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Indian Epigraphy c11.t3: 3. Creation of Rent-Free Holdings

Indian Epigraphy c11.t3

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3. Creation of Rent-Free Holdings

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As indicated above, some charters² record the sale of Government land (often fallow land) to an applicant paying the usual price and the Government’s acceptance of his proposal to create a rent-free holding out of the purchased land in favour of Brāhmaṇas or religious institutions. In such a transaction, it was believed, according to an ancient Indian convention, that five-sixths of the religious merit for the creation of the revenue-free holding would go to the purchaser of the land and one-sixth of it to the king of the country, whose government alone could create such a holding.³

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² Ibid., pp. 337 ff., 342 ff., etc.

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³ Cf. ibid., p. 344, text line 13; p. 348, text line 16; etc. Cf. *tapaḥ-ṣaḍbhāgam=akṣayyam* in the *Abhijñānaśakuntala*, Act II, verse 13.

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There is another kind of charters which, instead of speaking of the sale of the land that was created into a rent-free holding by the king in favour of Brāhmaṇas or religious institutions, merely state that the particular holding was created at the request of a certain officer or feudatory of the king or some other persons. In spite of the absence of any reference to sale in such records, some of them appear to be based on a transaction involving sale.⁴ Thus the Nalanda plate⁵ of Devapāla records a grant of five villages by the Pāla king to a Buddhist monastery at Nalanda at the request of Mahārāja Bālaputradeva who was the lord of Suvarṇadvīpa (Sumatra) and was responsible for establishing the monastery. The five villages were apparently purchased by Bālaputradeva from Devapāla as otherwise the whole of the religious merit accruing to the pious act of endowing the monastery with a rent-free holding for its maintenance would go to Devapāla and nothing at all to Bālaputradeva.¹ This was no doubt an undesirable position for the king of Sumatra. If he really purchased the villages, as he no doubt did, five-sixths of the merit would be his and only one-sixth would go to Devapāla according to the convention referred to above.

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⁴ As we have seen, sale of land was generally represented in ancient India as a gift. See above, p. 111, note 1.

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⁵ Bhandarkar’s List, No. 1613.

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¹ Cf. R. D. Banerji, Bāngālār Itihās, Vol. I, B. S. 1330, p. 210.

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But as regards the land made into a rent-free holding at the request of an officer or feudatory of the king, it was no doubt in many cases lying within their jāgīr, i.e. fief or estate. In the case of land forming part of jāgīrs which royal officers of ancient India enjoyed temporarily,² their occupants lost the rent of or income from the land in question so long as they were in their possession. But the king's loss of revenue was greater as the land remained rent-free when the jāgīr reverted to him or was later allotted to some other officer. It therefore seems that the occupants of jāgīrs had to compensate the king's loss at least partially for the creation of revenue-free holdings within their fiefs, as otherwise they could scarcely expect the full share of merit accruing to the pious act. We have also cases³ where a king is found to ratify the rent-free holdings created in their jāgīrs by members of the royal family.

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² Cf. Watters, On Yuan Chwang's Travels in India, Vol. I, p. 177.

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³ See the cases of such holdings created by Princes Sūryasena and Puruṣottamasena and ratified by king Viśvarūpasena in his Vangīya Sāhitya Pariṣat plate (N. G. Majumdar, Inscriptions of Bengal, Vol. III, p. 147; JAS, Letters, Vol. XX, pp. 206-07).

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But it appears that a number of the grants of rent-free lands issued by the kings were really made on behalf of persons whose names are not mentioned in the documents. This seems to be suggested by the fact that, in a few cases, even though the grants are recorded in the king's name, an endorsement at the end of the documents says that they were made by others and in reality there is a contradiction between the facts as stated in the charter proper and the endorsement. An important document of this type is the Bangaon plat¹ of Vigrahapāla, which purports to record the grant of a village by the Pāla king in favour of a Brāhmaṇa, although in an endorsement at the end it is summarily stated that the grant was made by an officer of the king named Ghaṇṭiśa out of his own jāgīr.

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¹ Ep. Ind., Vol. XXIX, pp. 48ff. Cf. Vol. XXXIII, p. 63, text line 10.

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Another interesting fact is that the indication of a particular grant being actually made by one of the king's officers or feudatories but represented as one made by the king is not clear in the documents, though some of them appear to suggest the fact in a vague way. There are many records which introduce a person without any ostensible relation with the charter stated to have been granted by the king. Such an introduction is often found at the end of the documents exactly in the position of the endorsement in the Bangaon plate of Vigrahapāla III, referred to above. In a few cases, such an enigmatic name is also met with in the body of the charter without any justification for its introduction. Since it is inexplicable why a person without anything to do with the grant should be mentioned in a royal charter at all, it seems that they might have been the real donors of the grants in question and that this fact was intended to be rather vaguely indicated in the said way. It also appears that there was an amount of reluctance on the part of the Government to admit such a fact.

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The Mehar plate² of Dāmodara records a grant of lands in favour of a number of Brāhmaṇas. But at the end of the king's description in verse, there is one stanza introducing Gaṅgādharadeva who was the officer in charge of the royal elephant force. The introduction of this person cannot be explained unless it is supposed that he was the real donor of the grant although the king was not eager to mention the fact explicitly in the document.¹

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² Ibid., Vol. XXVII, pp. 182 ff.

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¹ Ibid., Vol. XXX, pp. 52-53.

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The Andhavaram plates² of the Eastern Gaṅga king Indravaraman record the grant of a village as an agrahāra or rent-free holding in favour of several Brāhmaṇas. The king is clearly mentioned as the donor. But the record is stated in the end to have been written under orders of Lokārṇavadeva, the vanquisher of many foes. The charter was issued in the Gaṅga year 133. But, instead of describing it as the usual pravardhamāna-vijaya-rājya-saṁvatsara or Gāṅgeya-vaṁśa-pravardhamāna-vijaya-rājya-saṁvatsara as we find in other Gaṅga records, the inscription in question calls it Tunburu-vaṁśa-rājya-saṁvatsara. This reminds us of the Santa-Bommali plates³ issued by a Kadamba feudatory of a Gaṅga king, which describe the Gaṅga era as Gaṅga-Kadamba-vaṁśa-pravardhamāna-vijaya-rājya-saṁvatsara even though the Kadambas had nothing to do with the establishment of the era. It appears that the grant recorded in the Andhavaram plates of Gaṅga Indravarman was really made by his feudatory Lokārṇava of the Tumburu dynasty. Unless such was the case, it is difficult to explain why he was introduced as ordering for the writing of the document and why the Gaṅga era is described only in this record as associated with the Tumburu dynasty.⁴

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² Ibid., pp. 37 ff.

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³ Bhandarkar's List, No. 2053.

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⁴ An. Rep. Ind. Ep., 1951-52, p. 5.

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There is a stanza about the end of a charter issued by the Śailodbhava king Sainyabhīta Mādhavarman II Śrīnivāsa.⁵ The verse seems to refer to a ruler named Varamora or Varanara who is described as varadīkṛta-lokanātha-sakha. It appears that lokanātha mentioned in the passage quoted above is no other than the Śailodbhava king himself and Varamora or Varanara was his feudatory who was the real donor of the grant. The word varadīkṛta means, ‘[the king] who was made the giver of boons [by Varamora or Varanara]’ and refers to the favour shown by the king to the feudatory by agreeing to the creation of the rent-free holding recorded in the inscription no doubt at the feudatory's request.

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⁵ Ep. Ind., Vol. XXIV, pp. 128 ff.; Vol. XXXIII, p. 52.

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There is an endorsement at the end of the Balangir Museum plates¹ of the 8th regnal year Mahāśivagupta Yayāti I. It speaks of Prince Durgarāja as the son of Svabhāvatunga who seems to be identical with Mahāśivagupta Yayāti himself. The introduction of the prince is really inexplicable unless he was the real donor of the grant which was ratified by his father. Similarly the enigmatic endorsement at the end of the Mahada plates² of the Telugu-Coḍa king Someśvaradevavarman of South Kosala appears to show that Yaśogaja, described in it as a ruling chief born in the family of the donor, was the real donor of the grant which was ratified by the king. If this was not the case, the endorsement is quite meaningless.

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¹ JAS, Letters, Vol. XIX, pp. 117 ff.

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² Ep. Ind., Vol. XXVIII, pp. 283 ff.

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In this connection, reference may be made to the epithet dāpaka applied to a person in a number of copper-plate grants of the Imperial Paramāras. The word is generally understood by scholars in the sense a Dūtaka or executor.³ Since, however, the epithets dāpaka and dūta are sometimes both applied to the same person,⁴ it is difficult to support the suggestion. It is not impossible that the dāpaka was the real donor whose grant was ratified by the king.

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³ CII, Vol. III, p. 291, note.

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⁴ Cf. Ep. Ind., Vol. XXII, p. 76, text lines 67 ff. (verse 39).

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Rent-free holdings in the possession of gods, Brāhmaṇas and others were generally called agrahāra, sarva-mānya, sarva-namasya, namasya-vṛtti, etc. Sometimes particular names were applied to such holdings in order to indicate the special character of a gift. Thus the Garra plates⁵ (1205 A.D.) of Candella Trailokyavarman refer to the rent-free holding granted to the son of one who died while fighting the Turuṣkas (Muhammadans) on the king's behalf as a mṛtyuka-vṛtti (literally 'death-grant'). In the inscriptions of the Śātavāhanas, the expression *bhikṣu-hala* is used to indicate a rent-free holding to be enjoyed by the Buddhist monks while the privileges of the donees are collectively styled as *parihāras*.¹ The same records² show that sometimes an *akṣaya-nīvī* or permanent endowment was created by means of land instead of a sum of money.³

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⁵ Ibid., Vol. XVI, pp. 272 ff.

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¹ Cf. *Select Inscriptions*, p. 201.

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² Ibid., p. 200, text line 2.

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³ For the technical terms, see below.

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