The Mauryan Polity c13.s12.75

c13.s12.75

Of artisans Megasthenes says: "Of these some are armourers while others make the implements which husbandmen and others find useful in their different callings. This class is not only exempted from paying taxes, but even receives maintenance from the royal exchequer."[³] Evidently state employees are referred to here. According to the *Arthaśāstra* we find the state engaging itself in industries like weaving, in manufactures of arms and armour, where, besides free labourers, artisans were employed and paid for their services. One of the regulations laid down by Kauṭalya is that agricultural people should be supplied with the necessary implements by blacksmiths, carpenters, borers, rope-makers, snake-catchers, and similar workmen.⁴ Kauṭalya speaks of both time and piece wages.⁵ There is a definite ruling where it is said 'artisans shall be provided with wages and provision in proportion to the amount of work done. The menials were paid a monthly salary of 1¼ *paṇa*."[⁶] Excepting private workmen who undertook some industry after previously obtaining a licence to carry on that industry we do not come across passages where there is a definite injunction that these artisans in the state employ were taxed. If O. Stein means by his statement¹ that people other than those in the state employ, he is right. But that Megasthenes is not concerned with these but only with those in the state employ is evident from the circumstances in which his statement is made.²