Hindu Administrative Institutions c10.s3.44

c10.s3.44

The first six items mentioned above are police functions, the ultimate control of which lay with the magistrates of criminal justice. These are detecting crimes, and arresting the suspicious, protecting the civil population, preventive regulations against committing of crimes.³ The last five items show that the conception of administration of criminal justice went hand in hand with the police jurisdiction, and the one completed the other and was completed by the other. Police officials were the instruments for bringing to book law-breakers. There was a strong police organization affording security to the civil population. Much of the police control was by means of informants who sometimes acted as agents provocateurs. If the person suspected were an officer of rank the police officer would approach him and address him by taking him into his confidence. He would offer the officer a sum of money as bribe for letting his friend out of the trouble he was in. If this were accepted the officer was at once reported as charged with corruption and banished out of the land. The functions attributed to the informants, such as, shadowing the suspected, find a parallel in the modern secret police organization. When notices of property stolen and house-breaking reached the office there was police search with all strenuousness and the culprits were often found out. There are ample instructions for investigating cases of homicide and suicide which all go to show the high level, culture and civilization had attained during the epoch of the Mauryas.¹