Republics in Ancient India, c. 1500 B.C.–500 B.C. c7.88

c7.88

Moreover, the word *vṛṇatām*, from the root *vṛ* (*vṛṇoti*, —*ṇute*) has been taken to mean "to elect" by all supporters of the election theory. In the *Ṛg Veda* and the *Atharva Veda* it means "to choose", or "to select".⁸ This root might also be rendered as "to elect", but it depends on the context in which it is found. It might mean "to elect" if in a given passage we had evidence of two or more candidates contesting for the chieftancy of the political community. But no reference to anything like an electoral contest is to be found anywhere in the Vedic literature. No evidence is put forth by this school of historians to show that the people elected one candidate and rejected the other. The sources do suggest that the people, or rather the heads of the families, chose the king. If they approved a king unanimously, presumably by acclamation, this would hardly be an election in the modern sense.