Hindu Law and Custom (Recht und Sitte) c10.19

c10.19

Of the fables I mention here only the Pañc. 1,21 (similarly Kathās 4 and 19; 5, Kathā 1 and others), where the disputing parties come to the royal court (*rājakula*) and are heard by the judges (*dharmādhikariṇaḥ, sabhyāḥ*). The police too are mentioned in the fables. In Nepal the highest criminal court, which however in important cases is the court of first instance, has 251 officers:excluding the judge, who for the most part are police officers or beadles. The chief justice (*ditha*) presides over this body and the other three courts (*nyāyasabhā*) of the capital, each of which possesses two other judges besides him. The state council (*bhāradar sabhā*) is the highest court. In the provinces there are four other courts, yet the jurisdiction mostly lies in the hands of the Governors and the village headmen.¹ In India itself in the Mahratta period the executive and the judicial departments were mostly unseparated and were entrusted to the village headman (*pāṭil*) in the villages who was helped by his secretary mostly a Brahman; above the Pāṭil stood the governor (*kamāvisdār* or *māmlatdār*), above them the prince. The land-owners too could give judgment excepting in cases of capital offences. There were also judges proper (*nyāyā-dhīsa*) but their jurisdiction was very narrow¹. Already in the Jātakas (I, 199 ff.) the village headman makes a considerable income out of the fines he imposes (*daṇḍavali*).