Describe the main feature of gupta administration 400words
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Answer:
Explanation:
The main features of Mauryan administration were : There were five important political centres in the Mauryan Empire: Patliputra { the capital city } and the provincial centres of Taxila, Ujjayini, Tosali and suvranagiri Communications along the land and riverine routes were developed to administration the Empire.Mauryan administration was highly centralized.
The king was the supreme power and source of all authority.
He was assisted by a Council of Ministers. It was called ‘Mantriparishad’. The ministers were called ‘Mantris.’
Registration of births and deaths, foreigners, industries, trade, manufacture and sale of goods, sales tax collection were under the administration’s control.
The period was also marked by the growing significance of land grants which led to decentralization of political authority of the king and finally gave birth to feudalism in Indian history.
The law of the primogeniture was not firmly established, and sometimes elder sons were passed over in favour of younger sons. The king appointed ministers, commanders, governors etc. He received the obeisance of his vassals and princes. His pompous titles Paramesvara, Maharajadhiraja, Paramabhattaraka indicate the existence of lesser princes and chiefs with whom he had to come to terms in his empire.
The maintenance of the Varnasrama Dharma appear as an important royal duty in Gupta inscription imposed upon the king, who is described as the giver of thousands of gold coins. The second change noticeable in the Gupta kingship is not qualitative but quantitative and relates to its divine associations. They are compared to Vishnu as regards their function of preserving and protecting the people, and Laxmi, wife of Vishnu and goddess of prosperity appears on many Gupta coins.Ministers called by different names such as Mantrin, Amatya or sachiva may have restrained the despotic activities of the king, although inscriptions give very little idea of their functions and no idea of their corporate existence. Undoubtedly some individual ministers such as Harisena were powerful because of having combined posts of the Mahadan- danayaka, Kumaramatya, Sanhivigrahika in the same person. And then the post became hereditary in the same family for several generations. Such families must have played an important part in politics.
Ministers or advisers formed part of the higher bureaucracy of the Guptas. Among the other high officers we may take special notice of the Sandhivigrahika, who are not known to earlier inscription. Like the Mahamatras under Ashoka and the Amatyas under the Satavahanas, the Kuma- ramatyas formed the chief cadre for recruiting high functionaries under the Guptas. Literally translated as the minister of peace and war, the Sandhivigrahika first appears under Samudragupta whose Amatya Harisena holds this title.
We have the famous example of Harisena, who held the several important portfolios. We hear of Kumaramatya who held the offices of the Mahasvapti and Mahadanayka. We have no precise idea about the mode of payment to the officers under the Gupta Empire. The discovery of numerous Gupta’s gold coins and their use in land transaction in Bengal coupled with the prevalence of the tax known as Hiranya would suggest that at least higher officers were paid in cash.
Three grades of military commands came into existence, namely those of Mahabaladhikrta, Mahadanayaka and Senapati. The cavalry, the elephant corps and perhaps also the infantry were organized under separate commands. Civil officials such as Amatyas, Kumaramatyas, etc. performed military functions or were promoted to the rank of high military officers.
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A ministers hailing from Pataliputra accompanied Chandragupta II on his campaign to Western India. Similarly military officers may have performed civil functions.
The taxation system of the Guptas was not so elaborate and organised like that of the Arthasastra of Kautilya. The villagers paid in kind certain customary miscellaneous dues, which could be measured but these are not specified. They also paid hiranya or gold, but what it actually meant cannot be said. The artisans also had to pay some imposts, and traders were subjected to customs on commodities of trade, which were levied and collected by the custom officer.
Guptas evolved the first systematic provincial and local administration. This was primarily concerned with the collection of revenues and maintenance of law and order. The core, of the empire directly controlled by the Guptas was divided -into a number of provinces. A Gupta province was smaller than a Mauryan province, but much larger than a modem division.
The Bhukti was the largest administrative unit under the Guptas and there were at least six such divisions over Bengal, Jharkhand. Bihar, Uttar Pradesh, Chhattisgarh and Madhya Pradesh. It was placed in charge of an Uparika. The exact connotation of this high officer is obscure, probably in origin it had something to do with the collection of Uparikara, an additional impost on the peasants in addition to the fixed annual share of the produce.