The State in Ancient India: A Study in the Structure and Practical Working of Political Institutions in North India in Ancient Times c17.141

c17.141

The punishments were various and, on the whole, severe. Yuan Chwang’s statement that corporal punishment was non-existent is contradicted by himself and opposed to all we know of the ancient Hindu penal code. If a man violated “the rules of propriety, justice, fidelity or filial piety,” his nose or his ears were cut off, or his hands or his feet were amputated, or he was expelled from the country or he was driven into the desert wilds. For certain crimes which the Chinese traveller does not specify, the offenders were imprisoned. Yuan Chwang seems to imply, though he is not perfectly clear on the point, that imprisonment was extremely severe. The prisoners were not counted among men and were simply left to live or die.¹ But there is a passage in Bāṇa which shows that prison conditions were not so horrible. On auspicious occasions, like the birth of a prince, the king commanded the release of prisoners.² Minor offences were punished with fines. In certain north-western principalities, murder was punished by banishment to the desolate mountains.³ Treason, though always regarded as a heinous crime, was sometimes punished only by banishment. Five hundred Brāhmaṇas who were implicated in a conspiracy against the king were exiled by Harṣa, though the ministers and feudatories loudly demanded the extermination of the whole tribe. The king’s friends urged that the conspirators’ agent, who actually assaulted Harṣa, should be instantaneously put to death. The king, however, kept his head and closely interrogated the man. We are not told how he was ultimately punished.⁴