Pre-Buddhist India: A Political, Administrative, Economic, Social and Geographical Survey of Ancient India Based Mainly on the Jataka Stories c5.t3: IV. Organization
Pre-Buddhist India: A Political, Administrative, Economic, Social and Geographical Survey of Ancient India Based Mainly on the Jātaka Stories c5.t3
- Language
- English
IV. Organization
c5.t3.2
It is highly remarkable indeed that, in spite of a comparatively lower stage of trading enterprises and lack of fluid capital for the investment in industrial purposes, the economic life of this period evinces a higher state of co-operative activity and commercial or trading organization. Of course, the associative spirit, lending itself into formation of various associations for mutual assistance, due to a natural growth of civilization, to the instinct of self-preservation, goes back to very early times.¹ Economic groupings of various kinds are already known from Vedic times.² "The existence of trade associations," says Fick,³ "which grew partly for economical reasons better employment of capital, facilities of intercourse, partly for protecting the legal interests of their class, is surely to be traced to an early period of Indian Culture." The Law-books⁴ and the *Kauṭilīya*⁵ present a much more developed stage of this remarkable feature of the economic life of India. The culture-stage of the *Jātakas*, falling as it does midway between the Vedic and the strictly-Buddhist periods, embodies in itself the first beginnings, the formation and the process of development of the Merchant and Craft Guilds which, in later times, reached a high water-mark of organization, efficiency and importance, with their own laws, usages and officers.
c5.t3.3
¹ Dictionary of Political Economy, II, p. 209.
c5.t3.4
² See R. K. Mookerji, Local Government in Ancient India, (2nd edition); See Vedic Index, I, pp. 140, 471 ff.
c5.t3.5
³ op. cit., p. 267.
c5.t3.6
⁴ Cf. Mazumdar, Corporate Life in Ancient India, p. 24 ff.
c5.t3.7
⁵ Arthaśāstra, III, 14.
c5.t3.8
As far as economic organizations were concerned there was, it seems, a clear-cut and well-marked-out difference between the traders and the merchants on the one hand, and the craftsmen or the artisans on the other. So that it will be better for us to deal with the organisations, in whatever forms they may be, of these two types of workers.
c5.t3.9
Our texts frequently⁶ make mention of the *Seṇiyo* (skr. *Śreṇayaḥ*)—a term which has been generally accepted as standing for Guilds.⁷ But unfortunately they do not give us any clear idea as regards their character, their constitution or organization. It will appear, however, from what follows that these *seṇis* or guilds were particularly, if not solely, restricted to the craftsmen or the
c5.t3.10
⁶ J., I, pp. 267, 314; IV, pp. 43, 411; VI, pp. 22; 427.
c5.t3.11
⁷ See Rangaswami, op. cit., pp. 58-9; 183-6
c5.t3.12
CRAFT- GUILDS artisans i.e., those who were both the producers and the sellers of their own goods or articles. It is in this sense that we take *seṇi* as denoting particularly the craft-organization leaving out other temporary or semi-organizations of merchants or other groups of workers.
c5.t3.13
It is to be regretted that only four of the eighteen crafts (*sippāni*), organized in the form of a union,¹ are specifically mentioned: "the wood-workers (and the masons), the smiths, the leather-workers, the painters and the rest expert in various crafts."² It is difficult to fill up the fourteen unnamed guilds. Probably the number is only conventional, but it does indicate the wide-spread organization of the various crafts. As a matter of fact, the stories reveal a considerably greater number of crafts and occupations as already noticed.³ And out of these, however, only the more important and stable ones are likely to have been organized in the form of a union.
c5.t3.14
¹ J., VI, pp. 22, 427 (*aṭṭhārasaseṇiyo*).
c5.t3.15
² Ibid.—"Vaḍḍhaki. kammāra-cammakāra-citta-kārādīnaṃsippakesata aṭṭhārasa seṇiyo......"
c5.t3.16
³ See Rhys Davids, *Buddhist India*, pp. 90-6; Majumdar, *Corporate Life*, pp. 18-9.
c5.t3.17
Although the *Jātaka* stories do not enable us to fully comprehend the nature of craft-unions or guilds, such as they were in those days, they nevertheless give out certain indications here and there which may help us a little in our study.
c5.t3.18
There appear certain circumstances which, as Fick observes,⁴ "greatly favour a combination and organization of particular unions."
c5.t3.19
⁴ Op. cit., p. 278.
c5.t3.20
Firstly, the hereditary character of the craftsman's profession was, as already noticed,⁵ of essential importance. From his early youth, the son was apprenticed to the craft and art of his father. And the manual skill, the talent for a particular craft, was an inheritance of the family from generation to generation. But the fact of hereditariness alone is not sufficient for inferring anything like a compact union.
c5.t3.21
⁵ Supra, p. 205.
c5.t3.22
Secondly, the remarkable localisation of industries was an important factor which greatly contributed to the organisation of particular branches of industry. These localisations are seen mainly in three features: inside the cities, outside, but in the proximity of, the cities and in the isolated parts of the country.
c5.t3.23
Within the towns and cities, we see that certain streets, if not quarters, were fixed for certain artisans and tradesmen. For instance, the *dantakāra-vīthi* was the street of the Ivory-workers,⁶ the *rajaka-vīthi* that of the dyers,⁷ the *tantavitaṭṭhānam* was the weavers' place⁸ and *Surāpaṇa* was the place of the liquor-shops.¹ So were the florists'² and the perfumers' bazars.³ These instances alone however do not give us anything which may go to justify our inference that the crafts therein mentioned were organized in some form of a union.
c5.t3.24
⁶ J., I, p. 320; II, p. 197.
c5.t3.25
⁷ J., IV, p. 81.
c5.t3.26
⁸ J., I, p. 356.
c5.t3.27
¹ J., I, pp. 121, 252, 269, 350; II, pp. 427, 431; IV, pp. 115, 223-G. 53; V, p. 13; VI, pp. 276-G. 1196; 328.
c5.t3.28
² J., IV, p. 82.
c5.t3.29
³ Ibid.
c5.t3.30
Some trades and crafts were followed outside the towns or cities, although mostly in their proximity. Amongst these the potter's craft seems to have been the most important. The *Kumbhakāra Jātaka*⁴ mentions a suburban village (*dvāragāma*) in the vicinity of Benares, inhabited by the potters. Similarly, "not far from Benares" as the *Alinacitta Jātaka* says,⁵ "lay a carpenter's village (*vaḍḍhakigāma*) which, as we have already noticed, provided a splendid example of co-operative work.⁶ Further instances of such settlements, places occupied only with particular branches of industry, are also to be found in the stories.⁷ These craftsmen's villages or settlements, in the immediate neighbourhood of a big city, could find an easy market for their products and could also supply themselves with their ordinary needs, such as clothes, foodstuffs, implements and the like, from the city. About one of such villages, that of the carpenters, we learn moreover that it contained a thousand families. These were divided into two parts of five hundred families, each under a head or a leader (*jeṭṭhaka*).⁸ This may or may not be taken to show that at times there existed more than one union of the same class of craftsmen in the same locality. Another interesting sidelight thrown by the same story on the organization of such unions is that the carpenters living in that village, failing once to carry out the orders placed before them for which they had received large advances, were harassed and summoned to fulfil their contract. But, instead of doing that, they built a mighty ship secretly, emigrated *en masse*, with their families, "slipping down the Ganges by night and so out to sea, till they reached a fertile island" where they ultimately settled.⁹ Such a mobility of guilds is also witnessed in the inscriptions of a later period.¹⁰
c5.t3.31
⁴ J., III, p. 376.
c5.t3.32
⁵ J., II, p. 18.
c5.t3.33
⁶ Supra, p. 161.
c5.t3.34
⁷ J., II, p. 405; IV, pp. 159, 207, 344.
c5.t3.35
⁸ J., IV, p. 161.—"*Tasmin pana kulasahasse pañcannam pañcannam kulasatānam jeṭṭhakā dve vaḍḍhakī ahesum.*"
c5.t3.36
⁹ J., IV, p. 159.
c5.t3.37
¹⁰ For instance, The Indore Copper-plate Inscription of Skandagupta. (465. A. D.)—G. I., No. 16.
c5.t3.38
The craft-villages, not to speak of other homogenous villages that lay in the middle of the flat country, were much more remarkable. They formed themselves, naturally, into special markets for the whole country-side. Thus we read in the *Suci Jātaka*¹¹ that there were two smiths-villages (*Kammāra gāmas*) situated very near to each other, one of which is said to have comprised a thousand huts (*sahassakuṭiko*). From the villages round about, people came there to have razors, axes, ploughshares, spikes, needles and other implement made (*vāsipharasu-phalupacanādikārāpanattham*). Similarly, the hunters villages (*nesādagāmas*) on the Ganges or further afield supplied skins, ivory and the like.¹ "When one reflects," so runs the talented reflection of Fick, "what a difficulty such a local isolation creates in the economical relations, one will see in these manufacturing villages, not a phenomenon of secondary importance, but a highly important factor and one that is characteristic of the physiognomy of the social life of that time. The power of traditional customs, which suit the spirit of the Indian people inclined to schematism, has created and maintained here a new impetus which is stronger than the practical need which obviously points to a variety of professions within the same common life. However much the origin of professional communities may have to be traced, as we have to do in the case of the Russian village communities, to the close relationship of the villagers with one another and to the equal right of all in the common property,² on the Indian soil the maintenance of such a remarkable institution seems to have been due principally to the inborn tendency towards organization, classification, schematism in the minds of the Indians. As the Brāhmaṇas worked together in villages in which foreign, especially lower, elements were not tolerated so, following their example, social groups united by community of profession, separated themselvs from one another and helped to create the manifoldness of modern caste-life."³ We cannot wholly agree to the learned scholar's view, specially with regard to the 'impetus' for such unions, and the creation of caste-system. We are inclined to believe that it was the practical need, the natural instinct, more than anything else, which went to create such isolated village-unions.
c5.t3.39
¹¹ J., III, p. 281 ff.
c5.t3.40
¹ J., II, p. 36; IV, pp. 413; V, p. 337; VI, p. 71.
c5.t3.41
² Cf. Senart, *Les Castes dans l'Inde*, pp. 197, 229.
c5.t3.42
³ Fick, op. cit., pp. 282-3.
c5.t3.43
Lastly there was the institution of the presidents (*pāmukhā*) or aldermen (*jeṭṭhakā*), which indicates the presence of a certain form of organization. We have instances of such aldermen in the case of smiths (*kammārajeṭṭhaka*).⁴ garlandmakers (*mālākārajeṭṭhaka*)⁵ and carpenters (*vaḍḍhakijeṭṭhaka*).⁶ We are not told anything about the power or the functions of the aldermen. Their offices were probably hereditary as all others in that period, though not strictly so. These leaders of the guilds are sometimes described as quite important persons, wealthy of course, and favourites at the Court. "The principal smith," says for instance the *Suci Jātaka*,⁷ "was a favourite of the king, rich, and of great substance." Nothing is given out as to how these presidents of the guilds were inter-related. One *Jātaka*,⁸ however, inentions an officer, the *Bhaṇḍāgārika* to wit, who was the supreme head or the judge of all the guilds, besides being the 'treasurer,' literally the "houser of goods." The institution of such a post must have been the result of some quarrelling among the guilds, as Mrs. Rhys Davids has suggested.¹ About the office of this *Bhaṇḍāgārika*, also we know very little. "It was not confined to the custody of moneys.... it is possible that it referred to a supervision of the goods made or dealt with by a guild or guilds and not only to the king's exchequer."²
c5.t3.44
⁴ J., III, p. 281; V, p. 282.
c5.t3.45
⁵ J., III, p. 405.
c5.t3.46
⁶ J., IV, p. 161; VI, p. 332.
c5.t3.47
⁷ J., III, p. 281.
c5.t3.48
⁸ J., IV, p. 43—"Sabbasesīnam vicāraṇārahaṃ Bhaṇḍāgārikaṭṭhānam."
c5.t3.49
¹ See J. R. A. S., 1901, p. 865; *C. H. I.*, I, p. 206.
c5.t3.50
² *Ibid.*, I, pp. 206-7.
c5.t3.51
The learner or the apprentice (*Antevāsika*) also appears in the stories.³ But no terms or conditions of pupillage are given.
c5.t3.52
³ J., I, p. 252; V, pp. 290 *ff.* *Cf.* *Dialogues of the Buddha*, I. pp. 84, 89.
c5.t3.53
Thus it would seem that some of the crafts, at least, were organized in some form or other. What were the regulations of work, rules of apprenticeship, control of the craftsmen, we do not know. Fick compares these organizations with the guilds of the Middle Ages in Europe.⁴
c5.t3.54
⁴ Op. cit., p. 284.
c5.t3.55
While the craft-guilds, thus, seem to have enjoyed, more or less, a permanent form of organization, the other unions, those of the merchants and tradesmen (*vāṇijā*) were less so. These latter only seem to have had a temporary character. Although two of the characteristics or factors of an organisation, *viz.* hereditariness⁵ and the institution of an elder (*jeṭṭhaka*)⁶ are present also in these unions or combines, their permanent character is no where revealed.
c5.t3.56
⁵ For instance, J., I, pp. 98, 107, 120, 122; 312; II, pp. 64, 236, 287; III, p. 198; IV, p. 62. *Cf.* "The trade of the trader, dealer or middleman (*vāṇija*) may well have been largely hereditary." *C. H. I.* I, p. 210.
c5.t3.57
⁶ J., I, p. 25; II, pp. 295, 335; IV, pp. 137, 351—G. 179.
c5.t3.58
"In individual branches of the tradesmen's profession, their small stability may be the reason why we do not read anything of a close organization."⁷ The frequently-mentioned petty tradesmen (*vāṇijā*) who cry out their wares in the streets of the city cannot of course be imagined to have belonged to any organization. The pedlar dealing in pots and pans sells his goods with the cry "buy water pots, buy water pots."⁸ Similarly another merchant (*vāṇija*) went about hawking his goods, which were carried on a donkey.⁹ So also the corn-dealers (*dhaññavāṇijā*)¹⁰ the green grocers (*paṇṇikā*),¹¹ and such other petty tradesmen who appear in the stories do not seem to have formed any organization of their own. They plied on their trade in their individual capacity, unbounded by conditions of a common union, and fixing their own price.¹²
c5.t3.59
⁷ Fick, op. cit., p. 276.
c5.t3.60
⁸ J., I, p. 111.
c5.t3.61
⁹ J., II, p. 109.
c5.t3.62
¹⁰ J., III, p. 198.
c5.t3.63
¹¹ J., I, p. 312.
c5.t3.64
¹² *Cf.* J., I, pp. 111-2.
c5.t3.65
There are, however, certain indications here and there which would appear to show that there existed some sort of concerted commercial action on the part of the traders who carried on their more extensive trade on land and sea, thus forming something like occasional combines.
c5.t3.66
We frequently read of caravans (*sattha*) consisting of 500 carts (the number of the carts is only conventional) laid with goods (*bhaṇḍāni*) travelling across the country.¹ There the rank of the *Satthavāha*, or caravan-leader, seems to imply some sort of federation. Moreover, this position was apparently hereditary as the term *satthavāhakulam* indicates.² The insecure condition of the roads in those times necessitated the co-operation of a certain kind among these merchants. Having long and dreary distances to traverse, and being always in fear of an attack by organized bands of robbers who lay in wait for them³ the travelling tradesmen naturally went united in a body, with one man as their elder (*jeṭṭhaka*). This naturally implies that other merchants with their carts followed the *Satthavāha* and looked to him for directions as to halts, watering, precautions against brigands and dangerous places, and even as to routes, fordings etc.⁴ But it was not a strict union. Subordination was not always ensured⁵ and the evidence at hand does not warrant the inference of any fuller syndicalism among the traders.
c5.t3.67
¹ J., I, pp. 98, 107, 194, 368 : II, pp. 294; 335; III, p. 200; IV, p. 351-4; V, p. 22.
c5.t3.68
² J., I, pp. 98, 107, 194; II, p.
c5.t3.69
³ J., II, p. 388; IV, p. 115; 430.
c5.t3.70
⁴ J., I, p. 99 ff.
c5.t3.71
⁵ J., II, p. 108, 368; II, p. 295; III, p. 200.
c5.t3.72
Then again the hundred or so of merchants who, in the *Cullaka-Seṭṭhi Jātaka*,⁶ come to buy up the cargo of a newly arrived ship, have not formed any union, but are apparently each trying to "score off his own bat," no less than the pushful youth who forestalled them.⁷
c5.t3.73
⁶ J., I, p. 122.
c5.t3.74
⁷ C. H. I., I, p. 211.
c5.t3.75
In the same way we do not find any indication of syndicate or federation or any agreement existing between the out-going traders on board a common ship. The 500 fellow-traders on board the ill-fated ships in the *Valāhassa*⁸ and *Paṇḍara*⁹ *Jātakas*, or the 700 who were lucky enough to have Suppāraka as their pilot,¹⁰ or those others who are so often mentioned as sailing away to far-off lands for trading purposes:¹¹ in all these instances we do not hear anying like a close organisation, "beyond the fact that there was concerted action in chartering one and the same vessel." We cannot say whether these occasional combines were in any way similar to the joint-stock ventures of the chartered trading companies of England in the 16th and 17th centuries. But they were at least the precursors of co-operative enterprises, the *Sambhūyasamutthānam* of the *Dharma Sūtras*¹² and *Kauṭilīya*,¹³ which lay down definite rules for such organisations.
c5.t3.76
⁸ J., II, p. 128.
c5.t3.77
⁹ J., V, p. 75.
c5.t3.78
¹⁰ J., IV, p. 138 ff.
c5.t3.79
¹¹ Infra. Chapter on Exchange.
c5.t3.80
¹² Cf. Nārada, III, 1-9; See Majumdar, Corporate Life, pp. 73 ff.
c5.t3.81
¹³ Arthaśāstra, III, 14—"Guilds of workmen as well as those who carry on any co-operative work shall divide their earnings either equally or as agreed upon among themselves."
14. J., I, p. 404—"Aññena vāṇijena saddhiṃ ekato hutvā vārijjaṃ karoti." also II, p. 181,
c5.t3.82
We have several references to merchants entering into partnerships, either permanent or on specified occasions only. Thus the *Kūṭavāṇija Jātaka*¹⁴ informs us that two merchants entered into partnership and took five hundred waggons of merchandise from Benares to the country-districts. Similarly we read in the *Mahāvāṇija Jātaka*¹ that a number of merchants went into a temporary partnership. Another, the *Serivāṇija Jātaka*,² also relates the story of two merchants trading in partnership. The *Guṭṭila Jātaka*³ again indicates concerted action, in work and play. Also the horse-dealers, of whom we read so frequently⁴ as coming from the North and selling their horses, apparently carried on their business jointly. It is likely that the trading in company may have been undertaken to prevent mutual under-selling or the cornering of any wares.⁵
c5.t3.83
³³⁵ III, p. 200.
c5.t3.84
²⁷¹ Cf. C. H. I, I, p. 211.
c5.t3.85
¹ J., IV, p. 350—1—G. 179.
c5.t3.86
² J., I, p. 111.
c5.t3.87
³ J., II, p. 248; *Cf.* also I, p. 122.
c5.t3.88
⁴ J., II, p. 31, 287.
c5.t3.89
⁵ See J., I, pp. 99, 121, 194, 270, 354, 368, 413; II, pp. 109, 335; III, pp. 200; IV, p. 15 *ff*; V, pp. 22, 164.
c5.t3.90
We do not know as to how the agreements among partners, if any, were drawn up.⁶ But there is at least room for inferring that there were some elementary principles for the partners to abide by as the legendary story in the *Kūṭavāṇija Jātaka*,⁷ already referred to, shows. It is related that two merchants called respectively the "Wise" and the "Wisest" entered into partnership and took 500 waggons of merchandise from Benares to the country-side, where they disposed off their wares, returning afterwards with the proceeds to the city. When the time for dividing came, the Wisest said, "I must have a double share." "Why so?" asked the Wise. "Because while you are only wise, I am the wisest. And Wise ought to have only one share to the Wisest's two." "But we both had an equal interest in the stock-in-trade and in the oxen and waggons. Why should you have two shares?" "Because I am Wisest." And so they talked away till they fell to quarrelling, until at last they made an equal division. This may be taken to show⁸ that, while it was recognised as a general principle that profits should be proportionate to the share one contributes to the stock-in-trade, the idea of awarding special share for greater skill in business was not altogether unknown.
c5.t3.91
⁶ The Law-giver Nārada says "Loss, expenses and profit of each partner are proportioned to the amount contributed by him towards the joint stock company." III, 1-9; *C. H. I.*, I, p. 286.
c5.t3.92
⁷ J., I, p. 404 *ff*.
c5.t3.93
⁸ Majumdar, op. cit., p. 75.
c5.t3.94
What then was the position of the *Seṭṭhi* (mod. *Seṭh*) who constantly figures in the stories? Certainly, it was very high and respectable both in the Court and outside.⁹ The title *seṭṭhi* (*Śreṣṭhin* : Best : Chief) itself, rendered as "Treasurer" without much justification, may possibly imply headship or a representative character over some class of industry or trading.¹⁰ Fick is probably right in alluding to him as a representative of the Commercial Community.¹¹ The word surely implied an office (*thāna*) held during life: it was hereditary.¹ He appears to have a double role—that of an official and a rich trader. In his official capacity he attends to the king (*rājupaṭṭhāna*) daily.² He takes formal permission of the king when he wants to renounce the world³ or give away his wealth to charity.⁴
c5.t3.95
⁹ J., V, p. 382—"*Rājapūjito nagarajanapadapūjito.*"
c5.t3.96
¹⁰ The well-known *Seṭṭhi* of Rājagaha, Anāthapiṇḍika, the millionaire lay-supporter of the Buddha, had clearly some authority over his fellow-traders—See *Mahāvagga*, VIII 1, 16 *ff*.
c5.t3.97
¹¹ op. cit., pp. 259 *ff*.
c5.t3.98
¹ J., I, pp. 122, 231, 248, 348; III, p. 475; IV, p. 62, V, p. 382.
c5.t3.99
² J., I, pp. 120-; 269, 349; III, pp. 119, 299; 475; IV, p. 63; V, p. 384.
c5.t3.100
³ J., II, p. 64.
c5.t3.101
⁴ J., V, p. 383.
c5.t3.102
But his part as a rich and influential merchant prince is much more pronounced than his part as an official. A *Seṭṭhi* living in Benares engages in trade and drives a caravan of five hundred waggons;⁵ also we find mention of *seṭṭhis* living in the provinces and in the country side.⁶ There also their wealth and influence are great. Leaving aside the conventional statement of his wealth as eight hundred millions (*asītikotivibhavo*)⁷ we find that the *seṭṭhis* had, in their possession, nice houses with gorgeous coaches, servants and herdsmen.⁸ Sometimes they also possessed rice-fields.⁹ It follows from this that "we have to look upon the *seṭṭhis* not only as tradesmen but also as cattle-rearing and land-cultivating owners of the soil"¹⁰ There might be a chief (*mahā*) *seṭṭhi* and an *anuseṭṭhi* or subordinate officer.¹¹
c5.t3.103
⁵ J., I, p. 270.
c5.t3.104
⁶ J., I, p. 451; IV, pp. 37, 169.
c5.t3.105
⁷ J., I, pp. 349; 466; III, pp. 128, 300, 444.
c5.t3.106
⁸ J., I, p. 351.
c5.t3.107
⁹ J., II, p. 378.
c5.t3.108
¹⁰ Fick, op. cit., p. 263.
c5.t3.109
¹¹ J., V, p. 384; *Cf.* Mahāvagga, 1, 9.
c5.t3.110
DISTRIBUTION
c5.t3.111
IT IS THE DISTRIBUTION of produced wealth which has been the main guiding factor in the struggle for existence among the different members of the society, from times immemorial.
c5.t3.112
The fundamental problems in the economics of Distribution are the division of accumulated wealth between the various members of the community and of the annual income between its different members.
c5.t3.113
Though the stories often speak of persons of colossal wealth like the *Setthis* or the rich Brāhmaṇas, we will not be justified in holding, in general, that there existed startling inequalities in private property as they exist today. The extraordinary opulence of the kings, the *Setthis* or the rich Brāhmaṇas, was, perhaps, an exception, if not an imaginary thing. Big fortunes could not arise owing to the much simpler conditions prevailing in the economic life in those days. Very often all the factors of production were controlled by the same person (or persons) and, in such cases, all the shares of the produce practically went to him. Both in the case of peasant-proprietors and the small-scaled handicraftsmen, they supplied the labour as well as the small capital required, and were themselves the organisers. So, on the whole, the question of distribution does not appear to have been so acute or embarrassing as it did become at a later stage of the evolution of society. Still, however, the study of the various questions involved would reveal something which would not be described as harmonious or satisfactory.
c5.t3.114
The fundamental principles which govern the distribution of "national dividend" are two, *viz.*, "that each sharer should be remunerated on the principle of productivity, *i.e.*, according to the services rendered or the amount of utility created by its services, and secondly by basing remuneration on the personal and human needs of every member of the community."[1] Let us see how far and in what manner these principles are applicable to the conditions prevailing in the *Jātaka*-period, as regards rent, wages, interest or profit.
c5.t3.115
The question of the ownership of land in Ancient India is very much disputed,[2] of course owing to the apparently contradictory statements and views contained in the literature of Ancient India. Our *Jātakas* do not at all bother about this problem. What they reveal is, as has already been noticed, that the right of individual property in land, implying the powers of use and alienation by way of sale,
c5.t3.116
RENT.
c5.t3.117
¹ Rangaswami, op. cit., p. 104.
c5.t3.118
² See *I. H. Q.*, II, pp. 198 ff.
c5.t3.119
gift, mortgage etc. was well developed.¹ Certain customary rules regarding the prescription, limitation and adverse possession, in regard to the ownership and tenure of land, must have been current, and acted upon.
c5.t3.120
¹ Thus remarks Prof. Rangaswami: "Whether we accept or not the theory of an original or ultimate State-ownership of all land, individual ownership of a permanent character must be admitted, on the evidence available, as having existed virtually all through Hindu history." op cit., p. 104. After a very minute examination of the problem, Prof. K. M. Gupta, also, comes, more or less, to a similar conclusion: *Land Systems*, pp. 99 ff. See also C. H. I., I, p. 200. Hopkins says, "He (the peasant) owned land as against his fellow-subjects, but he owned it as against the king, just as the jackal owns what the tiger wants." *India, Old and New*, pp. 225-6; See also Jayaswal, *Hindu Polity*, II, pp. 174-83; Ghoshal, *History of the Hindu Revenue Systems*.
c5.t3.121
The general system of tenure under which land was held in those days seems to have been much similar to the present-day permanent *raiyatwārī* system. The ryot or the *kuṭumbika* possessed, according to immemorial custom, a right of possession and hereditary occupation in the land so long as he paid the rent that was due. This is, of course, peasant-proprietorship.²
c5.t3.122
² Cf. Mill, "The idea of property does not necessarily imply that there should be no rent. It merely implies that the rent should be a fixed charge. What is wanted is security of possession on fixed terms." *Principles of Economics*, quoted, by P. N. Banerjea, *A Study of Indian Economics*, p. 130 n.
c5.t3.123
The amount of rent depended mainly on custom. Simple as the conditions of those days were, the share of the produce from land which went to the king must here be treated as rent. The productiveness of land must have been understood to depend upon its fertility, both natural and acquired, and on its accessibility, as determined by its proximity to a market and the cost of transport.³ Productivity was, no doubt, a factor in the determination of the actual rent of any plot, but not the sole factor. Rent was not due to mere difference between the produce of any particular plot and the plot on the margin of cultivation, as the Ricardian doctrine supposes, but was, more or less, a definite charge. Of course, as already noticed, rent was subject to enhancement or reduction, and in that case custom was set aside in preference to the whim of the king or his officer.
c5.t3.124
³ Rangaswami, op. cit., p. 105.
c5.t3.125
We cannot say for certain whether there was any inter-relation between rent and prices. In fact, we have no indication whatsoever of anything like violent rise and fall in prices.
c5.t3.126
Rents were, usually, paid in kind.⁴ At the time of the reaping of crops, or sometime after, the representative of the king, the tax-collector (*Balisādhaka, Niggāhaka, etc.*) used to be present in the fields, and a division of the produce was made between the king (*raññobhāga*) and the peasant-proprietor, who represented his family. This system seems to have been somewhat advantageous, inasmuch as if and when crops failed, the peasant could secure remission, or at least postponement of the rent.⁵
c5.t3.127
⁴ J., II, p. 378.
c5.t3.128
⁵ J., II, p. 135.
c5.t3.129
Thus, excepting the general share of the king, probably one-sixth of the gross produce, and barring occasional extractions by the tax-collectors, the whole of the produce was available for distribution among the toilers of the soil themselves.¹
c5.t3.130
¹ In those days, when competition did not devitalise man's labour, such institutions as peasant-proprietorship had a beneficent effect upon mankind. Remarks Prof. P. N. Banerjea: "The economic and moral value of the system of peasant-proprietorship is immense, and there can be no surer means of improving the condition of the Indian cultivator than to confer on him at least limited rights of property."—op. cit., p. 131. The best way, however, seems in collectivising the land, as Russia shows.
c5.t3.131
We have already become familiar with the two types of labourers, the hirelings or the wage-earners and the slaves (*dāsakammakaras*). The craftsmen were, so to say, self-reliant and independent labourers. The wages of a craftsman were the price for the article sold, which included all elements of expenses of production with which modern economic analysis has made us familiar.² Similarly, in the large majority of cases of peasant proprietors where no added labour was required, the wages, as we understand the term today, did not exist. In both the cases, the instruments of labour, as already stated—land, agricultural implements, the workshop, the tools—were the instruments of labour of single individuals, small and circumscribed. The producer was the labourer himself *i.e.*, there was no need to appropriate the product. The worker's property in the product was based upon his own labour. This was no wage-labour. And even where external help was used, it was, as a rule, of little importance and very generally was compensated by something other than wages. The domestic servants, the *dāsas*, of course, boarded and lodged with their employers. The assistants or apprentices to craftsmen worked less for board and wages than for education and training, in order that they might become master-craftsmen themselves.
c5.t3.132
² J., II, p. 18. Subbarao, op. cit., p. 77.
c5.t3.133
This was the general rule. But society had far advanced from the pure primitive stage. Wage-labour had come to be recognised.³ We have seen labourers (*kammakaras : bhatakas*) working for wage, for hire. The labourers were hired on the farm.⁴ They were generally paid their wages in kind.⁵ The country being mainly agricultural, demand for hired labour on the farm was necessarily little, and consequently wages were low and non-progressive. They were not at all in proportion to the work done.
c5.t3.134
³ Cf. these remarks of Frederick Engels, one of the foremost twin-propounders of Scientific Socialism: "....Wage-labour, which contains the whole capitalistic mode of production in embryo, is very ancient; in a sporadic, scattered form it existed for centuries alongside of slave-labour. But the embryo could duly develop into the capitalistic mode of production only when the necessary historical pre-conditions had been furnished."—Socialism: Scientific and Utopian, p. 53 n.
c5.t3.135
⁴ J., III, p. 445; IV, pp. 144, 277.
c5.t3.136
⁵ J., III, p. 446; V, p. 212.
c5.t3.137
In the case of those other labourers who worked for hire, we find that the wages they received were hardly sufficient for their bare subsistence. The *māsaka* or one-fourth of a copper *paṇa* that the hired labourer received⁶ could not have been sufficient for his happy living, even if the purchasing power of a copper paṇa was high, as is sometimes suggested.¹ At the most, it could supply the worker with a good meal, or a little garland or some drink. It is expressly and often mentioned with regard to the day-labourers: "he (or she) lived a hard life on workman's wages—(bhatim katvā kiccena jīvati)"²
c5.t3.138
⁶ J., I, p. 475; III, pp. 325, 446.
c5.t3.139
¹ Pran Nath, op. cit., pp. 148-9.
c5.t3.140
² J., I, pp. 421, 475; II, p. 139; III, pp. 180; 325; 406, 444, 446. Even to-day, the wage-worker's plight is anything but satisfactory: the average wage cannot be more than 3 annas per diem for the able-bodied 'unskilled' labourer, leaving aside some large Industrial towns and cities.
c5.t3.141
There was of course no question of any connection between prices and wages. Wages were, more or less, fixed by custom.
Cites (5)
- Jātakatthavaṇṇanā — Pāli
- Jātaka — Pāli
- Mahāvagga — Pāli
- Kauṭilīya Arthaśāstra — Kauṭilya, Sanskrit
- Nāradasmṛti — Nārada, Sanskrit