The Mauryan Polity c8.s4.t7.6

c8.s4.t7.6

The officers of the jail were known as *bandhanāgārādhyakṣa* and *caraka*. The former was the Superintendent of the Jail and the latter was one of his assistants. If these officers were found charged with the ill-treatment of the prisoners or with violating the rule of law they were also punished. Some of the offences punishable were the infliction of punishments more severe than what was due, ill-treatment of the prisoners in the matter of rations and bedding, transfer of prisoners from one jail to another without assigning sufficient reason, and illicit intercourse with female prisoners. From the duties expected of the *dharmamahāmātras* of Aśoka's Edicts, it would appear that these officials correspond to the *dharmasthas* or judges of the civil and criminal courts mentioned by the *Kauṭalīya*. The suffix *mahāmātra* like the term *adhyakṣa* in the *Arthaśāstra* is a technical term for an official. According to Aśoka, these officials were to be engaged with the employers and employees, and were employed for taking steps against unjust imprisonment, and the release on insufficient grounds of those already imprisoned. They were also to see that the people did not molest one another. Some of these were the functions of the *dharmasthīya* court of the *Kauṭalīya*. At the least the *dharmamahāmātras* of the Edicts can be compared to the Superintendents of the Jails found mentioned in the *Arthaśāstra*. According to Aśoka¹ these dispensers of justice must be impartial as between one citizen and another. All men were equal in the eyes of law, and proper award of punishment not only entitled the judges but also the king whom they represented, to merit heaven.²