Social and Rural Economy of Northern India, cir. 600 B.C.–200 A.D. v1.c11.23

v1.c11.23

In the Vedic texts village headmen (grāmaṇi, grāmika) are styled Rājakartṛ and Ratnin aiding in the consecration of the king among certain other functionaries and are consulted by the king along with his ministers. The Mahāvagga gives the important reference that the gāmikas of Bimbisāra 80,000 in number, used to be summoned in a great assembly (V. 1.3.). In those days when kingship had not yet outgrown the tribal stage, the village chiefs were communal representatives and exerted a wholesome check on royal absolutism. But later records which synchronise with the growth of a centralised monarchy fortified by a bureaucratic machine, strike a different note. The periodical assemblies of gāmikas seem to have fallen into disuse with the rise of Maurya imperialism: they gradually sank down from the headship of autonomous villages to sleeping lords with irresponsible powers and vested privileges or were transformed into king's officers and absorbed into an official hierarchy. The Jātaka stories exhibit them in both these colours. Even as early as in the Upaniṣads the king is found appointing adhikṛtas over grāmas (Praśna-Up. III. 4); such appointment tallies with the conception of civil polity and paramount sovereignty implied in the honorific *Samrāṭ*. The *gāmikas* of Bimbisāra, be they elected or nominated, took orders and instructions from a controlling monarch (*diṭṭhadhammike atthe anusāsitā*). In the Arthaśāstra the *grāmikas* are subordinates to the *gopas*, *sthānikas* and still higher officers. The bureaucratic system is perfected in the law-codes (*Āpast*. II. 26.4.5; *Viṣ*. III. 7-15; *Yāj*. I. 337) and Manu lays down a detailed official gradation. The *grāmikas* appointed by the king are not to take cognizance of crimes and decide according to their free will but report all cases to lords of ten villages, they in turn to the next superior officers and so on (VII. 115-117; Mbh. XII. 87. 3 f.). In the Śukranītisāra the chief is a king’s deputy (II. 343) intoxicated by drinking the vanity of office (II. 227). In the Śaka and Gupta inscriptions as well, side by side with prolific land charters issued to royal favourites without any corresponding service derived in return, the *grāmikas*, *bhojakas*, etc., are found fitted into an elaborate framework of civil administration. Thus the upholder of popular rights and duties who loomed large in Vedic and early Buddhist social economy is no longer the bulwark of free village corporations and fades out into a leisurely lord or is stereotyped into an official automaton.