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The Positive Background of Hindu Sociology c7.s8: From the Āndhras and Kuṣāṇs to the Senas and Cholas

The Positive Background of Hindu Sociology c7.s8

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From the Āndhras and Kuṣāṇs to the Senas and Cholas

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¹⁷ De la Vallée Poussin: *Dynasties et Histoire de l'Inde depuis Kanishka jusqu'aux invasions musulmanes* (Paris 1935).

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It is neither necessary nor possible to enumerate all the dynasties in the diverse regions of India. We shall single out a few only,—but not unmindful of the fact that those myriads of states that are left out of the following count, whether foreign or Indianized-foreign, may have been no less important as furnishing the inspiration for the *Dharma*, *Artha* and *Niti* treatises in which we are interested. The list is as follows:

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1. The Empire of the Āndhras (c. B.C. 240-A.C. 250) in the Deccan. For a certain period their contemporaries in the North were the Indianized Scythians or Tartars, the Kuṣāṇ Emperors (A.C. 15-226).

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De la Vallée Poussin has a section entitled "*Conquête de l'Inde par les Grecs*" (Conquest of India by the Greeks), referring to "*les rois grecs*" (the Greek kings).¹⁸ About the princes of the House of Euthydeme he says "*ils font la conquête de l'Inde*" (They make the conquest of India). Such expressions are perhaps not more reasonable than those like "Europe" being conquered by the Persians, the Saracens, the Tartars or Mongols of Western, Central and Northern Asia, such as Asian historians have a right to use for certain periods of military contact in Eur-Asian history.¹⁹ The "expansion of Asia," i.e. the establishment of Greater Asia in Europe was achieved by the force of Oriental arms, the "edge of Damascus blades."

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¹⁸ *L'Inde* (Paris 1930) pp. 234-237.

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¹⁹ For an examination of such fallacies prevalent as they are among the historians, sociologists and philosophers of Eur-America see B. K. Sarkar: "The Futurism of Young Asia" in the *International Journal of Ethics* (Chicago) July 1918, "Democratic Ideals and Republican Institutions in India" in the *American Political Science Review*, November 1918, "An English History of India" in the *Political Science Quarterly* (New York, December 1919), and *The Political Institutions and Theories of Hindus* (Leipzig 1922) pp. 19-22.

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The following passage from Foucher's *Gāndhāra* Vol. II, is cited by De la Vallée Poussin with approval: "*L'art de conquerir l'Inde à l'aide des Indiens ne date pas de Dupleix*" (The art of conquering India with the help of Indians does not commence with Dupleix). The reference is to the part played by Indian mercenaries in the Greek campaigns in certain areas of the Punjab. But the student of history can quote plentiful instances of Europeans being exploited by non-Europeans against Europeans. The arts of treason, treachery, internecine warfare, feuds between dynasties, cities or districts etc. are quite orthodox and traditional European commodities. In his *Histoire du commerce entre le Levant et l'Europe*²⁰ Depping makes it clear as to how the Ottomans were aided in the conquest of Europe by the pro-Islamic politics of certain Christian Europeans against other Christian Europeans.

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²⁰ Vol. II. (Paris 1830), pp. 207-214, 222-224.

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In modern history likewise the "impossible Turk" of Western Asia has known how to keep Europe under Asian yoke with the help, diplomatic and otherwise, of Christian Europeans. Nor has Japan failed to demonstrate to the world that it is with the alliance of Christian European powers that the Asians can compel the Christian Europeans to understand the limits of their military ambitions.

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II. The Bhāra Śiva and Vākāṭaka Empires (150-348 A.C.). "The history of the Imperial Hindu revival," says Kasiprasad Jayaswal, "is not to be dated in the fourth century with Samudragupta, not even with the Vākāṭakas nearly a century earlier, but with the Bhāra Śivas half a century earlier still." Again, "if there had been no Bhāra Śivas there would not have come into existence a Gupta Empire and the Gupta Vikramādityas."²¹

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²¹ K. P. Jayaswal: "History of India c. 150 A.C. to 350 A.C. (Nāga-Vākāṭaka Imperial Period)" in the *Journal of the Bihar and Orissa Research Society* (Patna) May-June 1933, pp. 4, 7. This is to be consulted for the Gupta Empire also.

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In Jayaswal's judgment "the real contribution of the Bhāra Śivas is the foundation of a new tradition—or rather the revival of an old tradition—the tradition of Hindu freedom and sovereignty. The national law-book, the *Mānava Dharma Śāstra*, had laid down that Āryāvarta was the God-given land of the Āryas and that the Mlechchhas must live beyond that and outside. This was their political and international birth right prescribed by the sacred law of the land. It had to be vindicated. The tradition initiated by the Bhāra Śivas was kept up by the Vākāṭakas and was taken over by the Guptas and fully maintained by the subsequent emperors from Chandra-gupta Vikramāditya to Bālāditya."

III. The Gupta Empire (320-550 A.C.)

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According to the German art-historian and art-critic Hermann Goetz,²² this period was an epoch of "hyper-civilization" of the greatest splendour, what is technically known as "decadence" in contemporary literary criticism. He compares the conditions in Gupta India to those of Rome of the Caesars, as well as the Rokoko and the *fin de siècle* in eighteenth century Europe. "Its com-merce and traffic were flourishing; not the aristocracy, not the peasants, not the workmen but the great merchants, the bankers and industrials were the leading classes." And its relations extended to China and Japan, to Turkestan and Rome, to Cambodia and Java. It is in this period that Hindu culture commences to become a world-power, as described in my *Chinese Religion through Hindu Eyes* (1916).

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²² *The Relation between Indian Painting and Culture*, a lecture delivered at the School of Oriental Studies, London on 10th November 1924. See also Sarkar: *Chinese Religion Through Hindu Eyes* (Shanghai 1916), Chapter on "The Beginning of Hindu Culture as World-Power;" and D. R. Bhandarkar: "Identification of the Princes and Territories in the Allahabad Pillar Inscription of Samudragupta" in the *Indian Historical Quarterly" (Calcutta) June 1925.

IV. The Vardhana Empire (606-647) in Upper India and the Chālukya Empire (550-753) in the Deccan

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²³ C. V. Vaidya: *History of Mediæval Hindu India* (Poona), Vol. I. (1921) Book I. (Harsha); R. K. Mookerji: *Harsha* (London 1926).

V. The Kingdom of the Rāṣṭrakūṭas in the Deccan (eighth to fourteenth century A.C.)

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²⁴ For an account of the Pallava, Chola, Chālukya, Rāṣṭrakūṭa and other kingdoms in South India, see Aiyangar's *Ancient India*, pp. 31-38, 158-191; A. S. Altekar; *The Rāṣṭrakūṭas and their Times* (Poona 1934).

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VI. The Empire of the Cholas in Southern India beyond the Deccan (ninth to fourteenth century A.C.) "The Chola dynasty was singularly prolific in kings of more than ordinary capacity," says Smith in his Introduction to Aiyangar's *Ancient India*, "from the middle of the ninth century to the end of the reign of Kulottūṅga in A.D. 1118. It is clear from the details on record that the administration of the kingdom was 'highly systematised' from an early date. For instance, there is abundant evidence that the lands under cultivation were carefully surveyed and holdings registered at least a century before the famous Domesday record of William the Conqueror. The re-survey of 1086 was exactly contemporaneous with the English record. The Cholas were great builders; not only of cities and temples but also of irrigation works."

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According to Aiyangar this is the period of high water-mark of Hindu progress all round. Modern Hinduism assumed the shape in which we find it today. The indigenous literature as well as classical Sanskrit received considerable patronage. Religion had been re-adjusted to the requirements of the masses, and administration had come to be highly organised upon surprisingly modern lines. Revivalism in religion and reinvigoration were the order of the day. The story of one of the greatest monarchs of this period, Rājendra Chola (1013-1042), the son of Rājarāja the Great, who, according to the inscriptions, carried his arms successfully across Kaliṅgam, subdued Dakkana Lāṭam, Vāngāladeśam and the territory of Dharmapāla, fought battles on the Ganges and in Burma, and earned the proud surname of Gaṅgāikoṇḍa Chola, has been preserved in the Kanarese work, *Rājaśekhara-Vilāsam*. At the commencement of the 13th century the great Chola Empire was dismembered between the Yādavas of Deogiri, Kākātīyās of Orangal, Hoysālās of Dvārsamudra and other petty chieftains.

VII. The Kingdom of the Pālas and their successors, the Senas, in Bengal (eighth to twelfth centuries A.C.) synchronous with the ascendancy of the Rāṣṭrakūṭas

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²⁵ For an account of the hegemony of the Pālas in Northern India as successors of Harṣavardhana to Imperial titles and pretensions see the Bengali publications of the Varendra Research Society of Rajshahi, and R. D. Banerji's *Memoir on the Pālas* (Asiatic Society of Bengal 1915). Subsequent to these pioneering researches of 1911-15 are to be mentioned H. C. Ray: *The Dynastic History of Northern India* (Calcutta) Vol. I. (1931), and R. G. Basak: *History of North Eastern India* (Calcutta 1934). See also the Bengali work by D. C. Sen: *Brihat Vanga* (Calcutta 1935).

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The period embraced by the long reigns of Dharmapāla and of his son Devapāla covers nearly a century, including the period spent in consolidating the district of Bengal by Gopāla after his election by the people. This was a period of the greatest activity of the Bengali people in various directions, as will appear from the monumental relics discovered and collected by the Varendra Research Society (Rajshahi). This period has another importance, as we know from the book of Lāmā Tārānātha. It is during these long regions of Dharmapāla and his son Devapāla, that an eastern school of sculpture and painting was established by Dhīmān, born in Varendra, and by his son Vītapāla. The reputed minister Guravamiśra enabled his master Dharmapāla, originally a lord only of the Eastern quarter, to extend his dominions to all the quarters, over all the territories between the Himalayas on the North and the Vindhya mountains on the south between the two seas. The Lord Gauḍa (probably Devapāla)²⁶ suppressed the Utkalas, humbled the Hūṇas, and crushed the pride of the Lords of Drāviḍa and Gurjara.

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²⁶ See the reading of the *Garuḍa stambha* inscription interpreted by A. K. Maitra in "The Stones of Varendra" in the *Modern Review* for *August*, 1912. An important historical puzzle that awaits final solution is the relation between the Cholas and Pālas in the 10th century. South Indian tradition points to the overthrow of the Bengalis by the Tamil Napoleon, East Indian tradition points quite otherwise. The Varendra School evidently accepts the overthrow of the Dravidians by the Pālas, as here and also in R. Chanda's Bengali work, *Gauḍa Rājamāla*. South Indian scholars, however, accept the overthrow of the Pālas and Vāngālas as a historical fact (cf. Aiyangar's *Ancient India*). Mookerji records the Tamil view on pp. 174-177 of his *Indian Shipping*. See also R. D. Banerji's *Memoir on the Pālas of Bengal* (Asiatic Society of Bengal, 1915).

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It may be observed, in passing, that these researches of Indian scholars in the mediaeval history of Eastern and Southern India from archæological, linguistic, commercial and other standpoints have unearthed important facts of Bengali and Tamil antiquities which prominently demand recognition in the standard works on Indian culture-history. The Pālas, Senas and Cholas of mediæval India can no longer be treated as subordinate or petty princes ruling over the "smaller kingdoms" in one of the alleged periods of disintegration which, according to Smith, Foucher and others, Indian history is said to repeat after every epoch of consolidation. They must be ranked as to a certain extent on a par, in prestige, titles, pretensions, influences, and achievements, with the famous Vardhanas of the 7th cent. A.C., the Guptas of the 4th-5th cent. A.C. and the Mauryas of the 4th-3rd cent. B.C. Dharmapāla (c. 800 A.C.), the Buddhist Emperor of Eastern India, with his immediate predecessors and successors, Vijayasena (1097-1159), the Śaiva ruler of United Bengal, as well as Rājendra Chola, the great Śaiva monarch of the South, with his predecessors and successors, constitute remarkable contemporary Imperial families which must have a place by the side of such renowned Indian Napoleons, Empire-builders, and statesmen as Chandragupta Maurya, Asoka, the benevolent "Caesaro-papist," Chandragupta the Gupta, Samudragupta the Vikramāditya, and Harṣavardhana, who preceded them in solving the same problems in administration, commerce, religion and culture on the stage of Hindustan.

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The period of the mighty Pālas, Senas, Rāṣṭrakūṭas and Cholas has witnessed the solution of problems which are of paramount importance in Indian history, literature, fine arts, philosophy and religion. For, it was during this age that the ocean of Tantrism finally swallowed up in a common philosophy the divergent channels of Mahāyāna Buddhism²⁷ and latter-day Brāhmanism; that Vaiṣṇavism and Śaivaism,—the corner-stones of modern Hindu life,—received the official stamp; the parents of present-day vernaculars were encouraged and ‘protected’; noble religious edifices were built, huge sealike tanks were excavated; magnificent images were sculptured in bronze and stones; the navigation of the sea was pushed forward; commercial and cultural intercourse between the Southerners and Easterners was promoted; and India became really the School of Asia by supplying faith, literature, fine arts and material necessaries to China, Nepal, Tibet, Japan, Java, Burma, Cambodia and other lands beyond the seas. This period does, in fact, carry forward and develop the impulses, aspirations and tendencies of Hindu national life testified to by Yuan Chwang, the Chinese Master of Law; in Harṣavardhana’s time.

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²⁷ For the diverse aspects of Buddhism in evolution see H. P. Sastri: "Northern Buddhism" in the *Indian Historical Quarterly* (Calcutta, March, June and September 1925), N. Dutt: *Mahayana Buddhism and its Relation to Hinayana* (London 1930) and *Panchaviṃśati Sahasrikā Prajnāpāramitā* (London 1934).

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The Pālas, Senas, Rāṣṭrakūṭas and Cholas are really the spiritual successors of that great Empire-builder and statesman of the seventh century. The epoch of their hegemony in Indian history is a brilliant sequel to the splendid epoch of empire-building, religious toleration, colonizing activity, and social amalgamation which it had been the policy of the great Harṣa to foster and direct. Their services to the making of Indian national culture deserve the same careful handling, therefore, from historians as those of Harṣa.

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And now that excavations, explorations, readings and interpretations of old vernacular manuscripts, copper-plate inscriptions, architectural monuments, numismatics, study of folklore, folk-songs, folk-arts and village traditions, Sanskrit literature, old sculptures and paintings, call up before us a picture of political and religious life, commercial and social intercourse, art-development and literary progress no less definite and clear than what we have for any other period of Indian history, the necessity of looking upon the Pāla-Sena-Rāṣṭrakūṭa-Chola period as a really creative phase of Hindu India cannot be too strongly advocated.²⁸

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²⁸ B. K. Sarkar: *Chinese Religion Through Hindu Eyes* (Shanghai 1916), and *Folk-Element in Hindu Culture* (London 1917). My position in regard to the post-Harṣa Hindu Empires (c. 650-1350), as indicated in the first edition of the present work in 1913-14, has been well vindicated in and through subsequent publications, e.g. H. C. Ray: *The Dynastic History of Northern India*, Vol. I. (Calcutta 1931) pp. xxxiv-xxxvi.

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