Since South Asia's modern states became independent around the middle of the twentieth century, women have played an important role in the region's politics. Indeed, a recent study comparing countries worldwide for the number of years under female leadership from 1966 onwards found that South Asia holds the world's top position in this respect. India and its neighbours have witnessed several cases of women serving as prime ministers and leaders of political parties, many of them widows or daughters of former prominent— usually male— politicians. In contrast, the Indian subcontinent's earlier history saw very few instances of formal female rule. Surveys of Indian dynasties throughout the ages suggest that not even 1 per cent of the monarchs were women. An overview published two decades ago of about 500 female rulers in world history lists only twenty-five South Asians (a mere 5 per cent), with nearly one-third of them belonging to the twentieth century.

A handful of the women on Indian thrones are relatively well known, but even these queens are usually mentioned just in passing in general surveys of India's past. Examples from this varied group are Jalalat al-Din Razya (r. 1236– 1240), Delhi's only reigning sultana in over half a millennium, being chosen by her father as his successor, and popular as “Razia Sultan” in modern Indian cinema; the Maratha queen regent Tarabai Bhonsle (r. 1700– 1708), celebrated adversary of the Mughal emperors; and Rānī (Queen) Lakshmibai of Jhansi, who, widowed and pensioned off by the British, famously fought against them during the “Mutiny” of 1857– 1859.

The small number of female rulers in south India— the regional focus of this chapter— are probably even less widely known. Again showing a great diversity, these women include the martial “female king” Rudramadevi (r. 1263– 1289) of the Kakatiya state on the Deccan plateau, to whom I shall briefly return at the end of this chapter; the easily approachable and allegedly semi-naked queen of the Ullal (or Olala) kingdom on the southwest Kanara coast, vividly described by the Italian traveler Pietro Della Valle in the 1620s, when she had grown estranged from her husband (the ruler of another kingdom);