Who is a Maharaja?

Gurvinder Singh
56 minutes ago
3 min read

Maharaja Ranjit Singh ji - Sher-e-Panjab

In Indic civilisation, the Raja (ruler) is the prime servant of the people. His duty has always been to protect, serve and guide his people and to dispense justice. In return, the people paid a reasonable tax or tribute to the Raja.

The Raja was considered akin to God and one's father, and also called 'Anadatta'.

Not all Rajas are created equal.

The etymology of the word. Raja or Samant is generic. The term changes as per the size of his administration.

Samant is a title given to a ruler/administrator.
Sarpanch is the ruler who administers a single village
Naik is the ruler who administers 10 villages
Raja is the ruler who administers 1,000 villages
A Maharaja is the ruler who administers 10,000 villages
Samrat is the ruler who administers 100,000 villages
Chakravarti Samrat is the ruler who administers 700,000 villages

In all cases, the land, water and other natural resources belonged to the people. The Raja is only a steward who administers on behalf of the people and with their consent. It is a democracy, but without a formal voting system. The people, by their obedience, grant the Raja the right to rule over them.

The Raja or ruler was not some overlord or a boss, as has always been the case in the culturally masculine societies that exist in Europe and the Middle East.

What is this I say about feminine and masculine societies?

There are two major cultural systems in the world. The first originates from the Indic civilisation, which is feminine in nature. The other is the Judeo-Christian-Islamic belief system, which is masculine in nature. Masculine societies inevitably move towards creating empires or collapse trying.

Civilisations remain anchored in irrefutable truths where the core value system remains mostly unchanged for millennia. These values permeate every member of their society. Hence, civilisations are bottom-up phenomena, whilst empires are top-down systems.

The grassroots in a civilisation are strong because of the active involvement of the general population and the protection of their liberty and rights. Civilisations seemingly last forever, whilst empires rise quickly and fall even quicker.

Millennia-old Indian civilisation is a good example of the stable and respectable relationship between a wise ruler and the people.

Unfortunately, after a thousand years of military and cultural invasions by foreign empires, India's civilisational character has been savaged. We Indians are now thoroughly confused. Culturally, at home, we are Indic, but at work and play, we are increasingly European/American. We want to emulate Western ideas of empire, but find it difficult to give up our civilisational heritage.

Empires by nature are aggressive and dominating. Being top-down systems, they tend to be authoritarian and intolerant of others. In an empire, the Ruler is the owner of everything and everyone in his territory, who grants lands and resources to his minions as rewards.

Modern government structures are based on a European model of democracy. It claims, as beautifully espoused by American President Abraham Lincoln, that it is 'Government of the people, by the people, for the people'.

This system has replaced the Maharaja and his administration with a complex system of elections, ineffective bureaucrats and institutions that are disconnected from the people and their needs. They only serve an oligarchy.

Modern Europe and America have only been paying lip service to democracy, liberty and human rights, whilst acting as empires. Hyper-masculine European empires at first demolished the other masculine empire, the Islamic Ottoman Empire. Now the European Empire itself has been on an irreversible declining trajectory. First, there was a collapse of Colonialism; now, Globalism is collapsing.

Unipolarity, a defining feature of an Empire, is giving way to Multipolarity. This is a step closer to a collapse of old empires and hopefully a revival of civilisations

The Indic civilisation is the last of the 47 great civilisations surviving to date. It is time for Indians to make a choice: remain a civilisation or try to become an empire.

It is useful to remember that civilisations always collapse when they seek to become dynasties and empires.

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