The Political Institutions and Theories of the Hindus: A Study in Comparative Politics c12.s1.t2.11

c12.s1.t2.11

Large indeed in Alexander's days was the number of democratically governed peoples, with the institutions of *sva-râj* (self-rule), though often of an oligarchic character. One of the most important of these nations was the Ârattas (*Arâṣṭrakas*, i. e. kingless) with their kinsmen, the Kathians. Justin calls them robbers and they are condemned as such in the *Mahâbhârata*. But they proved to be a powerful military aid to Chandra-gupta in his successful wars against Macedonians and Greco- Syrians. It was the splendid assistance rendered by the Ârattas¹ that to a great extent enabled the Hindu commoner to easily clear the Indian borderland of the *mlechchha* (unclean, barbarian) Europeans, and push the northwestern limits of his empire to the "scientific frontier", the Hindukush Mountains.