Verse 8.373

Sanskrit text, Unicode transliteration and English translation by Ganganath Jha:

संवत्सराभिशस्तस्य दुष्टस्य द्विगुणो दमः ।
व्रात्यया सह संवासे चाण्डाल्या तावदेव तु ॥ ३७३ ॥

saṃvatsarābhiśastasya duṣṭasya dviguṇo damaḥ |
vrātyayā saha saṃvāse cāṇḍālyā tāvadeva tu || 373 ||

If the convicted man is accused again within a year, he shall be punished with a double fine. the same also in the case of intercourse with a ‘vrātyā’ or a ‘chāṇḍālī.’—(373)

 

Medhātithi’s commentary (manubhāṣya):

‘Convicted’—charged of the crime; when a man has committed adultery with a woman and has been punished, he is said to be ‘convicted.’

If such a man, within a year, commits adultery with the same woman, then the man being thus convicted and accused again, the fine shall be double.

Another reading is ‘saṃvatsarābhiśastasya’ in the compounded form. In this case also the passage may be construed somehow.

‘“The same also in the case of intercourse with a “vrātyā,”’—that is, when accused again.

Such cannot be the meaning of the verse, we say. In the case of the intercourse in question, there are hound to be various grades of punishment, in the shape of the ‘lowest,’ the ‘middle’ and the ‘highest’ amercement. So that it is not clear the ‘double’ of which one is meant.

What therefore is meant by ‘the same’ is that the line in the case of intercourse with the ‘vrātyā’ is to be ‘the same’ as that in that of the ‘caṇḍālī’; and for the latter case, the tine of ‘one thousand’ has been prescribed under 385, below.

‘Vrātyā.’—‘Vrāta’ means host, crowd; so that the ‘vrātyā’ would be one who has intercourse with a large number of men; the term being explained etymologically as ‘vrātena charati’; or it may be explained as ‘vrātam arhati,’ the ya in the middle coming in in accordance with Pāṇini, 5.1.66. Who would be the woman that would be ‘vrātyā’ in this latter sense? The unchaste woman who has intercourse with several men; for it is only she that can be said to be fit for a host,’ (‘vrātam arhati’).

Or, the term ‘vrātyā’ may stand for the village slave-girl, who has several masters.

Some people explain ‘vrātyā’ as meaning unmarried.

But according to this view the term would not be held to be used in its primary sense. For the writers on Smṛti have used the term in the sense of ‘those who have fallen off from the Sāvitrī’; and this cannot he applicable to women.

“But for the woman marriage has been declared to be the substitute for upanayana (initiation into Sāvitrī). So that she who has not been married, would be a ‘vrātyā.’”

But in that case the term would be used in the figurative, not the primary, sense. Even though the term ‘upanayana’ has been used in the sense of marriage, which is not-upanayana, yet when it is declared that ‘the man who is devoid of the upanayana is called a vrātya,’ it is never understood to mean that the man devoid of marriage is meant. Just as when it is said that ‘this place is without a lion,’ it is never understood to mean that ‘the place is without the boy,’—eveu though the term ‘lion’ may have been figuratively used for the ‘boy.’

“In the latter case there is possibility of the primary moaning of the term ‘lion’ being applicable, but in the case in question, there is no such for the term ‘upanayana.’”

Figurative use does not depend entirely upon the impossibility of the primary meaning; it stands in need of other attendant circumstances also.

Then again, there is no doubt that the term ‘upana yana’ in the sense of marriage can be only figurative; but what reason can there be for regarding the term ‘vrātyā’ also (in the present text) as figurative? Even though it be figurative, it will he difficult to explain this as being based upon the fact of there being no marriage.

Further, it may be supposed that the woman born of a vrātya,’ is also a vrātyā on the analogy of the bird born of a crow being a crow, and that born of the kite being a kite. And the term ‘vrātyā’ would he applicable to the child by its relationship to the ‘vrātyā’ (the nominal affix denoting this relationship).

“But the wife of the vrātya man cannot be called a ‘vrātyā,’ even though she bear a relationship to him.”

But in the case cited the difficulty would be due to the case coming under Pāṇini’s Sūtra 4.1.18 (by which the feminine form would be ‘vrātyī’). The case of ‘the child born of the Vrātyā woman’ however does not come under this Sūtra.

Thus then, if the term ‘vrātyā’ is to be taken in a figurative sense, it is to be understood to stand for ‘the woman born of a vrātyā woman.’ If on the other hand, the term is used in its primary sense, then it must mean ‘she who is fit for a vrāta or crowd,’—The ‘unmarried woman’ on the other hand does not come in either as the primary or the figurative meaning. Further, there is no time fixed for the marriage of women, by transgressing which they would become vrātyā (in the sense in which the man transgressing the time-limit for Upanayana becomes known as vrātya). As for the rule that girls should be married before puberty,—its transgression also is permitted by the sanctioning of the custom of ‘Svayaṃvara,’ ‘self-choice,’ which can be done only when a woman is of a sufficiently advanced age, and hence has attained puberty. And further, if no girl were to be married after puberty, several girls would have to remain in their father’s house till death.—(373).

 

Explanatory notes by Ganganath Jha

‘Vrātyā’—‘(a) A public woman, or (b) a woman who belongs, as slave, to several men, or (c) ‘unmarried’ (the last being rejected) (Medhātithi who is misrepresented by Buhler);—‘the wife of a person, who, though of a twice-born caste, has not had his sacraments’ (Govindarāja 'and Kullūka).

This verse is quoted in Vivādaratnākara (p. 394), which adds the following explanatory notes:—If a man is found to persist in the intercourse for one year, after having been convicted of it,—he should suffer double the penalty prescribed for the first offence of its kind; and the penalty should be enhanced in proportion to the period of duration of the connection. ‘Vrātyā’ is the woman fallen from virtue, who has abandoned all meritorious acts; but Halāyudha explains ‘vrātyā’ as a maiden that has passed her marriageable age.

 

Comparative notes by various authors

Mahābhārata (12.165.66).—‘On having intercourse with a Cāṇḍāla woman, a man of the three higher castes shall he branded with the sign of a headless body and banished; but the Śūdra shall be only branded. A Cāṇḍāla approaching an Ārya woman shall be put to death.’