हिंदीOn this day

Paramaras of Malwa

The Paramaras traced their birth to the fire-pit of Vasishtha on Mount Abu. Their king Bhoja of Dhara was the scholar-king the whole of India remembers.

  1. Siyaka II (Harsha)c. 948–972
  2. Vakpati Munjac. 972–990s
  3. Sindhurajac. 990s–1010
  4. Bhojac. 1010–1055
  5. Jayasimha Ic. 1055–1070
  6. Udayadityac. 1070–1086
  7. Naravarmanc. 1094–1133
  8. +3
Period: c. 948–1305 CE (chiefs from the 9th century)Region: Malwa, the plateau of Ujjain and DharCapitals: Ujjayini (Ujjain), Dhara (Dhar), Mandapa-durga (Mandu)
Photo: CNG Coins · CC BY-SA 3.0

01Siyaka and Munja

The Paramaras began as Rashtrakuta vassals in Malwa. Siyaka II threw off that rule and in 972 sacked the Rashtrakuta capital Manyakheta. His son Vakpati Munja was a poet as well as a fighter; Padmagupta and Dhananjaya wrote at his court. Munja crossed the Godavari to attack the Chalukya Tailapa II, was captured, and was put to death. The Prabandha Chintamani tells the tale of his captivity.

02Bhoja of Dhara

Bhoja ruled from about 1010 to 1055. Some eighty works are credited to him, among them the Samarangana Sutradhara on architecture and the Sarasvati Kanthabharana on poetics and grammar. He founded a Sanskrit school at Dhar, the Bhojshala, dedicated to Devi Sarasvati. At Bhojpur he began a Shiva temple with one of the largest lingas in India, and the drawings of its builders are still cut into the bedrock nearby. The great lake that gave Bhopal its name is credited to him.

Raja Bhoja
Person · Reigned c. 1010–1055 CERaja BhojaBhoja of Dhara is the king of Indian proverb, the one against whom every Gangu Teli is measured. He ruled Malwa for about forty-five years, fought on every border, and wrote or had written under his name works on poetics, architecture, astronomy and statecraft. The great Shiva temple at Bhojpur is his.Read →

03Udayaditya to the fall

Bhoja died while Chaulukya and Kalachuri armies were closing on Dhar. Udayaditya restored the kingdom and built the Nilakantheshvara temple at Udayapur in Vidisha district, whose prashasti gives the Paramara genealogy. Later kings were pressed by the Chaulukyas of Gujarat and then by Delhi; Iltutmish raided Ujjain and Vidisha in the 1230s. In 1305 Alauddin Khalji’s general Ain-ul-Mulk Multani killed Mahlakadeva, and Malwa passed to the Sultanate.

The rulers

  1. 1Siyaka II (Harsha)Sacked Manyakheta, 972c. 948–972
  2. 2Vakpati MunjaPoet-king; killed by Tailapa IIc. 972–990s
  3. 3SindhurajaHero of Padmagupta’s Navasahasankacharitac. 990s–1010
  4. 4BhojaScholar-king; Bhojshala and Bhojpurc. 1010–1055
  5. 5Jayasimha Ic. 1055–1070
  6. 6UdayadityaNilakantheshvara temple, Udayapurc. 1070–1086
  7. 7Naravarmanc. 1094–1133
  8. 8Arjunavarmanc. 1210–1215
  9. 9Devapalac. 1218–1239
  10. 10MahlakadevaKilled by Khalji’s army; the endc. 1300–1305

What they left

  • Bhoja’s Samarangana Sutradhara and Sarasvati Kanthabharana
  • Bhojeshwar temple at Bhojpur
  • Bhojshala at Dhar
  • Nilakantheshvara temple at Udayapur
  • The Upper Lake of Bhopal

People

Raja BhojaRuler
Reigned c. 1010–1055 CE

Raja Bhoja

Paramara king of Malwa, scholar and builder

Places

Bhojshala, DharDestroyed
Cholas and the Southern Seas

Bhojshala, Dhar

The hall of learning in Raja Bhoja’s capital at Dhar, held by Hindus to be his Sarasvati Sadan, which was turned into a mosque, known as the Kamal Maula mosque, in the Sultanate period. Sanskrit grammar tables, poems and a play are still cut on its walls; in May 2026 the Madhya Pradesh High Court held it to be a temple of Vagdevi, and appeals are before the Supreme Court.

Bhojeshwar Temple, BhojpurStanding
The long resistance: Sindh to Tarain

Bhojeshwar Temple, Bhojpur

An unfinished Shiva temple of Raja Bhoja on a ridge above the Betwa, holding one of the largest lingas in India. The builders’ plans, scratched on the surrounding rocks, survive with it.

OmkareshwarStanding
Cholas and the Southern Seas

Omkareshwar

A Jyotirlinga on Mandhata, an island in the Narmada whose shape, seen from above, is said to trace the syllable Om. Adi Shankaracharya found his guru here.

Mount Abu (Arbuda)Standing
The long resistance: Sindh to Tarain

Mount Abu (Arbuda)

Arbuda, the lone high massif of the southern Aravallis, where tradition places Vasishtha’s ashram and the fire-pit from which the Paramaras traced their birth. At its foot the army of Gujarat broke Muhammad of Ghor at Kasahrada in 1178.

Mahakaleshwar, UjjainRebuilt
Maratha ascendancy and the Sikh empire

Mahakaleshwar, Ujjain

The Jyotirlinga of Avantika, one of the seven moksha-giving cities, where Shiva is worshipped as Mahakal, Lord of Time and Death. The only Jyotirlinga facing south, and the only one bathed in ash at the dawn aarti.

Mandu (Mandavgad)Ruined
Sultanates, Vijayanagara and the kingdoms that stood

Mandu (Mandavgad)

A plateau of the Vindhyas ringed by 37 km of wall, the Mandapadurga of the Paramaras, taken by Alauddin’s army in 1305 and made the capital of the Malwa Sultans, with the palaces of Baz Bahadur and Rani Roopmati at its edge.

On the timeline

  • c. 995 CE

    Paramara Munja dies a captive of TailapaWar

    The poet-king of Malwa had beaten the Chalukya Tailapa many times, the Prabandhachintamani says; on his last campaign he crossed the Godavari, was captured and put to death.