Malla-yuddha such a wrestling match against a visiting champion in Singapore. Traditional Indian wrestling first began to decline in the north after the medieval Muslim invasions when influences from Persian wrestling were incorporated into native malla-yuddha. Under Mughal rule, courtly fashion favoured the Persianate pehlwani style. Traditional malla-yuddha remained popular in the south, however, and was particularly common in the Vijayanagara Empire. The 16th-century Jaina classic "Bharatesa Vaibhava" describes wrestlers challenging their opponents with grunts and traditional signs of patting the shoulders. Sculptures at Bhatkal depict wrestling matches, including female wrestlers. As part of his daily routine, the king Krishna Deva
Musti-yuddha was said to be an excellent horseman, charioteer, elephant rider, swordsman and boxer. The "Gurbilas Shemi", an 18th-century Sikh text, gives numerous references to musti-yuddha. The French General Allard commented on the boxing practiced by the early 19th-century Lahore army that "Duelling is not known in the army of Ranjit Singh. The soldiers settle their disputes with their fists; a brutal, and equally un-Christian, method of adjusting differences." The particular form of boxing he referred to was loh-musti, practiced primarily in the northwest. The British colonial introduction of western boxing in the 1890s caused a decline in native musti-yuddha, until