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51
No. 7]
EPIGRAPHIC NOTES
loss of revenue was greater as the land was rent-free even when the fief reverted to him or was subsequently allotted to some other officer. It therefore seems that the occupants of jāgirs had to compensate the king's loss at least partially for the creation of revenue-free holdings within their fiefs, as otherwise they could scarcely expect the full religious merit accruing to the pious act. We have also cases where a king is found to ratify the rent-free holdings created in their jāgīrs by members of the royal family.
But it appears to us that a number of grants of rent-free lands issued by the kings were really made on behalf of persons whose names are not mentioned in the documents. This seems to be suggested by the fact that, in a few cases, even though the grants are recorded in the king's name, an endorsement at the end of the documents says that they were made by others and in reality there is a contradiction between facts as stated in the charter proper and in the endorsement. An important document of this type is the Bangaon plate of Vigrahapala, which purports to record the grant of a village by the Pala king in favour of a Brahmana, although in an endorsement at the end it is summarily stated that the grant was made by an officer of the king named Ghantisa out of his own jāgir.
Another interesting fact is that the indication of a particular grant being actually made by one of the king's officers or feudatories but represented as one made by the king is not clear in the documents though some of them appear to suggest the fact vaguely. There are many records which introduce a person without any ostensible relation with the charter stated to have been granted by the king. Such an introduction is often found at the end of the documents exactly in the position of the endorsement in the Bangaon plate of Vigrahapala III, referred to above. In a few cases, such an enigmatic name is also met with in the body of the charter without any justification for its introduction. Since it is inexplicable why persons without anything to do with the grants should be mentioned in royal charters at all, we suspect that they might have been the real donors of the grants in question and the fact was intended to be rather vaguely indicated in the said way. It also appears that there was an amount of reluctance on the part of the Government to admit such a fact.
The Mehār plate of Damodara records a grant of lands in favour of a number of Brahmaņas. But at the end of the king's description in verse, there is one stanza introducing Gangadharadeva who was the officer in charge of the royal elephant force. The introduction of this person, as we have indicated elsewhere, cannot be explained unless it is supposed that he was the real donor of the grant although the king was not eager to mention the fact explicitly in the document.
The Andhavaram plates of the Eastern Ganga king Indravarman record the grant of a village as an agrahara or rent free holding in favour of several Brahmaņas. The king is mentioned as the donor. But, at the end, the record is stated to have been written under orders of éri-Lōkārņavadeva who vanquished many foes. The editor of the inscription says, "These plates furnish us with a new Ganga name-Lōkārņava." But he admits that the identity of this person cannot be determined without further evidence.
The charter was issued in the Ganga year 133. But, instead of describing it as the pravardhamana-vijaya-rajya-samvatsara or Gängeya-vaṁéa-pravardhamāna-vijaya-rājya-saṁvatsara as we
1 See the cases of such holdings created by Princes Süryasena and Purushottamasena and ratified by king Visvarûpasēna in his Vangtya Sahitya Parishad plate (N. G. Majumdar, Inscriptions of Bengal, Vol. III, p. 147; JAS, Letters, Vol. XX, pp. 206-07).
Above, Vol. XXIX, p. 48 ff.
Ibid., Vol. XXVII, p. 182 ff.
Ibid., Vol. XXX, pp. 52-53. • Ibid., P.
37 ff.
