History of Dharmashastra (Ancient and Mediaeval Religious and Civil Law in India) v1.c6.s16.t12.7

v1.c6.s16.t12.7

That Bhāradvāja was an ancient writer on arthaśāstra follows from the Kauṭilīya, wherein the views of Bhāradvāja are cited seven times and of Kaṇiṅka Bhāradvāja once. Some of the views of Bhāradvāja as described in the Kauṭilīya are that a king should choose his ministers from amongst his fellow-students, that the king should consider his line of policy alone in secret, that the princes should be punished secretly when they manifest no love for the king their father, that the minister should set one prince against another when the king is on his death-bed, that when calamities befall the king and the minister, the former is the lesser of two evils, that one should bow down before the strong. This last view occurs in the Mahābhārata in the same words.²⁴² The Śāntiparva (chap. 140) contains a dialogue between Bhāradvāja and king Śatruñjaya of Sauvīra in which daṇḍa is said to be the most pre-eminent among the expedients. The same parva (chap. 58. 3) mentions Bhāradvāja in a list of writers on rājaśāstra. The Yaśastilaka²⁴³ (4th Āśvāsa p. 100, Nirṇayasāgara ed.) quotes two verses of Bhāradvāja from his treatise on the topic of the six *guṇas*. This shows that Bhāradvāja's work on politics was available in the 10th century and contained verses (probably intermixed with prose).