Chandragupta Maurya and His Times c11.73

c11.73

**Roads.** Lastly, Megasthenes refers to the duties of these officials to maintain the roads. We have already seen that the maintenance of the roads of Traffic (*Vanikpatha*) was one of the main duties of the *Samāhartā* in the administrative scheme of Kauṭilya. Kauṭilya refers to various classes of roads in the country which he calls (1) *Rājamārga* [I. 21; II. 4], (2) *Rathyā* or the provincial roads leading to the district headquarters, (3) roads leading to elephant-forests, (4) the by-roads leading to the fields (*utpatha*) and other by-ways, (5) and the roads meant for vehicular traffic.