Consider the following statements about the administrative measures of Shivaji: 1. The scheme of Ashta Pradhan (eight ministers) was completed and announced at the time of Shivaji’s coronation with regulations and duties properly defined. 2. Shivaji introduced Marathi in place of Persian and coined Sanskrit technical terms for administrative purposes. Which of the statements given above is/are correct?
- (a)1 only
- (b)2 only
- (c)Both 1 and 2
- (d)Neither 1 nor 2
Correct — C, Both 1 and 2. Statement 1 is the standard account of the Ashta Pradhan. Shivaji had been served by ministers before 1674, but the council was formalised at his coronation at Raigad in June 1674, when the eight offices were fixed, given Sanskrit designations and assigned defined duties: the Peshwa or chief minister, the Amatya in charge of accounts, the Mantri who kept the record of the king's daily doings, the Sachiv who dealt with correspondence, the Sumant for foreign affairs, the Senapati commanding the army, the Panditrao for religious and charitable matters and the Nyayadhish for justice. Statement 2 is equally well attested. Shivaji set out to strip the administration of the Persian vocabulary inherited from the Deccan sultanates, using Marathi as the working language and having a Sanskrit lexicon of administrative terms, the Rajyavyavahara Kosha, compiled under Raghunath Pandit so that officials had Sanskrit words to put in place of the Persian ones. So both statements stand.
- (a)1 only — Accepts the Ashta Pradhan point but rejects the language reform, which is well documented — the Rajyavyavahara Kosha was compiled precisely to supply Sanskrit substitutes for Persian administrative terms.
- (b)2 only — Accepts the language reform but rejects the Ashta Pradhan point. The council was formalised and its duties defined at the coronation of 1674, which is the standard account.
- (d)Neither 1 nor 2 — Rejects both, which would leave the two best-known features of Shivaji's administration unaccounted for.
Shivaji's administration was a personal monarchy served by paid officers rather than a feudal order of hereditary chiefs. The eight ministers held office at the king's pleasure and had no independent power base; land assignments in lieu of salary were discouraged and cash payment preferred; and the forts, which were the backbone of the state, were each placed under three officers of different castes so that no one man controlled a fortress. The coronation of 1674 was the moment this system was given formal and deliberately Sanskritic shape.
The coronation is the hinge, and both statements hang from it. Shivaji was crowned Chhatrapati at Raigad in June 1674 in a ceremony designed to establish an independent Hindu kingship, and the Sanskrit vocabulary — for the ministers' titles and for administration generally — was part of the same assertion. Once you see the two statements as two aspects of one programme rather than as separate claims, the answer follows. The trap is the assumption that Persian, the language of chancery across the Deccan and the Mughal empire, could not have been displaced; Shivaji's court did substitute Marathi and Sanskrit, though Persian usage did not vanish overnight in practice.
- Shivaji was crowned Chhatrapati at Raigad in June 1674, and the Ashta Pradhan was formalised at that time with defined duties.
- The eight ministers were the Peshwa, Amatya, Mantri, Sachiv, Sumant, Senapati, Panditrao and Nyayadhish.
- The Sumant, also called Dabir, handled foreign affairs, and the Peshwa was the chief minister.
- The Rajyavyavahara Kosha, a lexicon of Sanskrit administrative terms compiled under Raghunath Pandit, was made to replace Persian usage.
- Ministers held office at the king's pleasure; the offices did not become hereditary in Shivaji's own time.
Eight offices with Sanskrit titles, fixed at the coronation of 1674 — the same programme as the substitution of Persian vocabulary.
- Assuming the Ashta Pradhan was hereditary; the offices were held at the king's pleasure and became hereditary only later.
- Confusing the Peshwa of Shivaji's council with the Peshwas who effectively ruled the Maratha state in the eighteenth century.
- Believing Persian was abolished outright; it was displaced in official vocabulary by design, not erased from practice at a stroke.
As a two-statement item on Maratha administration, or as a direct question on which minister held a particular portfolio.
The member of Shivaji’s Astha Pradhana who looked after foreign affairs was
- (a) Peshwa
- (b) Sachiv
- (c) Pandit Rao
- (d) Sumant
Answer(d) Sumant
The same council examined portfolio by portfolio. Knowing that the Sumant held foreign affairs, the Sachiv correspondence and the Panditrao religious matters is what turns a general statement about the Ashta Pradhan into something you can defend.
- practice — not a real PYQ
The Rajyavyavahara Kosha, compiled during Shivaji's reign, was
- (a)a revenue settlement register
- (b)a lexicon of Sanskrit administrative terms to replace Persian usage
- (c)a code of military regulations for the forts
- (d)a chronicle of the Maratha wars
Answer(b) a lexicon of Sanskrit administrative terms to replace Persian usage — compiled under Raghunath Pandit.
- practice — not a real PYQ
In Shivaji's Ashta Pradhan, the minister who looked after justice was the
- (a)Nyayadhish
- (b)Panditrao
- (c)Sachiv
- (d)Amatya
Answer(a) Nyayadhish — while the Panditrao dealt with religious and charitable matters.