Well, as far as I know, the first invasion of the South by any Muslim ruler was Malik Kafur - about 300 years after RJC.
Certainly, there weren't any established Muslim kingdoms in the North during RJC's time.
So, no... No raids/invasions by Muslim rulers during the height of Chola power. For that matter, no invasions from the North at all, until the 1300s. After that, by around the 1500s, Vijayanagar was up, so not much again for a while. But there were Muslim sultanates in the Deccan - Bahamani and its splinters that competed with Vijayanagar for dominance of the South.
By the way, it's incorrect to refer to any rulers but Babur's line as Mughals. The ones before were the Delhi Sultanate.
Thanks a lot shah for explaining me,recently i seen article which says that marthupandiyaragal was the first people,who fought for freedom ,they were powerful but for kaliyar kovil,where british feared mp's will demolish kaliyar kovil, made them to surrenderto british,but i feel chozhans might be there with same power ,tamilnadu might not been invaded and especially mughals might not looted that much from us.
Hi it was malik kafur the general of allaudin khilji who made it easy for northern invadrs. he came like a lightning in 1311. people could not beleive somebody could come from so far away and attack and hence the defeat,
but many would not know that a majority of malik's forces were from allied hindu kings, the hoysalas, the yadavas whom he had defeated just earlier andbound by treaty. that added to the speed too.
mughals were the last muslim kings of delhi. they were distinct from the delhi sultanate earlier. the slave, khilgi, thuklak, the sayyids and the lodi's
even among modis it was aurangazeb the last of the greatest to conquer in the south. but by then the south had a lot of muslim states like the bahmani kingdom.
I have a doubt? how much effect did Lanka had over Tamil Kings not able to have a bigger kingdom?
For the Northern Kings , they had some safety in 3 directions, North -Himalayas, South -Vindhyas, east - no major powers and rough terrains. The West was always the entry point of invaders (Greek,Muslim,Aryans).
Unlike that Tamil Kings had to face Lanka, who were just few 100 miles away from major Southern Capitals as well as strong kings in Deccan.AT any time Lanka can side with any other Tamil King(one of the three) and try to attack the capital of the major Tamil King. SO Tamil Kings always had to keep strong watch over Lanka to safe guard their capital.
I am not so sure abt anything I have mentioned so better to raise the question again
how much effect did Lanka had over Tamil Kings not able to have a bigger kingdom?
That argument could be posed for any other Kingdom as well. If one can believe that moats around forts helped in defense, then a sea certainly did more than a moat as deterrence. It is not to say the Lankan Kingdoms did not trouble the Tamil Kingdoms in Southern India.
That is just my 2 cents, hopefully others pitch and offer their opinion.
BTW, As far as the Aryans go; recent developments are proving there was no Aryan Invasion. That theory seems to be bogus and even BBC had recently acknowledged some "silimishams" on the part of British.
Tamil kings and lankan kings have a long relationship. Chola's always had problems with the lankan rulers, while the pandyas had their support mostly ( related with lot of marriages) . We have already seen the pandya haram thread. Pl also search for gaja bahu synchornisation, manavaman ( helped by mamalla to regain the lankan throne, fought with him against pulikesi), fm parantaga time cholas presence in lanka became permanent, with more and more ground secured by rrc and rjc. We see ref of lankan help to pandyas even later, during k2 battles against kulasekara pandya. There is ref of lankan forces supporting kopperuncingan as we'll !!
In effect the body of water between the two never posted a big hurdle. Think there is an inscription of rjc which compares to his continous fleet to ships launched to lanka that when the first landed in lanka there were still some at port in chola land....there comparing his line of ships to the bridge of rama.