Wednesday 23 May 2012

Kautilya's Arthashastra

Hari Krishnamurthy likes

K.hariharan

Create your like badge

power by BLOGSPOT-PING

Kautilya's Arthashastra Book II: The Duties of Government Superintendents
Translated by R. Shamasastry

Contents:
Formation of villages; division of land; construction of forts; buildings within the fort; the duty of the chamberlain; the business of collection of revenue by the collector-general; the business of keeping up accounts in the office of accountants; detection of what is embezzled by government servants out of state-revenue; examination of the conduct of Government servants; the procedure of forming royal writs; the superintendent of the treasury; examination of gems that are to be entered into the treasury; conducting mining operations and manufacture; the superintendent of gold; the duties of the state goldsmith in the high road; the superintendent of store-house; the superintendent of commerce; the superintendent of forest produce; the superintendent of the armoury; the superintendent of weights and measures; measurement of space and time; the superintendent of tolls; the superintendent of weaving; the superintendent of agriculture; the superintendent of liquor; the superintendent of slaughter-house; the superintendent of prostitutes; the superintendent of ships; the superintendent of cows; the superintendent of horses; the superintendent of elephants; the superintendent of chariots; the superintendent of infantry; the duty of the commander- in-chief , the superintendent of passports; the superintendent of pasture lands; the duty of revenue collectors; spies in the guise of householders, merchants, and ascetics; the duty of a city superintendent.

CHAPTER I. FORMATION OF VILLAGES.

EITHER by inducing foreigners to immigrate (paradesapraváhanena) or by causing the thickly-populated centres of his own kingdom to send forth the excessive population (svadésábhishyandavámanéna vá), the king may construct villages either on new sites or on old ruins (bhútapúrvama vá).
Villages consisting each of not less than a hundred families and of not more than five-hundred families of agricultural people of súdra caste, with boundaries extending as far as a krósa (2250 yds.) or two, and capable of protecting each other shall be formed. Boundaries shall be denoted by a river, a mountain, forests, bulbous plants (grishti), caves, artificial buildings (sétubandha), or by trees such as sálmali (silk cotton tree), samí (Acacia Suma), and kshíravriksha (milky trees).

There shall be set up a stháníya (a fortress of that name) in the centre of eight-hundred villages, a drónamukha in the centre of four-hundred villages, a khárvátika in the centre of two-hundred villages and sangrahana in the midst of a collection of ten villages.
There shall be constructed in the extremities of the kingdom forts manned by boundary-guards (antapála) whose duty shall be to guard the entrances into the kingdom. The interior of the kingdom shall be watched by trap-keepers (vágurika), archers (sábara), hunters (pulinda), chandálas, and wild tribes (aranyachára).
Those who perform sacrifices (ritvik), spiritual guides, priests, and those learned in the Vedas shall be granted Brahmadaya lands yielding sufficient produce and exempted from taxes and fines (adandkaráni).
Superintendents, Accountants, Gopas, Sthánikas, Veterinary Surgeons (Aníkastha), physicians, horse-trainers, and messengers shall also be endowed with lands which they shall have no right to alienate by sale or mortgage.
Lands prepared for cultivation shall be given to tax- payers (karada) only for life (ekapurushikáni).
Unprepared lands shall not be taken away from those who are preparing them for cultivation.
Lands may be confiscated from those who do not cultivate them; and given to others; or they may be cultivated by village labourers (grámabhritaka) and traders (vaidehaka), lest those owners who do not properly cultivate them might pay less (to the government). If cultivators pay their taxes easily, they may be favourably supplied with grains, cattle, and money.
The king shall bestow on cultivators only such favour and remission (anugrahaparihárau) as will tend to swell the treasury, and shall avoid such as will deplete it.
A king with depleted treasury will eat into the very vitality of both citizens and country people. Either on the occasion of opening new settlements or on any other emergent occasions, remission of taxes shall be made.
He shall regard with fatherly kindness those who have passed the period of remission of taxes.
He shall carry on mining operations and manufactures, exploit timber and elephant forests, offer facilities for cattlebreeding and commerce, construct roads for traffic both by land and water, and set up market towns (panyapattana).
He shall also construct reservoirs (sétu) filled with water either perennial or drawn from some other source. Or he may provide with sites, roads, timber, and other necessary things those who construct reservoirs of their own accord. Likewise in the construction of places of pilgrimage (punyasthána) and of groves.
Whoever stays away from any kind of cooperative construction (sambhúya setubhandhát) shall send his servants and bullocks to carry on his work, shall have a share in the expenditure, but shall have no claim to the profit.
The king shall exercise his right of ownership (swámyam) with regard to fishing, ferrying and trading in vegetables (haritapanya) in reservoirs or lakes (sétushu).
Those who do not heed the claims of their slaves (dása), hirelings (áhitaka), and relatives shall be taught their duty.
The king shall provide the orphans, (bála), the aged, the infirm, the afflicted, and the helpless with maintenance. He shall also provide subsistence to helpless women when they are carrying and also to the children they give birth to.
Elders among the villagers shall improve the property of bereaved minors till the latter attain their age; so also the property of Gods.
When a capable person other than an apostate (patita) or mother neglects to maintain his or her child, wife, mother, father, minor brothers, sisters, or widowed girls (kanyá vidhaváscha), he or she shall be punished with a fine of twelve panas.
When, without making provision for the maintenance of his wife and sons, any person embraces ascetism, he shall be punished with the first amercement; likewise any person who converts a woman to ascetism (pravrájayatah).
Whoever has passed the age of copulation may become an ascetic after distributing the properties of his own acquisition (among his sons); otherwise, he will be punished.
No ascetic other than a vánaprastha (forest-hermit), no company other than the one of local birth (sajátádanyassanghah), and no guilds of any kind other than local cooperative guilds (sámuttháyiká- danyassamayánubandhah) shall find entrance into the villages of the kingdom. Nor shall there be in villages buildings (sáláh) intended for sports and plays. Nor, in view of procuring money, free labour, commodities, grains, and liquids in plenty, shall actors, dancers, singers, drummers, buffoons (vágjívana), and bards (kusílava) make any disturbance to the work of the villagers; for helpless villagers are always dependent and bent upon their fields.
The king shall avoid taking possession of any country which is liable to the inroads of enemies and wild tribes and which is harassed by frequent visitations of famine and pestilence. He shall also keep away from expensive sports.
He shall protect agriculture from the molestation of oppressive fines, free labour, and taxes (dandavishtikarábádhaih); herds of cattle from thieves, tigers, poisonous creatures and cattle-disease.
He shall not only clear roads of traffic from the molestations of courtiers (vallabha), of workmen (kármika), of robbers, and of boundary-guards, but also keep them from being destroyed by herds of cattle.
Thus the king shall not only keep in good repair timber and elephant forests, buildings, and mines created in the past, but also set up new ones.

[Thus ends Chapter I, "Formation of Villages” in Book II, “The Duties of Government Superintendents,” of the Arthasástra of Kautilya. End of twenty-second chapter from the beginning.]

CHAPTER II. DIVISION OF LAND.

THE King shall make provision for pasture grounds on uncultivable tracts.
Bráhmans shall be provided with forests for sóma plantation, for religious learning, and for the performance of penance, such forests being rendered safe from the dangers from animate or inanimate objects, and being named after the tribal name (gótra) of the Bráhmans resident therein.
A forest as extensive as the above, provided with only one entrance rendered inaccessible by the construction of ditches all round, with plantations of delicious fruit trees, bushes, bowers, and thornless trees, with an expansive lake of water full of harmless animals, and with tigers (vyála), beasts of prey (márgáyuka), male and female elephants, young elephants, and bisons—all deprived of their claws and teeth—shall be formed for the king's sports.
On the extreme limit of the country or in any other suitable locality, another game-forest with game-beasts; open to all, shall also be made. In view of procuring all kinds of forest-produce described elsewhere, one or several forests shall be specially reserved.
Manufactories to prepare commodities from forest produce shall also be set up.
Wild tracts shall be separated from timber-forests. In the extreme limit of the country, elephant forests, separated from wild tracts, shall be formed.
The superintendent of forests with his retinue of forest guards shall not only maintain the up-keep of the forests, but also acquaint himself with all passages for entrance into, or exit from such of them as are mountainous or boggy or contain rivers or lakes.
Whoever kills an elephant shall be put to death.
Whoever brings in the pair of tusks of an elephant, dead from natural causes, shall receive a reward of four-and-a-half panas.
Guards of elephant forests, assisted by those who rear elephants, those who enchain the legs of elephants, those who guard the boundaries, those who live in forests, as well as by those who nurse elephants, shall, with the help of five or seven female elephants to help in tethering wild ones, trace the whereabouts of herds of elephants by following the course of urine and dungs left by elephants and along forest-tracts covered over with branches of Bhallátaki (Semicarpus Anacardium), and by observing the spots where elephants slept or sat before or left dungs, or where they had just destroyed the banks of rivers or lakes. They shall also precisely ascertain whether any mark is due to the movements of elephants in herds, of an elephant roaming single, of a stray elephant, of a leader of herds, of a tusker, of a rogue elephant, of an elephant in rut, of a young elephant, or of an elephant that has escaped from the cage.
Experts in catching elephants shall follow the instructions given to them by the elephant doctor (aníkastha) and catch such elephants as are possessed of auspicious characteristics and good character.
The victory of kings (in battles) depends mainly upon elephants; for elephants, being of large bodily frame, are capable not only to destroy the arrayed army of an enemy, his fortifications, and encampments, but also to undertake works that are dangerous to life.
Elephants bred in countries, such as Kálinga, Anga, Karúsa, and the East are the best; those of the Dasárna and western countries are of middle quality; and those of Sauráshtra and Panchajana countries are of low quality. The might and energy of all can, however, be improved by suitable training.

[Thus ends Chapter II, “Division of Land” in Book II, “The Duties of Government Superintendents” of the Arthasástra of Kautilya. End of twenty-third chapter from the beginning.]

CHAPTER III. CONSTRUCTION OF FORTS

ON all the four quarters of the boundaries of the kingdom, defensive fortifications against an enemy in war shall be constructed on grounds best fitted for the purpose: a water-fortification (audaka) such as an island in the midst of a river, or a plain surrounded by low ground; a mountainous fortification (párvata) such as a rocky tract or a cave; a desert (dhánvana) such as a wild tract devoid of water and overgrown with thicket growing in barren soil; or a forest fortification (vanadurga) full of wagtail (khajana), water and thickets.
Of these, water and mountain fortifications are best suited to defend populous centres; and desert and forest fortifications are habitations in wilderness (atavísthánam).
Or with ready preparations for flight the king may have his fortified capital (stháníya) as the seat of his sovereignty (samudayásthánam) in the centre of his kingdom: in a locality naturally best fitted for the purpose, such as the bank of the confluence of rivers, a deep pool of perennial water, or of a lake or tank, a fort, circular, rectangular, or square in form, surrounded with an artificial canal of water, and connected with both land and water paths (may be constructed).
Round this fort, three ditches with an intermediate space of one danda (6 ft.) from each other, fourteen, twelve and ten dandas respectively in width, with depth less by one quarter or by one-half of their width, square at their bottom and one-third as wide as at their top, with sides built of stones or bricks, filled with perennial flowing water or with water drawn from some other source, and possessing crocodiles and lotus plants shall be constructed.
At a distance of four dandas (24 ft.) from the (innermost) ditch, a rampart six dandas high and twice as much broad shall be erected by heaping mud upwards and by making it square at the bottom, oval at the centre pressed by the trampling of elephants and bulls, and planted with thorny and poisonous plants in bushes. Gaps in the rampart shall be filled up with fresh earth.
Above the rampart, parapets in odd or even numbers and with an intermediate, space of from 12 to 24 hastas from each other shall be built of bricks and raised to a height of twice their breadth.
The passage for chariots shall be made of trunks of palm trees or of broad and thick slabs of stones with spheres like the head of a monkey carved on their surface; but never of wood as fire finds a happy abode in it.
Towers, square throughout and with moveable staircase or ladder equal to its height, shall also be constructed.
In the intermediate space measuring thirty dandas between two towers, there shall be formed a broad street in two compartments covered over with a roof and two-and- half times as long as it is broad.
Between the tower and the broad street there shall be constructed an Indrakósa which is made up of covering pieces of wooden planks affording seats for three archers.
There shall also be made a road for Gods which shall measure two hastas inside (the towers ?), four times as much by the sides, and eight hastas along the parapet.
Paths (chárya, to ascend the parapet ?) as broad as a danda (6 ft.) or two shall also be made.
In an unassailable part (of the rampart), a passage for flight (pradhávitikám), and a door for exit (nishkuradwáram) shall be made.
Outside the rampart, passages for movements shall be closed by forming obstructions such as a knee-breaker (jánubhanjaní), a trident, mounds of earth, pits, wreaths of thorns, instruments made like the tail of a snake, palm leaf, triangle, and of dog's teeth, rods, ditches filled with thorns and covered with sand, frying pans and water-pools.
Having made on both sides of the rampart a circular hole of a danda-and-a-half in diametre, an entrance gate (to the fort) one-sixth as broad as the width of the street shall be fixed.
A square (chaturásra) is formed by successive addition of one danda up to eight dandas commencing from five, or in the proportion, one-sixth of the length up to one-eighth.
The rise in level (talotsedhah) shall be made by successive addition of one hasta up to 18 hastas commencing from 15 hastas.
In fixing a pillar, six parts are to form its height, on the floor, twice as much (12 parts) to be entered into the ground, and one-fourth for its capital.
Of the first floor, five parts (are to be taken) for the formation of a hall (sálá), a well, and a boundary-house; two-tenths of it for the formation of two platforms opposite to each other (pratimanchau); an upper storey twice as high as its width; carvings of images; an upper-most storey, half or three-fourths as broad as the first floor; side walls built of bricks; on the left side, a staircase circumambulating from left to right; on the right, a secret staircase hidden in the wall; a top-support of ornamental arches (toranasirah) projecting as far as two hastas; two door-panels, (each) occupying three-fourths of the space; two and two cross-bars (parigha, to fasten the door); an iron-bolt (indrakila) as long as an aratni (24 angulas); a boundary gate (ánidváram) five hastas in width; four beams to shut the door against elephants; and turrets (hastinakha) (outside the rampart) raised up to the height of the face of a man, removable or irremovable, or made of earth in places devoid of water.
A turret above the gate and starting from the top of the parapet shall be constructed, its front resembling an alligator up to three-fourths of its height.
In the centre of the parapets, there shall be constructed a deep lotus pool; a rectangular building of four compartments, one within the other; an abode of the Goddess Kumiri (Kumárípuram), having its external area one-and-a-half times as broad as that of its innermost room; a circular building with an arch way; and in accordance with available space and materials, there shall also be constructed canals (kulyá) to hold weapons and three times as long as broad.
In those canals, there shall be collected stones, spades (kuddála), axes (kuthári), varieties of staffs, cudgel (musrinthi), hammers (mudgara), clubs, discus, machines (yantra), and such weapons as can destroy a hundred persons at once (sataghni), together with spears, tridents, bamboo-sticks with pointed edges made of iron, camel-necks, explosives (agnisamyógas), and whatever else can be devised and formed from available materials.

[Thus ends Chapter III, "Construction of Forts,” in Book II, “The Duties of Government Superintendents” of the Arthasástra of Kautilya. End of twenty-fourth chapter from the beginning.]

CHAPTER IV. BUILDINGS WITHIN THE FORT.

DEMARCATION of the ground inside the fort shall be made first by opening three royal roads from west to east and three from south to north.
The fort shall contain twelve gates, provided with both a land and water-way kept secret.
Chariot-roads, royal roads, and roads leading to drónamukha, stháníya, country parts, and pasture grounds shall each be four dandas (24 ft.) in width.
Roads leading to sayóníya (?), military stations (vyúha), burial or cremation grounds, and to villages shall be eight dandas in width.
Roads to gardens, groves, and forests shall be four dandas.
Roads leading to elephant forests shall be two dandas.
Roads for chariots shall be five aratnis (7½ ft.). Roads for cattle shall measure four aratnis; and roads for minor quadrupeds and men two aratnis.
Royal buildings shall be constructed on strong grounds.
In the midst of the houses of the people of all the four castes and to the north from the centre of the ground inside the fort, the king’s palace, facing either the north or the east shall, as described elsewhere (Chapter XX, Book I), be constructed occupying one-ninth of the whole site inside the fort.
Royal teachers, priests, sacrificial place, water-reservoir and ministers shall occupy sites east by north to the palace.
Royal kitchen, elephant stables, and the store-house shall be situated on sites east by south.
On the eastern side, merchants trading in scents, garlands, grains, and liquids, together with expert artisans and the people of Kshatriya caste shall have their habitations.
The treasury, the accountant’s office, and various manufactories (karmanishadyáscha) shall be situated on sites south by east.
The store-house of forest produce and the arsenal shall be constructed on sites south by west.
To the south, the superintendents of the city, of commerce, of manufactories, and of the army as well as those who trade in cooked rice, liquor, and flesh, besides prostitutes, musicians, and the people of Vaisya caste shall live.
To the west by south, stables of asses, camels, and working house.
To the west by north, stables of conveyances and chariots.
To the west, artisans manufacturing worsted threads, cotton threads, bamboo-mats, skins, armours, weapons, and gloves as well as the people of Súdra caste shall have their dwellings.
To the north by west, shops and hospitals.
To the north by east, the treasury and the stables of cows and horses.
To the north, the royal tutelary deity of the city, ironsmiths, artisans working on precious stones, as well as Bráhmans shall reside.
In the several corners, guilds and corporations of workmen shall reside.
In the centre of the city, the apartments of Gods such as Aparájita, Apratihata, Jayanta, Vaijayanta, Siva, Vaisravana, Asvina (divine physicians), and the honourable liquor-house (Srí-madiragriham), shall be situated.
In the corners, the guardian deities of the ground shall be appropriately set up.
Likewise the principal gates such as Bráhma, Aindra, Yámya, and Sainápatya shall be constructed; and at a distance of 100 bows (dhanus = 108 angulas) from the ditch (on the counterscarp side), places of worship and pilgrimage, groves and buildings shall be constructed.
Guardian deities of all quarters shall also be set up in quarters appropriate to them.
Either to the north or the east, burial or cremation grounds shall be situated; but that of the people of the highest caste shall be to the south (of the city).
Violation of this rule shall be punished with the first amercement.
Heretics and Chandálas shall live beyond the burial grounds.
Families of workmen may in any other way be provided with sites befitting with their occupation and field work. Besides working in flower-gardens, fruit-gardens, vegetable-gardens, and paddy-fields allotted to them, they (families) shall collect grains and merchandise in abundance as authorised.
There shall be a water-well for every ten houses.
Oils, grains, sugar, salt, medicinal articles, dry or fresh vegetables, meadow grass, dried flesh, haystock, firewood, metals, skins, charcoal, tendons (snáyu), poison, horns, bamboo, fibrous garments, strong timber, weapons, armour, and stones shall also be stored (in the fort) in such quantities as can be enjoyed for years together without feeling any want. Of such collection, old things shall be replaced by new ones when received.
Elephants, cavalry, chariots, and infantry shall each be officered with many chiefs inasmuch as chiefs, when many, are under the fear of betrayal from each other and scarcely liable to the insinuations and intrigues of an enemy.
The same rule shall hold good with the appointment of boundary, guards, and repairers of fortifications.
Never shall báhirikas who are dangerous to the well being of cities and countries be kept in forts. They may either be thrown in country parts or compelled to pay taxes.

[Thus ends Chapter IV, “ Buildings within the Fort” in Book II, “The Duties of the Government Superintendents” of the Arthasástra of Kautilya. End of twenty-fifth chapter from the beginning.]

CHAPTER V. THE DUTIES OF THE CHAMBERLAIN.

THE Chamberlain (sannidhátá = one who ever attends upon the king) shall see to the construction of the treasury-house, trading-house, the store-house of grains, the store-house of forest produce, the armoury and the jail.
Having dug up a square well not too deep to be moist with water, having paved both the bottom and the sides with slabs of stone, he shall, by using strong timber, construct in that well a cage-like under-ground chamber of three stories high, the top-most being on a level with the surface of the ground, with many compartments of various design, with floor plastered with small stones, with one door, with a movable staircase, and solemnised with the presence of the guardian deity.
Above this chamber, the treasury house closed on both sides, with projecting roofs and extensively opening into the store-house shall be built of bricks.
He may employ outcast men (abhityakta-purusha) to build at the extreme boundary of the kingdom a palacious mansion to hold substantial treasure against dangers and calamities.
The trading-house shall be a quadrangle enclosed by four buildings with one door, with pillars built of burnt bricks, with many compartments, and with a row of pillars on both sides kept apart.
The store-house shall consist of many spacious rooms and enclose within itself the store-house of forest produce separated from it by means of wall and connected with both the underground chamber and the armoury.
The court (dharmasthíya) and the office of the ministers (mahámátríya) shall be built in a separate locality.
Provided with separate accommodation for men and women kept apart and with many compartments well guarded, a jail shall also be constructed.
All these buildings shall be provided with halls (sála) pits (kháta—privy [?]), water-well, bath-room, remedies against fire and poison, with cats, mangooses, and with necessary means to worship the guardian gods appropriate to each.
In (front of) the store-house a bowl (kunda) with its mouth as wide as an aratni (24 angulag) shall be set up as rain-gauge (varshamána).
Assisted by experts having necessary qualifications and provided with tools and instruments, the chamberlain shall attend to the business of receiving gems either old or new, as well as raw materials of superior or inferior value.
In cases of deception in gems, both the deceiver and the abettor shall be punished with the highest amercement; in the case of superior commodities, they shall be punished with the middle-most amercement; and in that of commodities of inferior value, they shall be compelled not only to restore the same, but also pay a fine equal to the value of the articles.
He shall receive only such gold coins as have been declared to be pure by the examiner of coins.
Counterfeit coins shall be cut into pieces.
Whoever brings in counterfeit coins shall be punished with the first amercement.
Grains pure and fresh shall be received in full measures; otherwise a fine of twice the value of the grains shall be imposed.
The same rule shall hold good with the receipt of merchandise, raw materials, and weapons.
In all departments, whoever, whether as an officer (yukta), a clerk (upayukta), or a servant (tatpurusha), misappropriates sums from one to four panas or any other valuable things shall be punished with the first, middlemost, and highest amercements and death respectively.
If the officer who is in charge of the treasury causes loss in money, he shall be whipped (ghátah), while his abettors shall receive half the punishment; if the loss is due to ignorance, he shall be censured.
If, with the intention of giving a hint, robbers are frightened (by the guards), (the latter) shall be tortured to death.
Hence assisted by trustworthy persons, the chamberlain shall attend to the business of revenue collection.
He shall have so thorough a knowledge of both external and internal incomes running even for a hundred years that, when questioned, he can point out without hesitation the exact amount of net balance that remains after expenditure has been met with.

[Thus ends Chapter V, "The Duty of the Chamberlain" in Book II, "The Duties of the Government Superintendents” of the Arthasástra of Kautilya. End of twenty-sixth chapter from the beginning.]

CHAPTER VI. THE BUSINESS OF COLLECTION OF REVENUE BY THE COLLECTOR-GENERAL.

THE Collector-General shall attend to (the collection of revenue from) forts (durga), country-parts (ráshtra), mines (khani), buildings and gardens (setu), forests (vana), herds of cattle (vraja), and roads of traffic (vanikpatha).
Tolls, fines, weights and measures, the town-clerk (nágaraka), the superintendent of coinage (lakshanádhyakshah), the superintendent of seals and pass-ports, liquor, slaughter of animals, threads, oils,. ghee, sugar (kshára), the state-goldsmith (sauvarnika), the warehouse of merchandise, the prostitute, gambling, building sites (vástuka), the corporation of artisans and handicrafts-men (kárusilpiganah), the superintendent of gods, and taxes collected at the gates and from the people (known as) Báhirikas come under the head of forts.
Produce from crown-lands (sita), portion of produce payable to the government (bhága), religious taxes (bali), taxes paid in money (kara), merchants, the superintendent of rivers, ferries, boats, and ships, towns, pasture grounds, road-cess (vartani), ropes (rajjú) and ropes to bind thieves (chórarajjú) come under the head of country parts.
Gold, silver, diamonds, gems, pearls, corals, conch-shells, metals (loha), salt, and other minerals extracted from plains and mountain slopes come under the head of mines.
Flower-gardens, fruit-gardens, vegetable-gardens, wet fields, and fields where crops are grown by sowing roots for seeds (múlavápáh, i.e., sugar-cane crops, etc.) come under sétu.
Game-forests, timber-forests, and elephant-forests are forests.
Cows, buffaloes, goats, sheep, asses, camels, horses, and mules come under the head of herds.
Land and water ways are the roads of traffic.
All these form the body of income (áyasaríram).
Capital (múla), share (bhága), premia (vyáji), parigha (?) fixed taxes (klripta), premia on coins (rúpika), and fixed fines (atyaya) are the several forms of revenue (áyamukha, i.e., the mouth from which income is to issue).
The chanting of auspicious hymns during the worship of gods and ancestors, and on the occasion of giving gifts, the harem, the kitchen, the establishment of messengers, the store-house, the armoury, the warehouse, the store-house of raw materials, manufactories (karmánta), free labourers (vishti), maintenance of infantry, cavalry, chariots, and elephants, herds of cows, the museum of beasts, deer, birds, and snakes, and storage of firewood and fodder constitute the body of expenditure (vyayasaríram).
The royal year, the month, the paksha, the day, the dawn (vyushta), the third and seventh pakshas of (the seasons such as) the rainy season, the winter season, and the summer short of their days, the rest complete, and a separate intercalary month are (the divisions of time).
He shall also pay attention to the work in hand (karaníya), the work accomplished (siddham), part of a work in hand (sésha), receipts, expenditure, and net balance.
The business of upkeeping the government (samsthánam), the routine work (prachárah), the collection of necessaries of life, the collection and audit of all kinds of revenue,—these constitute the work in hand.
That which has been credited to the treasury; that which has been taken by the king; that which has been spent in connection with the capital city not entered (into the register) or continued from year before last, the royal command dictated or orally intimated to be entered (into the register),—all these constitute the work accomplished.
Preparation of plans for profitable works, balance of fines due, demand for arrears of revenue kept in abeyance, and examination of accounts,—these constitute what is called part of a work in hand which may be of little or no value.
Receipts may be (1) current, (2) last balance, and (3) accidental (anyajátah= received from external source).
What is received day after day is termed current (vartamána).
Whatever has been brought forward from year before last, whatever is in the hands of others, and whatever has changed hands is termed last balance (puryushita).
Whatever has been lost and forgotten (by others), fines levied from government servants, marginal revenue (pársva), compensation levied for any damage (párihínikam), presentations to the king, the property of those who have fallen victims to epidemics (damaragatakasvam) leaving no sons, and treasure-troves,---all these constitute accidental receipts.
Investment of capital (vikshépa), the relics of a wrecked undertaking, and the savings from an estimated outlay are the means to check expenditure (vyayapratyayah).
The rise in price of merchandise due to the use of different weights and measures in selling is termed vyáji; the enhancement of price due to bidding among buyers is also another source of profit.
Expenditure is of two kinds—daily expenditure and profitable expenditure.
What is continued every day is daily.
Whatever is earned once in a paksha, a month, or a year is termed profit.
Whatever is spent on these two heads is termed as daily expenditure and profitable expenditure respectively.
That which remains after deducting all the expenditure already incurred and excluding all revenue to be realised is net balance (nívi) which may have been either just realised or brought forward.
Thus a wise collector-general shall conduct the work of revenue-collection, increasing the income and decreasing the expenditure.

[Thus ends Chapter VI, “The Business of Collection of Revenue by the Collector-General” in Book II, “The Duties of Government Superintendents” of the Arthasástra of Kautilya. End of the twenty-seventh chapter from the beginning.]