The great lawgiver of the Hindus is supposed to have lived at some time subsequent to s.c. 1400. The book of Institutes that bears his name, called the Manava Dharmasastra, seems to have been a compilation from the various laws in force through out a part of Northern India and of existing law books or Dharmasastras. Since his time there have been numerous glossaries, digests of text books, and commentaries, forming the authorities for the five schools of Bengal, Mithila, Benares, Mahratta, and Dravira. Menu's Institutes were translated by Sir William Jones.
After the Institutes of Menu come the Codes of Yajnavalkya and Parasara. Raghunandana, who is the author of a complete digest for Bengal, lived in the 16th century. The Vivada Bhangar nava, a code of Hindu law, according to the Bengal school, by Jagan - natha Tarkalankara, written at the end of the 18th century.
The Mithala school has the Vivada Chintamani by Vachaspati Misra, who also wrote the Vya vahara Chintamani.
The Benares school has three law-books, the Vivada Chandra, by Lakhima Devi ; the Vivada Ratnakara, by Chandeswara ; and the Vivada Tandava, by Ratnakara.
Smarta Bhattacharya wrote the Vyavahara Tatwa, a modern work on law, according to the Bengal school of Raghunandana.
The Vyavahara Mayukha is a Mahratta law book, by Nilakantha Bhatta. It was translated by Major Borrodale.
In the Telingana portion of the south of India, the work that is deemed authoritative in the Hindu law of inheritance is the Saraswati a code of laws which raja Pratapa Rudra Deva, a ruler in Orissa, caused to be written in the early years of the 16th century. The title means the recreations of the goddess of learning. It is in Sanskrit, and it purports to embrace the whole range of the religious, moral, and civil laws of the Hindus. It continues to be of some authority to the northward of the Pennar river, but even there it is in a great measure supplanted by the commentary of Vijianeswara, the prevailing authority in Southern India. The Saraswati Vilasa seems to have most in common with the Mitakshara. Yimuta Vahana's Digest, the author ity generally followed in Bengal, does not seem to to be anywhere referred to.
The trial scene in the Mrichchhakati is regarded as a true scene in an ancient Hindu court of justice in Northern India.
In the south of India the Mitakshara is the received authority with the British courts, and Mr. Justice Irmo; is of opinion that the rules of Hindu law are fairly represented in the Mitakshara and other such works.
Learned British lawyers have had their thoughts directed to a possible codification of the Hindu civil law, and with that object Mr. Justice Cun ningham, in 1877, framed a digest to help forward what seemed to him a great desideratum for the country. The difficulty, however, that is en
countered arises from the fact that the Hindu population consists of numerous races, who through thousands of years have each been following their own social customs. Dr. W. W. limiter plainly says that the codes of Menu and Vajna valkya, on which all the later law-books and commentaries profess to depend, only recorded the usages of certain Bralmianical centres in the north, and perhaps did not fairly record even them.
All Muhammadan law is founded on the Koran, and is inseparably bound up with the religion of Islam. But the commentaries upon their religion and law which have been produced by their two great sects, the Sunni and the Shialt, are almost innumerable. The Sunni have four distinct schools of jurisprudence, the Shafai, Maliki, Ilanbali, and each named after its founder, the most important being that founded by Abu Hanna, born A.D. 699. This learned doctor had a true judicial mind, and gave great scope to reason in his inter pretation of the maxims of the Koran. His teachings prevail in India. In the early years of British rule in India their Muhammadan law was administered both in civil and criminal cases. But there has been framed for all India a criminal code, famed for its justice, humanity, and com prehensiveness; and their civil law is still in force, and under an Act passed in 1864 the judges decide cases upon their own knowledge and judgment.
Two great disciples were Abu Hanna and Abu Yusuf. The latter was the friend of Harun-ur Rashid, and is stated to have earned in one night fees of £18,000 to £25,000.
India has the best code of penal law in the world, and many chapters of the civil law have been similarly consolidated, with excellent general results, by Macaulay and the eminent jurists by whom he has been succeeded. The courts of first instance are entirely manned by native judges, who sit without juries, and have unlimited juris diction, without distinction of creed or colour. A native judge has a seat on the bench of every one of the four high Courts constituted in the various provinces, which hear causes criminal and civil with scarcely any appellate control at all.
The British lawyers who have been most distin guished in India are Colebrooke, Ellis, Sir William Jones, Sir Francis Macnaghten, Sir Edward Ryan, Sir Thomas Strange, Sir Lawrence Peel, Sir James Colville, Sir Barnes Peacock. —Rummy's Law of Inheritance; Foulkes, Hindu Law of In heritance; Nelson's Prospectus of Hindu Law ; Maine's Early Law and Custom; Cunningham's Digest of Hindu Law; Dowson.