Mysuru Royal Family Overcomes 400-Year-Old Curse

VM Jai Kumar

Wednesday was one of the happiest days in the Myuru royal family for two reasons - a heir to the throne was born and mostly importantly the Wadiyar is believed to have overcome a 400-Year-old curse.

The Heir

Mysuru’s titular Maharaja Yaduveer Krishnadatta Chamaraja Wadiyar and his wife, Trishikaa Kumari Devi were blessed with a baby boy at a private hospital in Bengaluru on Wednesday.The baby boy is the 28th heir in the family. The last time a baby was born to the royal family was in February 1953, with the birth of Srikantadatta Narasimharaja Wadiyar.

The Curse

Legend has it that a curse was put on the Wadiyar family 400 years ago by queen Alamelamma – the wife of a Vijayanagara king. The birth of the royal baby on Wednesday has broken that curse, is the belief widely held.

The story goes that the Wadiyars had started as a principality of the larger Vijayanagara Kingdom in 1399 and Alamelamma was unhappy with the way Raja Wadiyar-I usurped the Vijayanagara kingdom from her husband King Tirumalaraja.

When the Wadiyar king sent his soldiers to take away Alamelamma’s ornaments, it is believed that she uttered, “Talakadu maralagali, Malangi maduvagali, Mysuru Doregalige Makkallilade Hogali," which translates to “May Talakadu turn into sand, may Malangi be consumed by whirlpools and may the kings of Mysore never have heirs”.

The Present King

Yaduveer Krishnadatta Chamaraja Wadiyar took over as the 27th titular king of the erstwhile Mysuru royal family in May 2015.

Yaduveer succeeded the former scion of Mysuru, Srikantadatta Narasimharaja Wadiyar, who died in 2013, leaving behind no heir. After a long search, Wadiyar’s wife Pramoda Devi formally adopted Yaduveer in February 2015, and named him the late scion’s successor.

Yaduveer is the nephew of the late Maharaja and the son of Leela Tripurasundari Devi and Swarup Anand Gopalaraj Urs.