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Hindu Polity: A Constitutional History of India in Hindu Times c9: Chapter II: Samiti

Hindu Polity: A Constitutional History of India in Hindu Times c9

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English

Chapter II: Samiti

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*The Sovereign Assembly of Vedic Times*

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§ 6. Going back to the oldest literature of the race, we find from the Vedas that national life and activities in the earliest times on record were expressed through popular assemblies and institutions. The greatest institution of this nature was the Samiti of our Vedic fore-fathers The word *samiti* (*sam* + *iti*) means 'meeting together,' *i.e.*, an assembly. The Samiti was the national assembly of the whole people or *Viśaḥ* (विशः) ;¹ for we find 'the whole people' or Samiti, in the alternative, electing and re-electing the *Rājan* (राजन) or '*King*.'² The whole people were supposed to be present in the Assembly.

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¹ In Vedic times, Hindu Society was divided into *Janas*, tribes or nations *e.g.*, Anus, Yadus, Kurus. But, at the same time, they were conscious of the fact that they all belonged to one common race, for all of them called themselves "*āryas*" आर्याः The people or the tribe were called *Viśaḥ* (विशः), from which the word *Vaiśya* ('one of the people' — 'the commoner') is derived. On Vedic Society, consult Zimmer, *Altindisches Leben*. See also Macdonell and Keith, *Vedic Index*, sub *Ārya*, *Jana*, etc.

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² विशस्त्वा सर्वा वाञ्छन्तु. Rig-Veda, x. 173.1. Atharva-Veda, vi. 87-1. ध्रुवाय ते समितिः कल्पतामिह ; AV., vi. 88. 3. त्वां विशो वृणतां राज्याय AV., iii 4.2. Also A.V., iii. 3.4 5. See *infra* § 204.

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§ 7. The functions of the Samiti may be gathered from different references. We have already noticed the most important business of the Samiti, to wit, electing the *Rājan*.³ It could also re-elect a king who had been banished.⁴ They were thus a sovereign body from the constitutional point of view. In the Atharva-Veda, VI. 64, which is a prayer-hymn for union and concord, and also in the Ṛig Veda, (X 191. 3), we have a prayer for a ‘common Samiti’ and ‘common policy of State’ (समानो मन्त्रः समितिः समानी), a ‘common aim and a common mind’ (समानं व्रत॑ सह॒ चित्तमे॑षाम् ).¹ This indicates that matters of state (*‘mantra’*) were discussed in the Samiti.

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³ Cf. नास्मै समितिः कल्पते ; AV., v. 19. 15.

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⁴ See *infra*, Chapter XXIII on Vedic Kingship.

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¹ "Same be their counsel, same their assembly, same their aim, in common their thought." Bloomfield, S. B. E., xlii. 136.

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The king attended the Samiti, and it was thought necessary that he should do so. The Ṛig-Veda has ‘like a true king going to the Samiti’ (राजा न सत्यः॒ समितो॑रियानः).² The inference is that it was the king’s duty to attend the Samiti, and that if he did not attend it, he would be considered ‘untrue,’ the significance of which we shall see when we come to the ceremony of Vedic Coronation. The practice of the king presenting himself before the Samiti continued probably as long as the Samiti existed. The Chhāndogya Upanishad, one of the youngest Vedic works, relating the visit of Śvetaketu Āruṇeya Gautama to the Samiti of the Pañchālas, mentions the King (Pravāhaṇa Jaivala) as present in the Samiti.³

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² RV., ix. 92. 6; Cf. वषीयंसः समनसः राजानः समिताविव, RV., x. 97. 6.

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³ Chh. Up., V. 3. Cf. Br. Ar. Up. vi. 2. See § 9 below.

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§ 8. Deliberations

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In deliberations, speakers were anxious to make speeches agreeable to the assembled Samiti (ये सं॒ग्रामाः॒ समि॑तय॒स्तेषु॒ चारु॑ वदेम ते).⁴ The speaker wanted to prove himself ‘brilliant, not to be contradicted,’ in the Samiti ⁵ To these deliberations would also refer the prayer in the Atharva-Veda, II, 27 :

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⁴ AV., vii-12. 1; xii. 1. 56.

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⁵ "When he has arrived at the Samiti, he should murmur 'Superior (to my adversaries) I have come hither, brilliant, not to be contradicted !' अभिभूरहमागमम् विराड्-विराजतः—a Vedic text quoted in Pāraskara-Gṛihya-Sūtra, III-13.4. See SBE, xxix, p. 363.

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"May the enemy not win the d e b a t e.........Overcome the debate of those that debate against us, render them devoid of force!
"Overcome thou the debate of him that is hostile to us, O Indra! Encourage us with thy might! Render me superior in debate."¹

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¹ S.B.E. XLII 137-8.

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questions other than political were also occasionally discussed in the Samiti, is borne out by the above-mentioned record about Śvetaketu. Śvetaketu was a young man of great learning who, as the Chhāndogya says,² claimed complete knowledge of the sacred and philosophic literature at the age of twenty-four. In the Chhāndogya and Bṛihadāraṇyaka Upanishads, we see the young man who had just completed his education, presenting himself before the Samiti, also called the Parishad of the Pañchālas (पञ्चानां समितिमयाय, पञ्चानां परिषदमाजगाम). The Kshatriya (Rājanya) king in the Assembly of the Pañchāla nation, Pravāhaṇa Jaivali (or Jaivala), put to him five philosophic questions, none of which the bumptious young man (Kumāra) could answer, and "he had to go away with the remark of Jaivali: '"How could '"anybody who did not know these things say that he had been '"educated?'"³ Here we find the Samiti acting as a sort of national academy.

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² Chhāndogya Up., VI (Prapāṭhaka), 1 Cf. Āpastamba Dharma-Sūtra I. 2. 5-6.

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³ Chh. Up., v 3.; Bṛi. Ār. Up., vi 2.

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Ṛig Veda are to be found only in portions which are considered to be the latest. We may, therefore, conclude that the Samiti was a product of the developed, not early, Vedic age. The developed stage of debate, evidently a free right of discussion, the anxiety of the debater to win over the opinion of others, all point to a culture of considerable degree. In the Germanic folk-assembly, we have some nobleman speaking and the ordinary people present merely expressing inarticulate approval, conveyed by noise of arms¹: the stage of debate is not yet known to them. It is therefore not accurate to compare the Samiti (as some European scholars have done) with the early folk-assemblies of Western Europe.

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¹ Tacitus, *Moribus et Populis Germaniæ* c. II.

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Another index of the developed stage of the Samiti is that the Samiti, like the Sabhā (which we shall presently discuss) had its Pati or Īśāna, President. For instance, see the *mantra* cited in Pāraskara-Gṛihya-Sūtra, III. 13.⁴: 'the lord (Īśāna) of this assembly is a man insuperable in his power.'²

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² S B E., xxix 362 Original: यस्याः पर्षद ईशानः सहसा सूनुष्टरो जन इति ।

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It is clear, as observed above, that the whole people were considered to be present in the Samiti. But when, for instance, Śvetaketu goes to the Samiti of the Pañchālas where philosophers and statesmen were sitting, it would be hardly probable that the whole nation, without any principle of representation, would be actually present. We already find in the Vedic period the principle of representation appreciated and variously acted upon: we have the Grāmaṇī or the 'leader' of the town or village, as a representative *persona* in the coronation ceremony;³ representatives of trade also are seen at the ceremony. From a passage in the 'Hymn to the Land' of the Atharva-Veda, where the Samitis (XII. 1.56, ये संग्रामा समितय: 'the assembled Samitis') of the whole land are referred to, it seems that those who were assembled (*saṃgrāmāḥ*) were the 'villages together' (*saṃgrāma*). The village, as a collective unit, is well known: Śaryāta Mānava 'wandered about with his *grāma* (Śatapatha, IV. 1, 5, 2, 7).⁴ In later times in in law-books, 'the village' fights out legal disputes; 'the village' is even fined. The Grāmaṇī was the key-stone of the village-constitution. The village even took to themselves the name of their leader (Grāmaṇī).¹ We have the 'village-together' meeting (*saṃgrāma*) 'desirous of agreement' in the Taittirīya Saṃhitā (संग्रामे संयत्ते समयकामः).² It seems that the village formed the basis of the constitution of the Samiti, if not originally, certainly, in later times.

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³ See *infra* § 211.

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⁴ ये ग्रामा यदरण्यं या सभा अधिभूम्याम् । ये संग्रामाः समितयस्तेषु चारु वदेम ते ॥ *Cf.* "In several passages, the word (grāma) occurs with what appears to be the derivative sense of 'body of men.'" Macdonell and Keith, *Vedic Index*, I. 245.

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¹ See Kāśikā on P., v. 3. 112. 'देवदत्तो ग्रामणीर्येषां त इमे देवदत्तकाः'.

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² ||. 1. 8. 4. Cf. वागैषि सुहृद्विरेकमत्यं समयः । सङ्‌गुभिः सन्धिरेवार्थः। Bhatta Bhaskara Miśra on TS. Inter-village gathering for war purposes gave the secondary meaning of 'war' to the expression *saṃgrāma*.

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The Samiti had a very long life. We find it in the Vedic age itself regarded as eternal, called "a daughter of Prajāpati," the Creator.³ It must have been, therefore, an ancient institution even then. Its continuous existence is attested by the Ṛig-Veda and the Atharva-Veda, and later, by the Chhāndogya Upanishad (*c.* 800 or 700 B. C.) which nearly marks the end of the later Vedic period. The period covered by these records extends over several centuries. That the institution did not far outlive the later Vedic age and did not come down to the epoch which in its latest phase saw the rise of empires, is borne out by the Pāraskara-Gṛihya Sūtra (*c.* 500 B. C.) which treats the Samiti (called by the other name, *Parishat*, or rather *Parshat*)⁴ evidently as a reminiscence (Pār. G. III. 13. 4.) In Pāraskara the ancient tradition of Samiti is merely applied to the Sabhā, as the opening sentence indicates (अथातः सभाप्रवेशनम्). The Samiti disappears before the time of the Jātakas (600 B. C.) We have thus the age-history of the Samiti from the latter part of the millennium of the Ṛig-Veda down to about 700 B. C., a life extending certainly over a thousand years, and very likely longer. In the imperial epoch, we naturally do not find the Samiti, but we find another institution which, as we shall see (Ch xxvii), was a phœnix, arisen out of the ashes of the Samiti.

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³ A. V., VII. 12.

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⁴ Parishat, lit. means the 'great session.' The meeting of the Samiti came to denote the Samiti itself. The form *parshat* is also occasionally found. (Cf. Baudhāyana, Dh. S., I. 1. 9.)

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