A History of Hindu Political Theories from the Earliest Times to the End of the First Quarter of the Seventeenth Century A.D. c11.s1.7

c11.s1.7

Beginning our survey of Kāmandaka's political ideas with his treatment of the concept of seven limbs of sovereignty, we have to observe that the author takes over from his master the specific order in which the 'calamities' of the limbs are described. Along with this Kāmandaka combines, however incongruously, a notion that was at best dimly perceived by Kauṭilya, the notion, namely, of the organic relation of the factors of sovereignty. Thus he applies in one place the epithet 'helpful to one another' (*parasparopakārī*) to the seven limbs, and he explains his meaning by saying that sovereignty does not flourish even if it is deficient in one single limb. In this passage is evidently embodied an idea which, if we might express it in the technical language of political theory, would be called that of the integration of the governmental units.