#and past parties aren't exempt either

[thereader-radhika]

Finance Minister Periya Pazhuvettaraiyar's Woes

In the beginning of the novel, Periya Pazhuvettaraiyar rants about the irresponsible behaviour of the crown-prince and the younger prince, with a bit of exaggeration obviously to rile up the chieftains. As the novel progresses, we can see that his accusations aren't baseless.

The older prince is the general of the Northern forces. What is he doing? He has not gone to war against the Rashtrakutas and Vengi. He lingers in Kanchipuram building a golden palace . . . From all the wealth he plundered from the Ganga, Kudagu and other territories, not a single piece of copper has he sent to the central treasury till today.

We don't know the amount of gold used in the construction of this palace but since Vanthiyathevan doesn't refute the Emperor when they talk about it, we can assume that there was some kind of golden work somewhere in the palace.

To Pazhu's secret relief,Aditha Karikalan isn't drawing any money from the treasury either. Later we see that Karikalan hasn't gone to conquer the northern regions because he is sending supplies to Lanka.

Arulmozhi Varman was sent to Lanka to gain experience in warfare and conquer the islands if possible. He refused to gather supplies for his army from the land he invaded, saying that it will inconvenience the harmless civilians.

When our troops invade another country, they have to fend for themselves with what they can capture there. They have to subsist on local produce and their salaries have to be paid from the booty collected from the conquered region, any excess being sent to the central treasury. But what does Prince Arulmozhivarmar do? He wants us to send food for his troops in Eezham. Over the past year I have shipped supplies ten times.

Hence the Finance Minister and later the Crown Prince have to send extra supplies for the soldiers under Arulmozhi. Though people in the Chola country believe that their prince is accomplishing great feats in Lanka, that isn't true either. Bhooti Vikrama Kesari was besieging Anuradhapuram when Arulmozhi Varman arrived at Lanka and he undertook a tour of the whole area occupied by Cholas. Mahindan retreated to Ruhana during this time. This is verified by Malayaman too.

Aniruddha Brahmarayar to Azhwarkadian:  There were many Pandya and Chera warriors in Mahindan's army who surrendered their arms and joined us when they heard that the Prince was leading our forces . . . You know what our troops are doing now in Lanka! Anuradhapuram was destroyed in earlier battles. The Buddhist viharams, temples, dagabas are all in ruins. At the behest of the Prince, our troops are renovating them.

That means resources from the Chola treasuries and granaries are used to feed not only their own army but the defected soldiers from Mahindan's army too. Moreover unnecessary (fictional) infrastructural renovations are going on in Anuradhapuram, on Chola dime.

When Vanthiyathevan reaches the Chola camp in Lanka, they are having a great party as if they have gone for a pleasure tour.

Various delicacies to go with the rice were also being cooked in smaller pots and pans. Their aroma made the warriors’ mouths water. The soldiers sang and danced in order to pass the time until their food was cooked. Since their beloved Prince was with them, their joy at this moment was unbounded.

Kundavai too contributes to the financial crisis in her own ways by making the Emperor issue orders like these:

Since our daughter Kundavai has decided to donate all the income accruing from the lands and other assets gifted to her situated in the Nalloor village to the hospital we proclaim that these lands will henceforward be free of tax.

This drives up the anger and anxiety of Periya Pazhuvettaraiyar further. As Pazhu feels slighted due their reaction to his latest marriage, there is a lot of communication gap too.

Tax exemptions given to influential people was a significant problem during the actual (real, not Kalki's PS) Chola period as the burden of these exemptions were compensated by levying taxes from common people which ultimately caused civil unrest and the downfall of the regime.

Agriculture supported the overwhelming masses of the people during this period. Land belonged to temples as Devadanam land; to Brahmins as Brahmadeya and to Velalas as Velan Vagai. Officials, dancing girls and soldiers also held land as Jeevitha, that is, for a living. Devadanam and Brahmadeya were Irayili, or tax-free land. In some places, Jeevitha land and land belonging to certain individuals were exempt from taxes. As the tax-free land was considerable and tended to expand over the period, small cultivators and other sections of the people had to bear an increasingly punishing tax burden.

- Rajukumar, M. D. “Struggles for Rights during Later Chola Period.” Social Scientist, vol. 2, no. 6/7, 1974, pp. 29–35. JSTOR, https://doi.org/10.2307/3516476.

Anna! We are driving our economy into the ground with our combined efforts 💃🏻🕺🏻

[writefasttalkevenfaster]

ah sorry I definitely could have been clearer 😅 I was referring to how the government is trying to mandate vaccines and even boosters (even though there's no proof that boosters are anything other than another round of the same shot and not proven to do anything) and want covid shot cards to be used to allow/deny entry into places. how science has been changing so quickly when something new is learned about covid (like recently it came out that the blue masks actually don't help protect you very much?) but it's barely being reported so the public can be made aware.. and on top of that so many government officials are super hypocritical in asking people to stay home and wear masks, but then we see pictures of parties and events where our leaders aren't wearing masks or social distancing.. idk it seems sort of authoritarian to me, because I genuinely can see the reasons people have for not wanting the vaccine and I feel like in the wrong government this could go downhill really fast...

tl;dr: i can understand what you mean, but i don't think i agree with you, at least not completely.

the federal government hasn't tried to mandate vaccines at all. hell, i live in a state where a majority of people have gotten the vaccine and there's no mandate here. i don't believe biden has even attempted to do a vaccine mandate because he knows that would be met very poorly by a large portion of the public.

as for the boosters, i don't think there's enough data right now to make a decision either which way, and although biden has been probably jumping the gun on distribution (from the little i've read on this in the past week).

i can see the problematic nature of covid vaccine shot cards -- especially when it comes to exemptions and the invasion of privacy that might entail. however, this is a different world now. and i can see why people want them. there's no mask mandate or vaccine mandate -- and this means that people who don't have the vaccine and don't wear masks, can just walk around. for me, i honestly would like the cards sometimes because i have family members who are severely immunocompromised. i'm scared to even go to school. even though my school requires proof of vaccination, i've had to limit my time on campus b/c i live too far away and public transport isn't an option for me anymore because there is no vaccine or mask mandate.

i don't know about blue masks not helping very much -- i tried googling it and i don't see anything come up. i think it was known very early on that some masks are better than others -- like obviously n99 and n95 masks are top of the line, and then masks with liners, cotton masks, etc and so on. however, i think any mask is better than none because anything covering your face is stopping droplets from spreading to other people, whether its all, most, or some.

i can understand what you mean by government officials being hypocritical. I know in the beginning of the pandemic, it was definitely frustrating and honestly disgusting. i agree with you.

i can understand people being hesitant about the vaccine, but honestly the science backs it up. it's been through FDA approval, its based on decades of science (it's not new in any regard), and no steps were skipped or expedited in making these vaccines. and health professionals everywhere who have read the studies, done their research, and understand this a hell of a lot better than most lay people do are all recommending it and getting it themselves. i see no reason to doubt them.

i can understand fearing the government, but at the united states hasn't been overreaching in my opinion -- i think they haven't been doing enough. at the very least, i would like a mask mandate. i do think its okay to have a sense of wariness when it comes to the government -- you should never trust anything or anyone blindly -- but here, the data backs up vaccines and masks. and i don't really have a problem with the government requiring it.