Champaka, Durgara, and Kuluta: Matching Medieval Hill States

A famous 2015 exam question named three medieval hill states. It matched two of them with the wrong regions. Champaka, Durgara and Kuluta sound alike, so candidates mix them up.

1.1 What does each old name mean today?

Champaka is the old name of Chamba, a district in Himachal Pradesh. Kuluta is the old name of Kullu, also in Himachal Pradesh. Durgara is the old name of the Jammu region.

The Government of India’s Chamba District Gazetteer says this plainly. It calls Durgara “the ancient name of Jammu State”, with Dugar as its present form. It calls Kuluta the ancient name of Kulu. It also names Champaka as the town of the Chamba rulers.

1.2 Why did the 2015 question go wrong?

UPSC CSP 2015, GS Paper I, Question 35, paired Champaka with Central India. It paired Kuluta with Malabar. Both pairs are wrong. Chamba and Kullu lie in the Himalayan north. Malabar is a coastal region in the south-west.

Only the Durgara and Jammu pair was right. So the correct answer was option (b), “2 only”.

2.1 What does the Somavarman grant say?

All three names appear together in a copper-plate grant. A copper-plate grant is a land gift engraved on metal sheets. Somavarman of Chamba issued it. Another plate by Somavarman and his brother Asata repeats the story. The Gazetteer dates both to AD 1056 or 1066, and thinks 1066 more likely.

The grant praises Sahila-Varman, an earlier Chamba king. It was written about 120 years after his death. It says several powers acted against him or toward him:

• The Kira people attacked, helped by the lord of Durgara and the Saumatika.
• The ruler of Trigarta sought his alliance after losing a contest.
• The lord of Kuluta, a kinsman, sought his favour.
• He also broke a force of the Turushka, a name for invaders from the north-west.

The Gazetteer says such praise is full of exaggeration. Still, it thinks the references probably rest on fact.

2.2 What does the Rajatarangini add?

The Rajatarangini is Kalhana’s chronicle of Kashmir’s kings. It names “Asata, Raja of Champa”. He visited Kashmir in the winter of AD 1087-88. This was in the reign of Kalasa, son of Ananta Deva. Kashmir claimed suzerainty over Chamba and other hill states, as Ananta Deva had done.

So two records show two spellings of one place. The grant says Champaka. The Rajatarangini says Champa. Both mean Chamba.

3.1 Who founded Chamba town?

Early Chamba rulers sat at Brahmapura, now Bharmour. Sahila-Varman ruled from about AD 920 to 940. The Gazetteer reasons that he founded Chamba town around AD 930. He had conquered the lower Ravi valley. He then moved the capital to the new town on the Ravi.

The Chronicle gives a story about the name. Sahila-Varman’s daughter Champavati loved the plateau. She asked her father to build a town there. He did, and named it Champa after her. A Champavati temple still stands in the town.

3.2 Is the Champavati story proven?

No. The Gazetteer calls it the Chronicle’s version and offers two other ideas. The town may be named for the champa tree, which grows nearby. Or it may take its name from the older Champa near Bhagalpur in Bihar. The name may even be older than Sahila-Varman.

So treat the daughter story as tradition. The safe fact is simple. Champaka and Champa are old names for Chamba.

3.3 What is the Lakshmi Narayan temple group?

The Lakshmi Narayan temple is the main temple of Chamba town. The district government says Sahil Verman built it in the tenth century, in the shikhara style. A shikhara is a curved tower above the shrine. The Gazetteer also lists it as the chief temple Sahila-Varman built.

Wooden roofs protect the temple from snow. Later rulers added to it. One placed a metal Garuda image on a high pillar at the gate.

4.1 What did Xuanzang record?

Xuanzang was the Chinese pilgrim of the seventh century. He travelled from Jalandhara, a kingdom in Punjab. Going north-east over mountain passes, he covered about 700 li. Then he reached the country he calls K’iu-lu-to, which means Kuluta. A li is a Chinese measure of distance.

Wikipedia dates his visit to the Kullu valley to 634 or 635 CE. So Kuluta is an old name that was already in use in his day. It points to the Kullu valley.

4.2 How were Kuluta and Chamba linked?

The Gazetteer says Kuluta owed allegiance to Chamba in Sahila-Varman’s time. It had done so earlier too. The two royal families were also joined by marriage.

The tie was not always firm. Kulu probably stayed under Brahmapura from the time of Meru-Varman. After Lakshmi-Varman died, in the early ninth century, Kulu recovered its independence. Its Raja took help from Bushahr and drove out the Chamba troops, says the Kulu Chronicle.

5.1 What was Trigarta?

Trigarta is the ancient name of Kangra. The Gazetteer says that early on it also took in Jalandhar. It stretched over plains between the Satluj and the Ravi. The Somavarman grant says its ruler sought Sahila-Varman’s alliance.

The Gazetteer notes traditions in Kangra of an early Chamba occupation of some territory.

5.2 Which other hill states appear in the record?

The Saumatika were most likely the people of Sumarta in Basohli. Basohli lies west of the Ravi. Basohli’s ruler later joined a confederation of hill chiefs against a Mughal viceroy. So did the chiefs of Chamba, Guler and Jammu.

Nurpur and Chamba sat on a trade route. Central Asian goods passed through them to Zanskar and Ladakh. So these small states were not isolated. They traded, fought, married and allied with each other.

5.3 Is Durgara the same as the Dogra dynasty?

The names look alike, and writers often link them. The Gazetteer gives Dugar as the modern form of Durgara. But the Dogra rulers belong to a later age.

The Dogra dynasty created Jammu and Kashmir through treaties after the First Anglo-Sikh War. Gulab Singh, an officer of the Sikh Empire, signed the Treaty of Amritsar in 1846. The Gazetteer also says the Dogras destroyed the Chamba town Chatargarh in 1836. Its name then became Gulabgarh.

So Durgara is the medieval name of the Jammu region. The Dogra dynasty is a nineteenth-century power. A similar name alone does not prove one unbroken line.

6.1 What happened in 1678?

In AD 1678 the Mughal emperor Aurangzeb ordered the demolition of Hindu temples in Chamba. Raja Chhatar Singh refused. The Gazetteer spells his name Chatar Singh. He ordered a gilded pinnacle on each chief temple of Chamba, as a mark of defiance.

The emperor was angry and summoned the Raja to Delhi. Chhatar Singh sent his brother Shakat Singh instead. The party turned back before reaching Delhi. The Raja seems to have calmed the emperor. The gilded pinnacles still stand on the temples today.

The Chamba district government adds that the pinnacles were placed on the Lakshmi Narayan temple tops in 1678.

7.1 How is this topic tested?

The 2015 question matched medieval hill-state names with present regions. The key is option (b), 2 only. Just one pair held up: Durgara with Jammu.

The test is simple. Place each name on a map, not just in your memory. Champaka and Kuluta are both in Himachal Pradesh. Durgara is in the Jammu region.