Hindu Polity: A Constitutional History of India in Hindu Times c40.109

c40.109

§ 257. The 'city magistrates' of Strabo are the Paura-mukhyas or the Paura-vriddhas. The boards of five and the full board of the thirty disclose the same arrangement as the quorums of three, five, ten, twenty and upwards in the Parishads of Law, the Buddhist Saṃgha, and the pañchaka, daśaka and viṃśaka saṃghas of Patañjali.¹ Brihaspati also enjoins committees of five in corporate associations.² In the Buddhist Saṃgha certain matters could be discussed by small quorums. But matters of greater importance could be discussed and decided by quorums of twenty and upwards only.³ In the description of the Paura of Pātaliputra we see that the council decides matters of general interest by the bigger quorum. This collective council of the 'city magistrates' corresponds to what the Rāmāyaṇa calls the Inner Body of the Paura. The Outer, the general body, must have been composed of a fairly large number, when the Inner alone had thirty members.