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The Political Institutions and Theories of the Hindus: A Study in Comparative Politics c11.t14: 5. Administration of Irrigation Works

The Political Institutions and Theories of the Hindus: A Study in Comparative Politics c11.t14

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English

5. Administration of Irrigation Works

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(Kashmir¹ had always given small produce, as Kalhana writes in the *Râja-tarangiṇî*, because it was liable to be flooded by the waters of the Mahâpadma Lake and was intersected by many streams. But during the reign of Avanti-varman (833—58) a phenomenal economic revolution was brought about so that the price of a *khâri* of rice fell from 200 to 36 *dinars*. This marvelous result is attributed by the Hindu historian to the engineering feats of the "illustrious" Sûyyâ, the *anna-pati* (lord of food).)

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¹ Kalhana, Book V, verses 68, 116—117, 72, 90—95, 97—98, 102, 106, 109—112.

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(Sûyyâ noticed that the water-locked tracts along the banks of the river Vitastâ were chiefly responsible for the calamities and famines of Kashmir. Accordingly he addressed himself first to the draining off of the water. Next he proceeded to dam up the river by a stone structure. Finally he removed the dam. Having thus given freedom to the stream Sûyyâ constructed several "new beds for the Vitastâ", i. e. canals, "wherever he knew inundation-breaches to occur during disastrous floods".)

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Sûyyâ's operations ultimately changed the very topography of the country. (Through technical skill he succeeded in making the different streams "move about according to his will" "just as a snake-charmer does with the snakes". A new confluence of the Vitastâ with its most important tributary, the Sindhu, was artificially created by the engineer's genius, and "it will last" says Kalhana, "to the end of the world". Sûyyâ also constructed stone-embankments for about thirty miles along the Vitastâ and dammed in the waters of the Mahâpadma. Having "raised the land from the water" he founded several villages. As the water was kept by means of circular dykes the villages looked like round bowls. The previous dependence of the locality on rainfall was thus rendered unnecessary through an achievement of the human brain.)

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The activities of the Kashmirian officer did not stop at this point. The amount of water necessary for irrigation was calculated by him in an interesting manner. He began with an hygrometric examination of the different classes of land. All village lands were first subjected to a temporary inundation under certain conditions. Then he took some soil from each village and observed the time it took to dry up. The different periods within which irrigation would be required for the different soils were thus ascertained. He then arranged accordingly on a permanent basis for the size and distribution of the watercourse for each village. The Ânula and other streams were utilized for the purpose.

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The story of one irrigation-tank can be told for about eight centuries. The Sudarśana Lake at Girnar in Kathiawar near the Arabian Sea was constructed by Puṣya-gupta, a *râṣṭrîya* (governor) of the western prefecture under Chandra-gupta Maurya.¹ Sluices connecting the tank with the agricultural areas were opened out by Tuṣaspha, the viceroy of Asoka. About A. C. 150 repairs of an adamantine character were undertaken by Suviśâkha, assistant to Rudra-dâmana, a satrap probably of the Kuṣân Empire. In Skanda-gupta’s time the dam had to be repaired a second time (458). The re-building was superintended by Chakrapâlita, a governor of the Gupta Empire.² Constitutionally speaking, *pax sârvabhaumica* has to be realized from the fact that both under the Mauryas and the Guptas Girnar was a remote corner of the empire, over 1,000 miles from Pâtali-putra, the capital.

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¹ *Ep. Ind.*, 1905—1906, pp. 46, 47, 49.

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² *Gup. Insc.*, pp. 56—65.

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The Sudarśana reservoir was built by damming up a small stream. The civil engineers of the Tamils conceived another idea in irrigation. Theirs was the plan of controlling a river at the head of its delta. The principle of anicuts is the distinctively original contribution of the Cholas to mankind’s economic development. Their scheme of dealing with deltaic land has since been accepted everywhere. No nation has been able to improve upon it yet.³ The hundred-mile embankments on the Kâverî and the main channels for irrigation were constructed by Kârikâla (*c* A. C. 150). Râjendra (1018—1035) excavated a large artificial reservoir at his new capital, Gangâikonda Śolapuram. The embankment was sixteen miles long and was provided with several substantial sluices.⁴

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³ Deakin, 252.

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⁴ Aiyangar, 185—188.

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Equal, if not more, energy and funds were devoted by the civil service of Ceylon to the problem of irrigation. Parâkrama Bâhu I (*c* A. C. 1150) constructed 1470 tanks and 534 canals, and repaired 1395 large with 960 smaller tanks and 3621 canals. Today there is no part of the island, except the central mountain districts, in which the remains of canals and tanks are not to be found. And it appears on close investigation that almost all irrigation-works were links in a chain of large connected systems. There is, therefore, no hyperbole in the statement of Tennant that “excepting the exaggerated dimensions of Lake Moeris in Central Egypt and the mysterious basin of Al-aaram, the bursting of whose embankment devastated the Arabian city of Mareb, no similar constructions formed by any race, whether ancient or modern, exceed in colossal magnitude the stupendous tanks of Ceylon.”¹

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¹ Deakin, 239—242. An account of Ceylonese civil service is furnished in Coomaraswamy’s *Mediaeval*, pp. 19—20.

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