Previous Year Question

Krishnadevaraya (1509–1529 CE) was the Tuluva ruler of the Vijayanagara Empire. During his reign, the Portuguese had emerged as an important maritime power on India's western coast. After the Portuguese occupation of Goa in 1510, relations between Vijayanagara and the Portuguese became increasingly significant. Krishnadevaraya permitted the Portuguese to construct a fort at Bhatkal for the protection of their trade. IGNOU explicitly associates this permission with Krishnadevaraya's relations with the Portuguese governor Afonso de Albuquerque.

Closer historical evidence survives from the Portuguese side. Robert Sewell's A Forgotten Empire records that Albuquerque initially renewed the request through Gaspar Chanoca, at which stage Krishnadevaraya did not give a specific approval. However, after the Portuguese recaptured Goa in December 1510, a letter from Fr. Luis, carried with Vijayanagara's ambassadors to Goa, reported that Krishnadevaraya had granted permission for a Portuguese fort at Bhatkal. Thus, the two records are not contradictory; they describe two successive stages of the negotiation.

An important practical basis of Vijayanagara-Portuguese cooperation was the supply of Arabian and Persian horses, vital for Vijayanagara's cavalry. The relationship was therefore connected not only with the proposed fort but also with maritime commerce and the wider political competition in the Deccan.