A History of Hindu Political Theories from the Earliest Times to the End of the First Quarter of the Seventeenth Century A.D. c9.63

c9.63

Next to the considerate treatment of the subjects Kauṭilya urges in the first case respect for the established customs. The king who acquires a new territory, the author declares, should adopt the same mode of living, the same dress, and the same language and manners as those of his subjects, and should participate in their congregational festivals and amusements. Not that all customs are to be enforced, for the king is asked to abolish those customs which he considers to be injurious to the revenue and the army, or holds to be unrighteous. Along with these wise and beneficent counsels Kauṭilya exhibits in the first case an example of that intellectual cunning which is so characteristic of him. A member of the enemy's family who can wrest the conquered territory, Kauṭilya says, should be provided with a sterile tract or else with a fourth part of a fertile tract on condition of his supplying a fixed sum of money and a fixed number of troops : in raising these he would incur the displeasure of the people and be destroyed by them.∗