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CHAPTER VII
ADMINISTRATION OF KALINGA (Continued)
ADMINISTRATION OF JUSTICE
Asoka paid special attention to the administration of justice. No wonder if he kept a watchful eye when the newly-conquered country of Kalinga was formed into a province of his Empire, since when a territory is newly subjugatel and is in an unsettled condition, the officers, who are charged with proper administration and maintenance of peace and order there, are apt to transgress the bounds of justice and mercy. That such a transgression did actually occur on the part of his officers, we know from his various inscriptions. In Separate Kalinga Edict I, Aśoka takes the Nagára-vyāvahārikas severely to task, because some people of the district-towns of Tosali and Samāpā were subjected to arbitrary imprisonment or were harassed without much cause. He plainly gives them to understand that they had not fully grasped the meaning of his words when he said that all men were his children (Save munise pajā mamā--SKE I and SKE II), and that he desired for them as for the latter, both material and spiritual happiness. . When his expostulations were over, he gave them a healthy piece of advice. He pressed on their attention the fact that unless they performed their duties sedulously, they would neither gain Heaven nor would discharge their duties to the King. Still fearing that notwithstanding all these remonstrances the state of affairs might not improve and that arbitrary imprisonment and causeless harassment might continue, he threatens them with sending forth a Mahāmātra every five years to see
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