Hindu Polity: A Constitutional History of India in Hindu Times c18.43

c18.43

§ 99. The passage in the Pāli Canon noticed above places the Pettanikas by the side of the Rāshtrikas, and, as we have seen, the term denoted 'hereditary leaders.' Theirs appears to have been really a perverted form of the Rāshtrika, or rather the Bhoja, form of government, where rulers or leaders had managed to become hereditary. In the Aitareya Brāhmaṇa itself, one class of Bhojas are distinguished from the other by the expression *Bhoja pitaram* (VIII. 12) or hereditary Bhoja (literally, who himself a Bhoja would also be the father of a Bhoja). The commentary to the Aṅguttara Nikāya has in one place¹ *bhuttānubhuttaṃ bhuñjati* (=*Pettanika*) which would signify a Bhoja Pettanika. The Pettanika oligarchy, or probably aristocracy, was prevalent in Western India as evidenced by Aśoka's inscriptions. That it existed in Eastern India is probable, coming as it does in the Pāli passage.