Police in Ancient India

Like in modern times, in ancient times too, the state was expected to maintain law and order. And when we talk about the functioning of police in ancient India, we find that like many other topics of ancient Indian history, we have limited information. Although there are certain names that appear in different sources that are of officers who had some role to play in the maintenance of law and order in a particular state, the problem which we have is this. In ancient India, in most cases, there was no distinction between a police officer and a military officer. So, this we should keep in mind. Now, when we look at the police administration of ancient India, we have to start from the very bottom, which is at the village level. When it comes to the police administration in the village level, we find that it was the village chief who in sources is called Gramini. So, Gramini was in charge of preserving law and order in a village. And most likely, he was tasked to catch the culprit and send it over to the officials of the state. And whenever there were some soldiers or some officers who were stationing in a particular village to maintain law and order or for some official purposes, it was the duty of the entire village to look after these officers. So, in that case, there was a distinct tax that was imposed on a particular village in which these officers were staying. Now, if we move from the village level up to the district level, here what we find is that the person who was tasked of maintaining law and order also had to collect taxes. So, in this way, at the district level, in ancient times, there was no strict separation between these two roles as we see today. This can also be seen in Kautilya's Arthashastra where Kautilya mentions an officer who is called Pradesh. Now, Pradesh had to maintain law and order in the district and he also had to collect revenue. Apart from these two roles, he also sometimes had to perform the role of a judge. So, there were three distinct roles which this particular officer had to perform at the district level. Now, moving up the hierarchy, the most detailed information about police administration at the urban level is mentioned in Kautilya's Arthashastra. In this text, Kautilya talks about Ashtadash Teertha or 18 great officers. Of these 18 great officers, there were some officers who had to perform police duties. Now, if we are talking about the administration at the city level, let's start with the palace itself, which was the center of the entire city. Kautilya here mentions two officers, Dvarika and Antarvansika. Antarvansika was in charge of maintaining the inner security of a palace. Most likely, he was in charge of securing the harem of the king and there are some scholars who believe that this officer was most likely a lady. If we move outside the palace, the officer who was in charge of securing the palace and its residents from outside was an officer called Dvarika. So, these two officers guarded the palace of the king. If we move from the palace to the general city administration, we have an officer called Durgapal. At the start, Durgapal had to perform some military duties as well. But in later sources, he becomes solely a police officer and like his counterparts at the village and district level, apart from maintaining law and order, he also had to collect revenue from the city. Now, in later sources, Durgapal becomes Kotpal and from Kotpal, we have Kataul which would ultimately become Kotwal. Just like in modern times, there were also cases in ancient times where travellers who were travelling on roads or in trading routes were harassed and robbed. So, ancient states also had to secure these roads from these brigands and robbers. In ancient times, there was an officer called Antpal. Antpal had the duty to secure these roads that connected villages to districts and cities. Although the duty of an Antpal was to guard the frontier of the kingdom, but he was also responsible for making roads and highways free from robbers. And like other officials, he also had to collect revenue, particularly road tolls. In Arthashastra, we find that the merchants and other travellers who were travelling on roads and highways had to pay this road toll to the Antpal. And this was also a kind of an insurance. If there was a robbery in which these merchants lost their belongings, the Antpal had to compensate for these losses. So, these are some of the officers that are mentioned in ancient sources. Now, in police administration, there are different components and one of these components is criminal law. We can see how crucial this criminal law is for ancient Indian theorists from Kautilya's Arthashastra. Kautilya calls criminal law Kantak Sodhana, which means clearing of thorns. So, you can see how Kautilya thinks about criminal law and its administration. In this administration of criminal law, one of the vital elements were officers at the bottom level. In ancient sources, these low-level officials are called chatas and bhatas. And like their senior counterparts, these low-level officers also performed the duty of soldiers during war time. There are some sources from which it appears that these chatas and bhatas did not always have the best interest of the public in mind. There is a 5th century inscription in which we are told that these chatas and bhatas were considered oppressive not only by the villagers but even in the eyes of the rulers. So, police officers misusing their power is not a recent phenomenon. It has an ancient precedent. Now coming back to the question of police administration. In ancient times, the king was expected to provide security to his people. This was the reason why people gave taxes to him. If you want to know more about this subject, do watch this video where I have talked about how ancient Indian theorists talked about taxes. And if you like this channel, do subscribe. Thank you for watching.