Vasundhara Desai, writer and researcher, has underlined the need to recognise the contribution of Bishtappaiah, a religious leader, in resurrecting the main ‘gopura’ of Virupaksha Temple.
Ms. Desai, who claims to be a 11th generation direct descendant of Bishtappaiah, told presspersons here on Tuesday that during her over a decade-long study, she could come across developments during the post-Vijayanagara period.
“As per recorded history, the Vijayanagara empire came to an end after the war at Talikota and the Moghuls ransacked and looted the wealth of the empire. But a post-Vijayanagara study revealed that Thirumala, one of the scions of Vijayanagar kings, returned and provided security to the Virupaksha Temple and Car Street and it was continued by the last king Srirangaraya, until he fled seeking protection from Keladi rulers. After that, Bishtappaiah, a follower of sage Vidyaranya, took up the work of resurrection of the temple and its surroundings and also construction of the ‘gopura’ between 1660 and 1694. Since then, the ‘gopura’ is known as Bishtappaiah Gopura in oral history but it has not been documented,” she said.
Ms. Desai said that she had presented 10 papers on her study at meetings of historians and they had been appreciated by research scholars, including Vasundhara Philiozat, M. Chidanand Murthy, Suryanath Kamat, George Mitchell, among others.
“In fact, Mr. Mitchell, who along with John Fritz, has done a lot of study on Hampi, and also officials of the Archaeological Survey of India were of the view that some of the developments on the restoration of monuments happened during the 17th century.
“ I want the authorities to recognise the contribution of Bishtappaiah by officially documenting that the tower was constructed by him and also put a plaque in front of the tower,” she added.
