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A CULTURAL STUDY OF THE NISITHA CURNI
(ašiva)i in the text clearly reveal that in certain regions there was always a fear of drought and famine which were usually accompanied with epidemic also. In such circumstances nothing could grow for want of rains, and people, especially the monks, suffered terribly for being unable in procuring alms.
Land-owner ship-Regarding the ownership of the land two different theories have been upheld by the ancient Hindu law-givers-state-ownership of the land or the theory which recognises king as the owner of the land and that of the peasant-proprietorship. In the context of the ownership of a garden in the NC. the author has remarked that the garden (drama) could have been purchased by the kudumbi, the bhojika, the village (gameņa), the vaņik, the gotthi ( corporation), the arakkhiya, or by the king (ranna) by paying the stipulated sum ( mulla )." Here from the mention of the purchase of a garden by the king it may be judged that the theory of the state-ownership of land has not been upheld by our author, although the king like anyone else had the right to purchase the land by giving the proper price. Elsewhere in the NC. a cultivator is mentioned as cultivating on the other's field (parāvatta-khetta) by paying the negotiated amount of money. It points towards the peasant-proprietorship of the land and that the land could be even given on rent or mortgaged by its owner. In some of the contemporary Maitraka records. the fields are mentioned to have been owned by the kuțumbins (kuțuñbi-khetta) and very often the term satka has been used to convey the idea of ownership. It was thus the theory of
1. Dubbhikkh or omakāla ( famine ) and, asiva ( epidemic) have regularly
been mentioned in the NC. as two circumstances in which the excep
tions ( apavāda ) to the rules could be resorted to by the Jaina monks. 2. For the concept of ownership of land in ancient India sce-Kane, P. V.,
History of Dharmaśāstra, vol. III, p. 547; also Gopal, op. cit., pp.
1-31. 3. NC. 3, P. 498; Bih. Vr. 2, pp. 287-88. 4. PEST ariau gri offre à gefa afro arepN C. 3, p. 519. 5. EI. XXII, 115-20; XXI, 183; IV, 76-81.
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