State and Government in Ancient India c15.145

c15.145

Curiously enough Smṛiti and Nīti writers do not emphasise military leadership and ability in the minister.⁴ A perusal of the epigraphical evidence, however, shows that they were usually military leaders as well. Harisheṇa, the Foreign Minister of Samudragupta, was also a general (*mahābalādhikṛita*). Provincial governors under the Ikshvākus and the Vākāṭakas were military commanders, and the same was the case probably with many of their ministers. Chāmuṇḍarāya, the minister of the Gaṅga king Mārasiṁha, had won the battle of Gonur for his king.⁵ In 1024 A. D. the Minister of Records of the Later Chālukyas was a *mahāprachaṇḍadaṇḍanāyaka* ; clearly he was a high military officer as well. All the ministers of the Kalachuri king Bijjaladeva were *daṇḍanāyakas* or generals.⁶ One is surprised to find that even the minister Hemādri, who had spent so much of his time in writing about *vratas* and rituals, should also have been a general ; he was not only well aquainted with the theory and practice of training war-elephants, but had led a successful expedition against a rebel chief in Jhandi district¹. Nāgarasa, the premier of Yādava king Kṛishṇa, was as great a scholar as a soldier.²