Which of the following statements reflect the distinctive features about 6th century BCE Ganas or Sanghas ? 1. The ancient Indian Ganas were oligarchies. 2. The ancient Indian Ganas were non-monarchical states. 3. Magadha, Kosala, Vatsa and Avanti were the most powerful States of that era. 4. The procedures of the Buddhist monastic order (Sangha) were patterned on the Sangha politics. Select the correct answer using the codes given below :
- (a)1, 2 and 3 only
- (b)1, 2, 3 and 4
- (c)1, 2 and 4 only
- (d)3 and 4 only
Answer
Why
Correct — B, (b) 1, 2, 3 and 4.
All four statements are correct, so the option that names 1, 2, 3 and 4 is the answer. Each has to be judged separately, and each is worth knowing on its own.
Statement 1 is correct. The standard account of the sixteen mahajanapadas records that while most of them were ruled by kings, some — known as ganas or sanghas — were oligarchies, in which power was shared by a number of men who were collectively called rajas. Oligarchy is precisely a form of government in which power is exercised by a group rather than by one person, so the description fits.
Statement 2 is correct, and it is the other side of the same coin. The gana or sangha is defined in contrast to the monarchical mahajanapada: there was no single king at the head of it. To call these states non-monarchical is simply to say what distinguished them from the rest.
Statement 3 is correct. Among the mahajanapadas of the sixth to fourth centuries before the common era, four kingdoms stand out as the great powers of the age — Magadha, Kosala, Vatsa and Avanti — and Avanti is described in the standard reference as one of the four great monarchies of India in the period after Mahavira and the Buddha, the other three being Kosala, Vatsa and Magadha. Magadha eventually absorbed the rest.
Statement 4 is correct as well, and it is the most interesting of the four. The internal working of the Buddhist monastic order was based on the traditions of the ganas and sanghas: matters were settled by discussion until a consensus emerged, and where consensus failed, by a vote. That the monastic order took its procedure from the political assemblies of the gana states, and even its name, is a point the textbooks make expressly.
With no false statement in the list, the only option that can be right is the one that includes all four.
Why the others are wrong
- (a)1, 2 and 3 only — ‘1, 2 and 3 only’ drops statement 4, which is correct. The Buddhist order did borrow its procedure from the gana states: business was transacted in an assembly, agreement was reached by discussion, and where discussion failed a vote was taken. The connection is not a modern inference but something the sources themselves show, and it is reinforced by the fact that both the Buddha and Mahavira came from such states. The option is attractive to a candidate who is confident about the political material — oligarchies, non-monarchical states, the great kingdoms — and has never had occasion to connect it with the history of the monastic orders. It is a reminder that a four-statement list often spans two chapters of a syllabus deliberately, so that only a candidate who has read both can complete it.
- (c)1, 2 and 4 only — ‘1, 2 and 4 only’ drops statement 3, which is also correct. Magadha, Kosala, Vatsa and Avanti were indeed the great powers among the mahajanapadas of the period, and their rivalry is the framework of the political history of the age; Avanti in the standard account is one of the four great monarchies of the time, with Kosala, Vatsa and Magadha the others. A candidate may hesitate here for a defensible reason — the question is about the ganas, and statement 3 is about the monarchies, so it can look like a stray line included to be rejected. It is not. The stem asks which statements reflect the distinctive features of the ganas, and setting them against the great kingdoms of the same era is part of describing what made them distinctive.
- (d)3 and 4 only — ‘3 and 4 only’ drops the two statements that describe the ganas directly, both of which are correct: they were oligarchies, and they were non-monarchical. The option would suit a candidate who has taken the word ‘gana’ to mean something other than a form of state — a tribe, a clan, a confederacy of villages — and who therefore resists the political vocabulary of statements 1 and 2. The sources are clear enough on the point. Some mahajanapadas were governed not by a king but by a body of men called rajas who shared power between them, and that arrangement is what the words gana and sangha name in this context. The two statements are not merely compatible with each other; the second follows from the first.
Concept
By the sixth century before the common era northern India was organised into sixteen mahajanapadas, the great territorial states out of which the political history of early India begins. Most were monarchies. A minority were ganas or sanghas — the two words are used interchangeably for them — in which power was not vested in a single king but shared among a body of men who were together called rajas.
These were not democracies in the modern sense. The rajas were the heads of leading families, and the ordinary cultivators, labourers and slaves had no part in the assembly, which is why the accurate description is oligarchy: rule by a group. In some cases, the Vajji sangha among them, the rajas appear to have controlled land and other resources collectively.
Two facts give them an importance out of proportion to their size. First, both Mahavira and the Buddha came from such states, so the intellectual ferment of the age had its roots in them. Second, the Buddhist monastic order adopted their procedure: decision by discussion, and where discussion failed, by vote — the sangha of monks taking both its method and its name from the sangha of rajas.
Against them stood the great monarchies. Magadha, Kosala, Vatsa and Avanti were the dominant powers of the age, and the long contest between them ended in the supremacy of Magadha, whose advantages in agriculture, iron, elephants and river communications are a standing examination topic in themselves.
This is a four-statement item of the kind that dominates the paper, and it belongs to the harder variety: every statement in the list is true. That shape is worth recognising, because a candidate who assumes that a list of four must contain at least one false line will manufacture a doubt and choose a three-statement option.
The list is also drawn from two different parts of the syllabus. Statements 1, 2 and 3 come from the political geography of the mahajanapadas; statement 4 comes from the history of Buddhism and the organisation of its monastic order. Examiners construct lists this way on purpose, and the practical consequence is that a candidate must judge each line on the material it belongs to rather than deciding the item from a single recollection.
The printing is worth a note. ‘6th century BCE’ is set with a superscript ‘th’ in the booklet, and the paper uses the era abbreviation BCE rather than BC. Statement 3 capitalises ‘States’ in the middle of the sentence. Each of the four statements ends with a full stop and sits on its own indented line, above a codes line inviting the candidate to select the correct answer — the standard layout for the thirty or so statement questions on this paper.
Key facts
- Most mahajanapadas were ruled by kings, but some — known as ganas or sanghas — were oligarchies in which power was shared by a number of men collectively called rajas.
- Oligarchy means a form of government in which power is exercised by a group of men, which is exactly what distinguishes the gana from the monarchical state.
- Both Mahavira and the Buddha belonged to such ganas.
- In the Vajji sangha the rajas probably controlled resources such as land collectively.
- Magadha, Kosala, Vatsa and Avanti were the four great powers among the states of the age, and Magadha eventually prevailed over the rest.
- The internal functioning of the Buddhist monastic order was based on the traditions of the ganas and sanghas: consensus reached through discussion, and a vote where consensus failed.
Study next
Common traps
- Assuming a list of four statements must contain a false one, and rejecting whichever line is least familiar.
- Treating statement 3 as irrelevant because it names monarchies in an item about ganas; the contrast is part of the description.
- Taking ‘gana’ to mean a tribe or a clan rather than a form of state, which makes the two political statements look wrong.
- Missing the link between the monastic order and the gana assemblies, which spans two chapters of the usual syllabus.
Ancient-history items on this paper are set as statement lists rather than as single-fact questions, and they are pitched at the level of the school textbook, which means the deciding sentences are the ones a textbook prints in italics or a marginal note — here the definition of oligarchy and the sentence about the monastic order’s procedure. Expect the list to mix political and religious history, and expect at least one option that omits a single true statement, since that is the option a partly prepared candidate will find attractive. The mahajanapadas, the rise of Magadha and the organisation of the early Buddhist order recur across recruitment papers, and the same handful of facts answers most of what is asked.
Related PYQs
EPFO_APFC_2016_Q13Which of the following statements are correct in respect of 'Stridhana' ? 1. Various types of movable property gifted to a woman on various occasions during her lifetime. 2. Various types of movable property gifted to a woman at the time of her first marriage. 3. On the woman's death, this wealth could be inherited by her children and husband. 4. On the woman's death, this wealth could be inherited by her natural legally adopted children, with none of the sons-in-law, having any claim on any part thereof. Select the correct answer using the codes given below :
- (a) 2 and 3 only
- (b) 2 and 4 only
- (c) 1 and 4 only
- (d) 1 and 3 only
Answer(c) 1 and 4 only
The paper’s other ancient-history statement list, where the work is again to adjudicate each numbered line separately rather than to recognise the topic.
EPFO_APFC_2016_Q16Ayodhya is located at the bank of which river ?
- (a) Falgu
- (b) Ganga
- (c) Sarayu
- (d) Yamuna
Answer(c) Sarayu
A short item on Ayodhya, the capital of Kosala in the epic tradition and one of the four great powers named in statement 3 here.
Practice
- practice — not a real PYQ
In the context of early India, the term ‘gana’ or ‘sangha’ refers to
- (a)a monarchical state ruled by a hereditary king
- (b)a state in which power was shared by a number of men collectively called rajas
- (c)a guild of merchants and artisans
- (d)an assembly of village elders under a royal officer
Answer(b) a state in which power was shared by a number of men collectively called rajas — this is the arrangement that distinguished the ganas from the monarchical mahajanapadas. Option (a) describes the ordinary mahajanapada, option (c) describes the shreni, and option (d) describes a village institution rather than a form of state.
- practice — not a real PYQ
The internal functioning of the early Buddhist monastic order was modelled on
- (a)the court procedure of the Magadhan kings
- (b)the traditions of the ganas and sanghas, with decisions by consensus and, failing that, by vote
- (c)the rules of the Vedic sacrificial assemblies
- (d)the guild regulations of the merchant shrenis
Answer(b) the traditions of the ganas and sanghas, with decisions by consensus and, failing that, by vote — the order took both its procedure and its name from the gana states. The other options name institutions of the period that had no such influence on the monastic constitution.