State and Government in Ancient India c12.s2.15

c12.s2.15

It is sometimes argued that Rudradāman (*c.* 130 A. D.), Harshavardhana (*c.* 606 A. D.) and Gopāla (*c.* 750 A. D.) owed their throne to their election by the people.¹ It is no doubt true that Rudradāman and Gopāla are expressly described as being elected to the kingship by their people²; but these statements occur in panegyric documents composed by their court poets and cannot be taken too seriously. Rudradāman's record, relied upon in this connection, elsewhere states that he had become a king by his own prowess³ and describes how he had conquered and annexed a number of provinces. The claim put forth on behalf of such a famous conqueror by his court poet that he owed his throne to his election by the people can hardly be accepted by the historian. Gopāla, the founder of the Pāla dynasty, had put an end to the anarchy and restored law and order in Bengal; he was the founder of his dynasty and his claim to kingship is sought to be strengthened by the fiction of his being elected by his subjects. The crown used to pass hereditarily in his family and none of his successors cares to profess that he owed his throne to his people's votes. It is no doubt true that Harsha owed the crown to election; but it was the crown, not of his hereditary kingdom of Thāneshwar, but that of the Maukhari kingdom of Kanauj, which belonged to his deceased brother-in-law Grahavarman, and to which he had no claim. After the death of Grahavarman, there was no competent heir left for the Maukhari throne. The Maukhari ministers, therefore, decided to offer the crown to the brother of their widowed queen. This instance shows that when there was a failure of heirs, the ministers and other high dignitaries used to elect a suitable successor from among the relations of the deceased king.¹ There are some such instances in the Jātaka stories too.² But they cannot show that the kingship was elective in normal times. Epigraphic and literary evidence shows that almost all the dynasties subsequent to *c.* 600 B. C., of which we have any knowledge, were passing the crown on the principle of heredity. The very idea of the election of the king appeared totally strange to the historians of the 12th century.³