Republics in Ancient India, c. 1500 B.C.–500 B.C. c7.550

c7.550

We have quoted, at the beginning of this section, a representative sample, consisting of about one-third of the total of 117 passages, which refer to the institution of the *vidatha* in the two *Vedas*. They include most of the passages used by Professor Sharma in his argument. It is evident that the *vidatha* was a popular institution of the Vedic Indians, but its occurrences are independent of, and comparatively fewer than, those of *jana* and the *viś*, denoting tribe or people, which occur 275 and 271 times respectively.¹ If the *vidatha* were a tribal organization, as Professor Sharma gives us to understand, one would expect it to be associated either with the *jana* or *viś*. But in fact there is not a single hymn in the entire *Ṛg* collection which associates *vidatha* with these two words. Hence, it can be fairly concluded that the *vidatha*, unlike the *sabhā* and *samiti*, did not have a tribal connotation.