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DMINISTRATION OF KALINGA
183
Rathikas in MRE I (Yer. ver.), and with the Pulisas in PE IV and PE VII.
Buhler identified the Rajjukas with Rajjugahaka Amachcha which finds mention in Pali literature and which means Rope-holder, Field-measurer-rather Surveyor, and hence, signifies a Revenue and Settlement Officer.1 Dr. Thomas agrees with Buhler in thinking that, while Rajjukas represented the highest local officials, their chief functions were connected with survey, land settlement and irrigation. The Arthaśastra refers to a class of officials called Chora-rajjuka but there is no reference to the Rajjuka proper. Jacobi has found in the Kalpasūtra, a Jaina work, the word Rajju, which he explains as 'a Writer or a Clerk'.
The Rajjukas, however, do not appear in any of the above capacities in the Edicts of Aśoka. On the contrary, in PE VII, they are represented as the officials with ruling authority exercised over many hundred thousand of the populace. The same statement occurs in a more elaborate form in PE IV. In it, Aśoka tells as that he had delegated his full Royal authority to the Rajjukas and made them supreme heads of all administration. They were like expert nurses to whose care was entrusted the welfare of all the children viz., his subjects. In matters of the administration of justice and the maintenance of equitable transactions of human affairs, they were made free agents so that they might initiate all necessary measures and proceedings on their own authority with self-confidence and without any fear of interference. Even in the case of criminal justice, they were the supreme judges in the
1. E. I., vol. II p. 406 fn; Cf also the prose version of the Kurudhamma Jataka.
2. CHI, vol. I, p. 487.
3.
II, 6.
4. Original-Lajukā pi bahukesu-pāna-sata-sahasesu āyatā.
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