The Early History of the Deccan (Parts I–XI) v1.c7.s7.43

v1.c7.s7.43

Industry and commerce occupied the next place in the economic life of the land. Various classes of workers figure prominently in the contemporary records. Inscriptions at Nāsik and Junnār mention *kularikas* (potters?), *odayantrikas* (makers of hydraulic engines), *tilapisakas* (oil-millers), *dhannikas* (corn-dealers), *kolikas* (weavers), *vasakaras* (bamboo workers), *kasakaras* (braziers). Each of them had a guild of its own and these were technically called *śreṇis*.³ They were corporate bodies, wielding great influence in the state. *Śreṇi-dharma* or ‘the usage of the guilds’ had the force of law. They served trade or craft interests in various ways. A special feature of these associations was the banking facilities provided by them. They received cash deposits and endowments of property, and undertook to spend the income from them in a specified manner. For instance, the Nāsik epigraph of Uṣabhadāta shows that at Govardhana one weavers’ guild accepted a permanent investment of 2,000 *kārṣāpaṇas* yielding interest at the rate of 1 per cent. per month,⁴ and another of 1,000 *kārṣāpaṇas* at ¾ per cent. per month. The interest on the larger sum was earmarked for supplying annually ‘to every one of the twenty monks who kept the *vassa* in the cave (at Nāsik) a cloth-money of 12 (*kārṣāpaṇas*)’ and that on the smaller sum was set apart for providing them with means to meet other expenses.⁵ An inscription by a Śaka lay-worshipper at Junnār records the investment of the income of two fields with the guild at Konachika for planting *karañja* and banyan trees.⁶ The guilds had also the power to make gifts in the name of the corporation. At Junnār there is an epigraph which notices the gift of a seven-celled cave and a cistern by the guild of corn-dealers.¹ ‘The guilds must have been of long standing, and their operations characterized by honesty and fair dealing; for otherwise men would scarcely have made perpetual endowments with them.’² The deposits served as capital for the traders and encouraged them to engage in commercial enterprises.