About Mysore History of Mysore

Until 1947, Mysore was the capital of the Kingdom of Mysore which was ruled by the Wodeyar dynasty, except for a brief period in the late 18th century when Haidar Ali and Tipu Sultan took power. The Wodeyars were patrons of art and culture and have contributed significantly to the cultural growth of the city, which has led to Mysore earning the sobriquet Cultural capital of Karnataka.

According to Hindu mythology, the area around Mysore was known as Mahishūru and was ruled by a demon, Mahishasura. The demon was killed by the Goddess Chamundeshwari, whose temple is situated atop the Chamundi Hills. Mahishūru later became Mahisūru and finally came to be called Maisūru, its present name in the Kannada language. The anglicised form of the name is Mysore.In December 2005, the Government of Karnataka announced its intention to change the English name of the city to Mysuru.This has been approved by the Government of India but the necessary formalities to incorporate the name change are yet to be completed.

The region where Mysore city stands now was known as Puragere till the 15th century.The Mahishūru Fort was constructed in 1524 by Chamaraja Wodeyar III (1513–1553), who later passed on the dominion of Puragere to his son Chamaraja Wodeyar IV (1572–1576). Since the 16th century, the name of Mahishūru (later Mysore and changed again to Mysuru by the Government of Karnataka on November 1 2007) has been commonly used to denote the city.During the rule of the Mysore Kingdom under Wodeyars, served as a feudatory. Mysore was the center of the Wodeyar administration till 1610 when Raja Wodeyar ousted the Vijayanagara governor at nearby Srirangapatna and made it his capital. With the demise of the Vijayanagara Empire in 1565, the Mysore Kingdom gradually achieved independence and became a sovereign state by the time of King Narasaraja Wodeyar (1637).When the kingdom came under the rule of Tipu Sultan, he demolished much of Mysore town to remove any traces of the Wodeyar rule.After Tipu Sultan's death in the Fourth Anglo-Mysore War in 1799, the capital of the kingdom was moved back to Mysore.The administration was looked after by Diwan Purnaiah, since the Wodeyar king Mummadi Krishnaraja Wodeyar was a minor. Purnaiah is credited to have been responsible for many improvements in the Mysore city, mainly in relation to public works.In 1831, Mysore lost its status as the administrative centre of the kingdom when Mark Cubbon, the British commissioner, moved the capital to Bangalore.However it regained this status in 1881, when the British handed the power back to the Wodeyars.The city remained the capital of the Wodeyars till 1947 with Mysore Palace as the centre of administration.

The Mysore municipality was established in 1888 and the city was divided into 8 wards.In 1897, an outbreak of bubonic plague killed nearly half of the population of the city.With the establishment of the City Improvement Trust Board (CITB) in 1903, Mysore became one of the first cities in Asia to undertake a planned development of the city.When the Quit India Movement was launched in the early 1940s, Mysore city also played a part in it. Leaders of the independence movement like H. C. Dasappa and Sahukar Channayya were at the forefront during the agitations.The Maharaja's College hostel was the nerve centre from where the movement was controlled in the Mysore district and the Subbarayana Kere ground was an important location for public demonstrations.

After the Indian independence, Mysore city remained as a part of the Jayachamarajendra Wodeyar, the then king of Mysore, was allowed to retain his titles and was nominated as the Rajapramukh of the state. He died in September 1974 and was cremated in Mysore city.Over the years, Mysore has become well known as a centre for tourism and the city has remained largely peaceful, except for occasional riots related to the Kaveri river water dispute.Some of the events that took place in Mysore and made national headlines were the fire at Premier Studios that claimed the lives of many people, the sudden deaths of many animals at the Mysore Zoo.