India as Known to Panini: A Study of the Cultural Material in the Ashtadhyayi c10.s1.43

c10.s1.43

*PARISHAD*—Three varieties of *Parishads* were known to Pāṇini, (1) academic, (2) social and (3) administrative. The first kind of *Parishad* was an academy of specialist scholars within the *Charaṇa* whose function was to fix the *Śākhā* text to be adopted by the *Charaṇa* with special reference to its phonetical and grammatical points. Pāṇini refers to the *Charaṇa-Parishad* in *sūtra* IV.3.123 (*Patrād-hvaryu-parishadaś-cha*) regulating the term *pārishada* to denote something that appertained to a *parishad* (*parishadaḥ idam*). The Āchārya along with his academy (*saparishatka āchārya*) greeted the student on his first admission (यक्षमिव चक्षुषः प्रियो वा भूयासमिति सपरिषदकमाचार्य मभ्येत्य ब्रह्मचारी पठति, *Gobhila Gṛihyasūtra*, III.4.28; *Drāhyāyaṇa Gṛihya.* III.1.25). Charaka records full details of an academic *Parishad* (Vimānasthāna, VIII.19-20). Patañjali mentions *pārishada* as a work which was the product of a Vedic *Charaṇa* (cf. *Sarva-Veda-Pārishadam*, quoted above). Its earlier variant in the *Nirukta* was *Pārshada* which Yāska mentions as works composed in the *Charaṇas* (*pada-prakṛitīni sarva-charaṇānāṁ pārshadāni*, *Nirukta*, I.17). Patañjali also gives the form *pārshada* for Pāṇini's *Pārishada* works of the Sātyamugri and Rāṇāyanīya schools of the *Sāmaveda* (*Bhāshya*, I.22). As Durgāchārya explains, the *Pārshada* works were the *Prātiśākhyas* produced in the *parshad* (=*parishad*) of each *Charaṇa*, and dealing mainly with phonetical and grammatical topics.