Republics in Ancient India, c. 1500 B.C.–500 B.C. c6.s2.34

c6.s2.34

It is a serious mistake on the part of the student of ancient political institutions to interpret ancient terms, concepts, and institutions in a modern context. Jayaswal, Bhandarkar, Majumdar, and to some extent Altekar as well, have been guilty of imposing twentieth-century democratic ideas and institutions on early Indian polity. They seem to start with a purpose which was, no doubt, a natural reaction to the criticism of the nineteenth-century imperialist writers who underrated Indian achievements and various aspects of her past culture, as well as being based on the presupposition that if Greece and Rome had democratic institutions ancient India should have had them also.