Manusmriti with the Commentary of Medhatithi
by Ganganatha Jha | 1920 | 1,381,940 words | ISBN-10: 8120811550 | ISBN-13: 9788120811553
This is the English translation of the Manusmriti, which is a collection of Sanskrit verses dealing with ‘Dharma’, a collective name for human purpose, their duties and the law. Various topics will be dealt with, but this volume of the series includes 12 discourses (adhyaya). The commentary on this text by Medhatithi elaborately explains various t...
Verse 8.186
Sanskrit text, Unicode transliteration and English translation by Ganganath Jha:
स्वयमेव तु यौ दद्यान् मृतस्य प्रत्यनन्तरे ।
न स राज्ञाऽभियोक्तव्यो न निक्षेप्तुश्च बन्धुभिः ॥ १८६ ॥svayameva tu yau dadyān mṛtasya pratyanantare |
na sa rājñā'bhiyoktavyo na nikṣeptuśca bandhubhiḥ || 186 ||If the man restores it himself to the next-of-kin of the deceased depositor,—he should not be harassed by the king, or by the depositor’s relatives.—(186)
Medhātithi’s commentary (manubhāṣya):
It has been just declared that while the depositor is still alive, the deposit shall not be handed over to his ‘next-of-kin.’ But when he is dead, if the depositary should himself restore the property to his heir, who does not know that it belongs to him, then he shall not be made to undergo the trouble of a law-suit and all that follows in its wake.
If there be a suspicion that there may he something more with the man,—on the ground that the deceased was a wealthy man and he did not keep his property with any other person,—then other kinds of evidence shall be considered, but the man shall not be harassed with oaths or ordeals with poison, etc.; though there would he nothing wrong in the employment of such test as the ‘ghaṭakośa,’ the ‘satyataṇḍula’ and so forth (which are not so humiliating).
The condition of ‘the absence of witnesses’ (mentioned in 182-183) should be taken as applicable here also.—(186)
Explanatory notes by Ganganath Jha
This verse is quoted in Vivādaratnākara (p. 87), whieh adds the following explanation:—On the death of the depositor, if the depository deliver the deposit to the depositor’s heir, he should not be blamed either by the king or by the dead man’s relatives. The term ‘svayameva’ implies that during the depositor’s life-time, he should not deliver it to the heir, even though asked to do so by the latter;—and that on his death he should give it to the heir even without being asked to do so;—and in Vivādacintāmaṇi (p. 37).
Comparative notes by various authors
Nārada (11.10).—‘The depositor being dead, if the depositary restores the deposit to his next of kin of his own accord, he must not be harassed, either by the King or by the relations of the depositor.’