Buddhist (though a Telugu Nayakafrom Madurai), Sri Vikrama Rajasinha began his renovation work by repairing the DaladaMaligawa which had been destroyed by British troops in the 1803-1804 war. He put up the Pattiruppuwa, an octagonal pavilion and one of three main structures which comprise the Dalada Maligawa. The eight sides of the Pattiruppuwa represented the eight directions of the universe with the monarch at the center.
He had converted the Bogambara marsh into a lake by December 1810, the Bogambara lake was being used by devotees to bathe before they entered the Dalada Maligawa. By then work was in progress on the Kandy lake, the palaces and other civil infrastructure in the city. The civil servant cum historian, R. L. Brohier, wrote that when Sri Vikrama Rajasinha was struck by the idea that he should walk from his palace to the Malwatta Vihara, he ordered his chief craftsman and architect to have a “bund” built over the intervening soggy paddy fields. “The water,which the bund eventually held, turned out to be a beautiful lake which pleased the king immensely. He named it ‘Kiri Muhuda’ which means sea of milk.”
According to Ingirisi Hatana, a valuable source of material on the reign of Sri VikramaRajasinha, the length and breadth of the city was surveyed. With the help of technicians, it was made smooth and flat “as if it were the work of Vishvakarma (the divine architect).” The waterin the lake resembled the milk ocean (Kiri muhuda). The palace (Vimana) was “fit for the God Sakra.” There were 12 streets, one of which was the Svarna Kalyana Street (Golden Pleasant Street).
“The streets were replete with arches and other sights and were bustling with people. Beside the large lake, were attractive red lotuses in full bloom. Honey bees hummed and golden geese played in the water full of fish. The rice field and gardens bloomed as if they were the Nandana Gardens of the God Sakra. The city simmered with silver and gold pinnacles with little openings (kavulu) in the shape of a lion’s mouth,” the Ingirisi Hatana said.
It further said that Kandy was known as Sirivardhana (Overflowing with prosperity) “where resides Sri Vikrama Rajasinha, the noble lord of Lanka as he appeared full decked in ornaments and wearing a golden crown such as that he is like the radiant God Purandara (Indra) himself. May this noble prince be protected by beauty and prosperity, as long as the sun and moon and the Great Meru itself lasts owing to the power, luminosity and fame of the God Ishwara, Maha Brahma, Vishnu, Ganesha, and Skanda Kumara.”
Mount Meru is the sacred five-peaked mountain of Hindu, Jain, and Buddhist cosmology which is considered to be the center of all the physical, metaphysical and spiritual universes.
Obeyesekere says that the king was a compulsive builder of dams, ponds and irrigation reservoirs all for the common good. He built a dam across the Talatuoya, north of Kandy, for the use of the people of the area. He also built a canal for the people of Pasgama and Sagama.
Controversial Project
However, the renovation of Kandy was highly controversial in the Seven Korales (present–day Kurunegala district) and the Four Korales. This was because the king was commandeering labor from there from 1811 on wards. According to the anti-king monk, Hurukgommuwa Unnanse,people were rounded up, bound and taken away to work in Kandy. Molligoda, the Disawe of the Four Korales (who eventually betrayed the king in 1815) was collecting people at the rate of two or three per family “sending them forcibly” and “tearing down the roofs of some men who absconded.” The king had recruited some Malays and Muslims too, but these gave him the slip and fled to Colombo, then firmly under British control.
The British spy John D’Oyly wrote in his diary that the people of the Seven Korales were “very much dissatisfied.” One of his informants told him that the people were “waiting for the English to take over Kandy.” However, Obeyesekere does not attribute it to forced labor but to the fact that they were suffering from some diseases and there had been crop failures too. In 1806, there had been a revolt which Vikrama Rajasinha had crushed.
British Eyed Kandy
The British had been wanting to takeover Kandy ever since Fredrick North became Governor in 1798. They began using divisions between Sri Vikrama Rajasinha and his politically ambitious Adigars and other chiefs. They made an attempt to seize Kandy by force in 1803 and 1804 but failed because they could not face the Kandyans’ guerilla tactics. However, they saw to it that Kandy suffered extensive damage. The king treated the rebel chiefs mercilessly, which led to the propaganda that he was cruel and sadistic.
However, the British did not give up. Its spy in Ceylon, John D’Oyly, a sophisticated Cambridge graduate, who became the first Government Agent of Kandy after the takeover in 1815, started sowing seeds of discontent among officials and chiefs of the Fourth and Third Korales where the British were influential. D’Oyly sold the notion that VikramaRajasinha is a despotic alien Tamil oppressor of the Sinhalese. He also bribed the officials heavily with cash, Obeyesekere points out. He further says that D’Oyly had been bribing officials from 1807 onwards, encouraged by the then Governor Thomas Maitland.
However, Obeyesekere insists that despite the anti-king leanings of the top officials and chiefs, ordinary people were supportive of Sri VikramaRajasinha and were dismayed when the British captured their kingdom. The British made a bid to make a spectacle of the 1815 KandyanConvention by which the Sinhala chiefs transferred power to them. But the people ignored the event, not even coming out to the streets to witness the military parade. In fact,local chiefs who handed over power to the British on a platter in 1815, themselves rose in rebellion against the British in 1817-1818.
After taking over Kandy in March 1815, the British showed scant regard for the brand new town. According to Prof.Gerald Peiris, D’Oylymade the king’s palace his residence. Many buildings in the temple-palace complex were turned into military barracks. The MagulMaduwa (the Audience Hall) became an Anglican chapel and later a court of law. The Pattiruppuwa was desecrated. A part of the Malwatte monastery became a military hospital and an Anglican church came up in the ground belonging to the Pattini Devale. King Sri Vikarama Rajasinha was captured, sent to India with his family and lodged in the Vellore fort.
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