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The Positive Background of Hindu Sociology c14.s9.t4: 4. Abul Fazl's Ain-i-Akbari as a Semi-Moslem and Semi-Hindu Nītiśāstra

The Positive Background of Hindu Sociology c14.s9.t4

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4. Abul Fazl's Ain-i-Akbari as a Semi-Moslem and Semi-Hindu Nītiśāstra

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A very important document of the sixteenth century in the domain of politics is the semi-Hindu, semi-Moslem treatise in Persian entitled the *Ain-i-Akbari*¹ by Abul Fazl (1551-1602). It was composed about 1596-1597.

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¹ H. Blochmann: *The Ain-i-Akbari* (Calcutta 1873), Vol. I. Biography, p. xxx. See also Gladwin's translation (*Ayeen Akbari*).

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A glance at the table of contents of the *Ain-i-Akbari* exhibits its rough similarity in formal features with a Hindu *Nītiśāstra*. We may call it the *Akbar-nīti*, so to say. The contents are in short as follows:

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I. The Household. The Treasury. The Mint. The Method of separating the silver from the gold. Illuminations. The Kitchen. The Days of Abstinence. Writing and Painting. The Arsenal. Elephants. Horses. Camels. Cow-stables. Buildings, Building materials etc.

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II. The Army. The Civil Services. Salaries. Donations. Feasts. Regulations regarding marriages. Regulations regarding education. The Admiralty.

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III. The Eras (Hindu and other). Revenues. Measurements. The Executive. The Judiciary. Nineteen Years' Rates of Revenue.

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IV. The Twelve *Subahs* or Provinces. The Assessment of Land.

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V. A Description of Hindustan. The Character of the Hindus. Their Astronomy and Geography. The Nine Philosophies. The Eighteen *Vidyās*. The Eighteen *Purāṇas*. The Eighteen *Smritis*. Music. *Rājanīti* (Politics). *Vyavahāra* (Law). Marriages. Festivals etc.

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VI. Moral Sentences. Epigrams. Rules of Wisdom emanating from the Emperor, etc.

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The *Ain-i-Akbari* is generally considered to be an Imperial Gazetteer of Moghul India. But it is not quite correct to describe it as a Gazetteer in the strictest sense of the term. The descriptive and statistical data bearing on Akbar's times, especially the *Subahs* or provinces, are certainly to be found in this treatise. But the author is not all an historian or statistician. He has his interpretations, messages, and moral ideas to propagate and they do not appear to be in any way subsidiary to something else. Abul Fazl is indeed a student of ethics, spirituality, life's mission and so forth. He is a philosopher.

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Many passages and paragraphs, nay, chapters of the *Ain-i-Akbari* cannot be taken as contributions to objective history or records of actual facts. Even in regard to the land revenue settlements and figures relating thereto as given by Abul Fazl one is not quite clear as to whether we always and everywhere have the things actually in force or come across the general scheme of financial administration such as served as the basis for executive action. These features of Abul Fazl's treatise become apparent by the side of another great Persian work, the *Seir Mutaqherin*² (View of Modern Times), the history of India after Aurangzeb composed by Gholam Hussein of Bengal in 1780. This work of the eighteenth century is more objective as history, although no doubt it is furnished with its personal equation as every historical composition is bound to be. A comparison with such formally historical treatises enables us to feel that the *Ain-i-Akbari's* place in the history of political, economic and financial literature cannot be limited to its realistic historicity alone. The work has been conceived by the author as a much more than historical treatise. It is an account in which the messages, norms, ideals etc. play as prominent a rôle as the objective book-keeping and compilation of registers.

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² Eng. transl. by M. Raymond (Calcutta 1902), four volumes.

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The *Khatima* (supplement) to the *Mirat-i-Ahmadi*³ (History of Gujarat) in Persian by Ali Muhammad Khan, which was composed between 1750 and 1760 and is somewhat contemporaneous with the *Seir-Mutaqherin*, is likewise another work with which it should be considered generally irrelevant to compare the *Ain-i-Akbari*. The author of this *Khatima*, although influenced in scholarship by Abul Fazl, has produced nothing but a descriptive work, almost a guide-book, so to say, to the shrines of the saints, Hindu temples etc. as well as a register of the Government officials and departments, the Sarkars paying tribute, and so forth. A work like this may be drawn upon by the researchers of today as a source book for the economic, administrative and socio-religious facts and institutions of Gujarat in the eighteenth century without even a word of criticism. There is nothing else in the *Khatima* to occupy the reader's interest or intellect. The atmosphere in the *Ain-i-Akbari* is far otherwise.

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³ English translation by Nawab Syed Ali and C. N. Seddon (Baroda 1924).

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In the preface to the Book which is given over to Hindu civilisation Abul Fazl enables us to see something of his inner springs of action. The "love of his native country," Hindustan, is referred to by himself in so many words as one of the motives impelling him to write this history. He is one of the first "patriots" of modern India. We are also told that the desire to remove the strife and animosity between the diverse races of India (Hindus and Moslems) is also an urge in this literary endeavour. He wants to function as a bridge between the two great religions, to be a peace-maker. The ambition of establishing peace and unanimity is a burning passion with him.

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This Introduction gives us seven reasons for the origin of conflict among persons of diverse religions. In his treatment of the subject we come into contact with a brain which is not only modern in its makeup but which it is almost impossible to improve upon. He is discussing of course the problems of other religions, especially Islam *vis-à-vis* Hinduism. But in his analysis are to be found the profoundest considerations of comparative sociology with reference to the race-questions. As an essay in toleration this Introduction can be used even today anywhere on earth. His logic is unchallengeable in theory and fruitful in practice. We are reminded in this context of another great Moslem scholar, Alberuni.⁴

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⁴ E. C. Sachau: *Alberuni's India* (London 1910), two volumes. See the section dealing with Greater India in Moslem Asia ("From Harṣa to Hemādri", *Supra*, pp. 459-465).

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The comparative method is a remarkable trait of Abul Fazl's logic. This manifests itself not only in the discussion of the questions relating to the conflicts arising from the diversity of faiths but also in the manner in which he deals with the arts and sciences of the Hindus. At important points he turns to the Greeks, and this also in the manner of Alberuni, and places Hindu achievements by the side of those of the former. In astronomy he finds analogy with Ptolemy and remembers the Persian, the Egyptian and the Greek philosophers. The references to Greek culture constitute the general perspective, so to say, of his researches in "indology." As one of the modern founders of comparative methodology in world-culture this Indian Mussalman of the sixteenth century deserves his rightful place in the history of science and philosophy and is by all means a great precursor of the Hindu Rammohun Roy of the end of the eighteenth and the early nineteenth century.

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Abul Fazl's ideals are definite and precise. It is the moral and social philosophy that concerns him the most. History, economics, statistics, biography, the personality of Akbar are to him but the pegs on which to hang his moralizings, ideals and spiritual propaganda. There is hardly any chapter of importance, especially in the first two Books, in which we do not again and again come into contact with this great key to his life. He is writing about Akbar's India or rather about Akbar himself but all the time with an eye to the illustration of his own spiritual ideals. To him Akbar should appear to be an interesting character simply because it is this monarch who happens to embody all that he considers to be great and divine in personal and public life.

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Throughout the *Ain-i-Akbari* we encounter but one problem. To the author it is a moral problem and a political problem in one. He is never tired of discussing it or referring to it and has therefore succeeded in imparting to the treatise a lofty tone such as is associated with the greatest political masterpieces of the world.

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And what is the life-blood of the ideal preached in season and out of season in the *Ain-i-Akbari*? It is the category of the "just king" (pp. viii, ix, 12). This is the doctrine that occupies the central place in Abul Fazl's political philosophy. And it is here that we see how profoundly he assimilated the eternal problem of Hindu politics, namely, the *rājarṣivrittam* (the conduct of the philosopher-king or royal sage) of our old Kauṭalyan tradition.

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In the first edition of the *Positive Background* the '*Ain-i-Akbari* was quoted simply as an evidence of the persistence of the Hindu political ideology in the sixteenth century. The passages are reproduced below:

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"The political literature of the Hindus was known to Abul Fazl, who in *Ayeen 'Akbari* has given a short synopsis of probably some of the *nīti śāstras* in his possession in the chapter on the various branches of learning cultivated by the people of Hindusthan ruled by his master, the great Akbar. Besides giving an elaborate description of Hindu law under the heading *beyhar* (*Sans.* *vyavahāra*) and referring to ‘many other sensible books upon government’ the compiler of this Moghul Gazetteer gives the following summary of *Rājneet*, ‘the art of governing a kingdom :’

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‘It is incumbent on a monarch to divest himself of avarice and anger, by following the counsels of wisdom. * * * * It is his indispensable duty to fear God * * * to pay particular respect to men of exalted rank and behave with kindness towards his subjects of every description. * * * He should be ambitious to extend his dominions. * * *No enemy is so insignificant as to be beneath his notice. * * *A wise prince will banish from his court all corrupt and designing men. * * *

‘The king resembles a gardener, who plucks up the thorns and briers, and throws them on one side, whereby he beautifies his garden, and at the same time raises a fence which preserves his ground from the intrusion of strangers. * * * The king detaches from the nobles their too numerous friends, and dangerous dependents. * * *

‘In affairs of moment it is not advisable to consult with many. * * * Some ancient monarchs made it a rule to consult men of a contrary description and to act diametrically opposite to their advice. * * * They found it the safest way to join with the prime-minister a few wise and experienced men and to require each to deliver his opinion in writing. A prince moreover requires a learned astrologer and a skilful physician.

‘If any monarch is more powerful than himself he continually strives to sow dissension among his troops; and if he is not able to effect this, prudently purchases his

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friendship. * * * The prince whose territory adjoins to his, although he may be friendly in appearance, yet ought not to be trusted; he should always be prepared to oppose any sudden attack from that quarter. With him whose country lies next beyond the one last-mentioned he should enter into alliance; but no connexion should be formed with those who are more remote. If he finds it necessary to attack his enemy, he should invade his country during the time of harvest.'

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"Here we have from a non-Hindu source the traditional ideas of the Hindus regarding constitution, international morality, etc. as preserved in the Hindu literature of the sixteenth century."

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The student of comparative politics will be justified to go farther. In so far as the general, philosophical or theoretical ideas are concerned, the *Ain-i-Akbari* is to be treated virtually as a Persianized edition, so to say, of a Sanskrit *nītiśāstra*. It is within the philosophical framework of a Hindu treatise on politics that Abul Fazl has put in the statistics and administrative details of Akbar's Empire. It not only preserves the Hindu tradition by describing Sanskrit literature and Hindu philosophical ideas in Book IV. but is a document of the most profound assimilation of Hindu culture by a philosophically minded Mussalman.

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Let us analyze a bit of his own philosophical synthesis. In the general preface to his *Ain-i-Akbari* Abul Fazl says about royalty as follows:

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"If royalty did not exist, the storm of strife would never subside, nor selfish ambition disappear. Mankind, being under the burden of lawlessness and lust, would sink into the pit of destruction, the world, this great market place, would lose its prosperity, and the whole earth become a barren waste. But by the light of imperial justice some follow with cheerfulness the road of obedience, whilst others abstain from violence through fear of punishment; and out of necessity make choice of the path of rectitude.''

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In this political philosophy of Abul Fazl we have an adaptation from the Hindu doctrines of *mātsya nyāya* (logic of the fish) as well as of *daṇḍa* (punishment). He is a first class writer and stylist and he has presented the Hindu philosophical "patents" in a most polished and dignified language, which only the Persianist of course can appreciate in the original.

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Among the "excellent qualities" flowing from royalty as conceived by Abul Fazl we are told that the king "puts the reins of desire into the hands of reason; in the wide field of his desires he does not permit himself to be trodden by restlessness nor will he waste his precious time in seeking after that which is improper. * * * He is for ever searching after those who speak the truth and is not displeased with words that seem bitter but are in reality sweet." Here, again, we have but a paraphrase from the Hindu doctrine of *vyasanas* (vices) and *rājadoṣas* (faults or disqualifications of a king).

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It is exceedingly interesting that even in regard to the professional structure of the people Abul Fazl cannot think of anything but the fourfold Hindu social stratification. He says that the political constitution becomes well tempered by a "proper division of ranks." The four classes into which according to him the world may be divided are (1) warriors, (2) artificers and merchants, (3) the learned, and (4) husbandmen and labourers. We are taught also that it is obligatory for a king to put each of these in its proper place, and by uniting personal ability with respect due for others, to cause the world to flourish.''

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It does not take anybody acquainted even cursorily with the Hindu *artha*, *smriti* and *nītiśāstras* long to understand that Abul Fazl is reproducing the most fundamental concept of the king's functions *vis-à-vis chāturvarṇya* (the four-ordered social polity). It is curious that no modern scholar seems to have even suspected that the words, phrases and sentences of a philosophical, theoretical or general character in all these paragraphs are almost *verbatim* copies from the *Manu Samhitā* ch. VIII (*Rājadharma*).

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We shall now point to one or two other Sanskritisings or Hinduizings of the Persian text. In *Ain* 13 which discusses the origin of metals, Abul Fazl speaks of the ''seven bodies'' within quotation marks. According to some manuscripts the Hindus are referred to as giving the opinion that the metal called *ricac* is a ''silver in the state of leprosy.'' One wonders if Abul Fazl is not dealing in this chapter with the Hindu doctrine of seven metals. And one may not be surprised if *zinc*, the seventh metal, which began to be recognized by the fourteenth century Hindu writers on medicine like Madanapāla, is Abul Fazl's ''silver in the state of leprosy,'' for some of the Sanskrit names for zinc, namely, *rasaka*, *rūpyabhrātā* etc. connect it with silver.

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In *'Ain* 41 which deals with the imperial elephant stables the four kinds of elephants (namely, *bhaddar*, *mand*, *mirg* and *mir*) and their three dispositions (namely, *sat*, *raj*, and *tam*) are derived from the Sanskrit treatises on elephants. Abul Fazl names also the eight *diggajas* or elephants as guardians of the quarters or points of the earth in the Hindu manner and gives likewise another Hindu classification of elephants. The entire chapter (pp. 117-124) points to a fine assimilation of Sanskrit *gajaśāstras* by Moslems in regard to other items as well. Abul Fazl quotes neither Varāhamihira's *Brihat Samhitā* nor Bhoja's *Yuktikalpataru* nor any treatise like the *Śukranīti*. He is, however, not a plagiarist as he says explicitly that these ideas about elephants are Hindu.

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Ain 72 describes the "manner in which His Majesty spends his time" (pp. 153-156). In such expressions as the "care with which His Majesty guards over his motives and watches over his emotions," "he listens to great and small," "he does not allow his desires or his wrath to renounce allegiance to wisdom," "his august nature cares but little for the pleasures of the world," etc. one may read the echoes or reminiscences of the "qualifications" and "vices" of kings with which the Hindu *artha* and *nītiśāstras* deal as a matter of course. Some of these virtues are of course but generalities and platitudes found in every treatise on ideal polity from Plato and Kauṭalya to Al-Farabi (c. 950), the great Arab encyclopaedist who based his *Al-Madinat-al-Fadila* (*Model City*) on Plato. Abul Fazl does not therefore have to copy such maxims from any specifically Hindu sources.

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Such moralizings or ascriptions of moral qualities to a *Padshah* may also be expected of Abul Fazl quite independently. It should still be observed however that he is writing in a Hindu atmosphere about a monarch who is pro-Hindu with vengeance, nay, who is condemned as *Kafer* by orthodox Mussalmans.⁵ Further, Abul Fazl is actually using Hindi words at every turn and referring to Hindu customs in the most familiar way. One may perhaps suggest, therefore, that the author of *Ain-i-Akbari* is not uninfluenced by the traditional (Kauṭalyan) Hindu conception of the *rājarṣi*, the philosopher-king, while describing Akbar's daily routine, meals and other habits, as well as temperament etc. in *Ains 72-75* (pp. 153-160). The characteristic Muslim salutations (*taslim* and *kornish*) are, however, not included in these remarks. But Abul Fazl's dicta that "royalty is an emblem of the power of God and a light-shedding ray from this Sun of the Absolute" (p. 159) or that "even spiritual progress would be impossible unless emanating from the king in whom the light of God dwells" (p. 158) point perhaps to the fact that Abul Fazl is here making propaganda about his hero for a people that is used to the language of the *Manu Samhitā*. Not the least *tenden-ciös* item in all these statements is the one, as told by Abul Fazl, that "His Majesty abstains much from flesh so that whole months pass away without his touching any animal food." The author makes it a point to observe in this connection that the animal food, "though prized by most, is nothing thought of by the sage." This can be easily interpreted as an attempt on the part of Abul Fazl at "speaking to the gallery." But the fact that these statements about Akbar are truths and not mere propaganda furnishes all the more ground for believing that the emperor, his court, as well as Abul Fazl were Hinduized in thought and form.

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⁵ For the pro-Hindu habits and laws of Akbar as described and condemned by Badaoni, see Blochmann, vol. I. pp. 176-184, 193, 205.

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These suggestions about Abul Fazl's Hinduization of the *Ain-i-Akbari* will derive fresh strength from what is known about his personal character.

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According to the *Maasir-ul-Umará* quoted in Blochmann's *Ain-i-Akbari* (pp. xxvii-xxviii), Abul Fazl is reported to have been "an infidel." "Some say, he was a Hindu, or a fire-worshipper or a free thinker, and some go still further and call him an atheist; but others pass a juster sentence, and say that he was a pantheist, and that like other Sufis he claimed for himself a position above the law of the prophet." All these descriptions, repugnant naturally as they are to an orthodox Mussalman, are however quite in keeping with an academically high placed or philosophically-minded Hindu or Hinduized scholar. And since Prince Salim in his *Memoirs* describes Abul Fazl as a "Hindusthani Shaikh by birth, who was well known for his learning and wisdom"⁶ we may not be far from the truth when we surmise that this Indian-born Shaikh was well up in the Hindu *smriti* and *nīti śāśtras* and at any rate had grown up by assimilating the contributions of the Hindu cultural tradition.

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⁶ Blochmann, vol. I, (1873), Biography p. xxvi. For the translations from Sanskrit works into Arabic from 750 to 850 A.C. See E. C. Sachau: *Alberuni's India* (London 1910), vol. I. pp. xxviii-xxxv. Alberuni's own translations or adaptations from Sanskrit may be seen *Ibid.*, pp. xxxvi-xl.

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It is interesting to have to observe that even as a profound student of Arabic literature Abul Fazl must have been introduced to the Hindu *vidyās*, because, as is well known, a considerable portion of Arabic texts was made up of translations of or adaptations from Sanskrit treatises in the eighth and ninth centuries. The amount of original researches in Hindu culture embodied in the work on India by Alberuni (973-1048) the great Arab mathematician and philosopher was immense.

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Had we known less than we actually do about Akbar's socio-religious pro-Hindu propaganda and the ultraliberal intellectual activities of Abul Fazl, his elder brother Faizi, and their father we might perhaps have been led to suspect that part of the idealism in Abul Fazl's work,—the general preface as well as the text—is to be ascribed to an acquaintance with Al-Farabi's treatise on the *Model City* (c. 950). As a learned scholar Abul Fazl may certainly have studied the Arabic treatise on governmental statutes (*El Akham es Soulthaniyah*) by Mawerdi (972-1058), chief justice of Bagdad, or derived profit from the Persian *Siassat Namah* (Treatise on Government) by Nazamoul Mulk (c. 1063-1092). And of course the greatest philosophico-historical work of the "Middle Ages," namely, the *Mokaddemah* in Arabic by Ibn Khaldun (1332-1406), the Egyptian judge, could not have failed to furnish this "Hindusthani Shaikh" with literary norms.⁷

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⁷ For Al Farabi see the German translation (*Die Muster-Stadt*) by F. Dietrici, Leyden 1895, and Carra de Vaux: *Avicenne*, Paris 1900. The *El-Akham es Soulthaniyah* is available in French as *Les Status Gouvernementaux* by Fagnan, Paris 1915. The *Siasset Nameha* is available in French as *Traité du Gouvernement* by Schefer, Paris 1893. The *Mokaddemah* is available in French as *Prolegomènes Historiques* by de Slane, Paris 1862-68. See also T. Husein: *La Philosophie Sociale d'Ibn Khaldhoun*, Paris 1917. A study as to the nature of Abul Fazl's contacts with these and other Arabic and Persian "old masters" in politics, economics, history and sociology etc. ought to be very interesting for an investigation into the achievements of Indo-Saracenic Renaissance.

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But the borrowings, assimilations, reminiscences or adaptations from the Sanskrit texts are too direct and palpable as well as pronounced. The surroundings of Abul Fazl's daily life and the literary activities in which he took part while preparing the *Ain-i-Akbari* should appear to be Muslim only in name. The Hindu-Moslem camaraderies of his Padshah as well as of himself and his group are enough to explain that forces nearer home were responsible for the kind of idealism and political philosophy which found expression in the *Akbar-nīti*.

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The translations from "Hindi" (Sanskrit)⁸ into Persian of works like the *Mahābhārata*, the *Rāmāyaṇa*, the *Atharva Veda*, the *Harivamśa*, the *Nala Damayantī* etc. such as are described in the *Ain* 34 indicate the Hindu atmosphere which could not fail to leave its impress upon the contributions of Abul Fazl. It is not quite clear, however, whether the translations were made direct from Sanskrit or from Hindi translations. But it is important to notice that he himself had a hand in the translation of the *Mahābhārata*, just as Faizi in that of *Nal Daman*.

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⁸ Blochmann Vol. I. (1873) pp. Biography, xvii, 104, 199-200. For the translations of Sanskrit works under Moslem auspices see also D. C. Sen: *History of Bengali Literature* (Calcutta 1911); N. N. Law: *Promotion of Learning in India During Muhammadan Rule (By Muhammadans)* (London 1916); B. K. Sarkar: *Folk-Element in Hindu Culture* (London 1917); M. Z. Siddiqi: "Services of Muslims to Sanskrit Literature" (*Calcutta Review*, February 1932).

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In the special preface to the sections dealing with Hindu culture we learn from his own statements that his studies in Hindu culture were commenced early. But he felt that his knowledge was not sufficient. So he renewed his former studies with the help of those who could guide him. He speaks of the painful researches undertaken in order to arrive at the truth about the Hindus, their sciences, philosophies, and religions. This explains naturally the almost *verbatim* extracts from Hindu treatises on law and politics in this Muslim work.

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It is interesting that at the very threshold of his study on Hindu culture, even in the introduction Abul Fazl makes the readers acquainted with his fundamental conclusion, namely, that the Hindus are not polytheists but are worshippers of God and only one God. And this conclusion he poses against the popular tradition of his times to the effect that the Hindus are polytheists. He repeats his conclusion at the commencement of the lengthy section and remarks that the Hindus are no mere idolators, "as the ignorant suppose." The Hindu explanation of image worship is reproduced by himself as his own conviction, namely, that the images are designed simply to prevent the thoughts of the people from wandering while at prayer. Abul Fazl should here appear to be a twin to Alberuni who preceded him by over five hundred years.

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It is evident that Abul Fazl has taken his pen in the interest of a propaganda. It is a propaganda of inter-religious understanding and inter-racial peace. From the view point of his own race and religion this propaganda is fanatically pro-Hindu. Indeed he has made it a point to collect together all the good things that may be said about the people whom he wants to raise in the estimation of his co-religionists. Perhaps from Megasthenes to Nivedita have the Hindus never been flattered in such a dignified manner by any non-Hindu as has been done by Abul Fazl in the *Ain-i-Akbari*.⁹

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⁹ See in this connection Alberuni's sympathetic (although critical) appreciation of Hindu philosophy and general culture in the eleventh century (c. 1017-1030); E. C. Sachau: *Alberuni's India* (London 1910) vol. I. pp. xvii-xix.

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In all essentials the *Ain-i-Akbari* has turned out to be a joint Hindu-Moslem literary work so characteristic of the Indo-Saracenic renaissance of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. Nay, it is perhaps one of the first creative specimens of Hindu-Moslem cultural fusion such as has marked the evolution of Indian arts and sciences since then. And in his emphasis on goodness and moral life as the foundation of spirituality and the key to the kingdom of God he is an avatar of positivism representing thereby the very spirit of the renaissance. For, no student of *nītiśāstras*, oriental or occidental, can afford to forget that the statement "that every man of sense and understanding knows that the best way of worshipping God consists in allaying the distress of the times and in improving the condition of the poor" (*Ain* 2) came from the pen of the Indian Mussalman of the sixteenth century.

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As a rationalist, as a "protestant," and as a humanist Abul Fazl has served to liberate the Moslem mind. The enfranchisement of the intelligence which was cunsummated in the Christian world by the Renaissance was accomplished in Moslem India by the author of the *Ain-i-Akbari*, the same enfranchisement which was to attack the Hindu mind two centuries later in and through Rammohun Roy. For the students of world culture in political philosophy it is of importance to observe that some of the formative forces in Abul Fazl's toleration, humanism, eclectic approach to the things of matter and spirit, as well as positivism were furnished by the Hindu *Manu Samhitā* and *Mahābhārata*.

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