Vyavahāramālā Explained

Vyavahāramālā is a treatise in Sanskrit on jurisprudence and legal practices composed by some scholar from Kerala sometime during the 16th-17th centuries CE. This was the standard reference for legal practices in the kingly courts of the erstwhile kingdoms of Travancore and Cochin till the adoption of modern legal practices under the supervision and guidance of John Munro (1778 – 1858) who had served as Resident and Diwan of the States of Travancore and Cochin between 1810 and 1819. However, Munro's reforms did not make Vyavahāramālā completely obsolete. Munro used it to develop an Anglo-Indian code of law for the Travancore kingdom called Caṭṭavariyōla and established a hierarchy of courts and the rules for presenting cases in those courts.[1]

Vyavahāramālā is a digest of rules on legal procedure extracted from the well-known ancient Smṛti called Parāśarasmṛiti. Based on theselection and organization of the verses collected in the Vyavahāramālā one could see that is a it is a collection of verses on law and legalprocedure based on the Vyavahāranirṇaya of Varadaraja.[1] It is a work consisting of 1234 verses and the main part is divided into 19 chapters called prakaraṇa-s. Before starting the prakaraṇa-s, the author has dealt with some general requirements of legal procedures like qualities of the judge, the layout of the court, etc. The first eleven prakaraṇa-s deal with civil laws, the next five prakaraṇa-s deal with criminal laws, the seventeenth prakaraṇa discusses laws relating to partition of property, the eighteenth one deals with some further aspects of criminal laws and the final prakaraṇa is devoted miscellaneous topics not touched upon in the previous chapters.[2]

Authorship

Ulloor S. Paramesvara Aiyer in his multi-volume "Kerala Sahithya Charithram" ("History of Literature in Kerala") claimed that Mazhamaṅgalaṃ Nārāyaṇan Naṃpūtiri (c. 1540–1610) who hailed from Kerala, India was the author of Vyavahāramāla.[3] But curiously, in a Malyalam translation of Vyavahāramāla authored by Ulloor S. Paramesvara Aiyer himself, there is no mention of the authorship of Vyavahāramāla.[4] It appears that the authorship of Vyavahāramāla has not been determined definitively.[5]

Contents

The following list of topics discussed in Vyavahāramāla indicates the nature of the contents in the work.[6]

Full texts

Notes and References

  1. Davis, D. R. . Recovering the Indigenous Legal Traditions of India: Classical Hindu Law in Practice in Late Medieval Kerala . Journal of Indian Philosophy . 1999 . 27 . 3 . 159–213 . 10.1023/a:1026483519342.
  2. Book: Asoka kumar V . Vyavaharamala: Translation and study . 2002 . Kerala University . 25 July 2024.
  3. Book: Ulloor S. Paramesvara Aiyer . Kerala Sahithya Charithram Part II . September 1954 . Department of Publications, University of Travancore . Thiruvananthapuram, Kerala, India . 15 July 2024. (pages 293–301)
  4. Book: S. Paramesvara Aiyar . Vyavaharamala (edited with an introduction and an appendix) . 1925 . Govt of Travancore . Thiruvananthapuram . 24 July 2024.
  5. Book: Rajee P V . Vyavaharamala: A text on Indian jurisprudence . 2008 . Sree Sankaracharya University of Sanskri . 24 July 2024. (A PhD thesis on Vyavahaaramālā submitted to Sree Sankaracharya University of Sanskri in 2008)
  6. Book: Rajee P V . Vyavaharamala: A text on Indian jurisprudence . 2008 . Sree Sankaracharya University of Sanskri . 24 July 2024. (Chapter IV of a PhD thesis on Vyavahaaramālā submitted to Sree Sankaracharya University of Sanskri in 2008)

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