In the second volume of Macnaghten's Principles and Precedents of Hindu Law, where he has

collected the opinions of Hindu law officers upon questions propounded to them, I find that as
authorities for the answers given to the questions put to the pandits in Case XVIII (pp. 197, 198,
199) they, on 20th April 1810, referred both to the Dattaka Mimansa and the Dattaka Chandrika.
In the case of Raja Sumsheer Mul v. Rani Dilraj Koonwur Case XIV, p. 189, which was a case
from the Gorakhpur district and was decided on the 3rd January 1815, the Dattaka Mimansa was
relied upon, and it was distinctly stated in the opinion of the Hindu law officers that the adoption
referred to in that case was allowable according to the Dattaka Mimansa, which is current in
Gorakhpur." Similarly the opinion expressed in Case V (p. 180) on 19th March 1815, was stated
to be "conformable to the doctrines of Manu, the Vyavaharatatwa, the Dattaka Mimansa and
other law books." In 1823, 1824, and 1826 both the Dattaka Mimansa and the Dattaka Chandrika
were referred to by the pandits in the cases mentioned in pages 175-179 and 183. Turning, again,
to Strange's Hindu Law, I find under "Responsa Prudentum,' a case decided by the Provincial
Court of Masulipatam on 27th July 1809 (Vol. II, p. 103) in which the pandit in his answer
referred to the Dattaka Mimansa and the authority of Sakala quoted in it. Mr. Ellis in a paper
communicated on 16th August 1812, referred "to a correct copy of Nanda Pandita's Dattaka
Mimansa procured at Madras." (Strange's Hindu Law, Vol. II, p. 169). In the case of Raja
Haimunchull Singh v. Roomer Gunseeam Singh 2 Knapp 203, which was a, case from the
Etawah district, instituted in 1810 and decided in 1813 by the Provincial Court, and in 1817 by
the Sadar Dewani Adalat of Bengal, within whose jurisdiction the district of Etawah then was,
the pandits referred to the Dattaka Mimansa "as in force in the zila Etawah." The pandits of the
Provincial Court of Bareilly no doubt referred to the Mitakshara and the Vyavahar Mayukha, a
work of authority in Bombay; hut it must be borne in mind that the Mayukha also deals with the
question of adoption, and being, like the Mitakshara, a commentary on Jajnavalkya, it could with
propriety be referred to at the same time with the Mitakshara. It is thus clear that even before
Sutherland had commenced to translate the Dattaka Chandrika and the Dattaka Mimansa, those
works were well known among Hindu pandits as authorities on questions of adoption not only in
Northern India, but also in the Presidency of Madras. It is true that no reference is made to them
in Colehrooke's Digest of Hindu Law compiled in 1796, but it must be remembered that in the
Digest very little prominence was given to the question of adoption. It may be that Jagannath
Tarkapanchanan, the author of the Vivadabhangarnava, which is the original of Colebrooke's
Digest, was not aware of the Dattaka Chandrika and the Dattaka Mimansa or did not consider
them to he works of authority, but the Privy Council in Rungama v. Atchama 4 Moo. I.A. 1,
followed those treatises in preference to Jagannath's work. Besides, whatever may be the
authority of Jagannath Tarkapanchanan in the Bengal school he is not regarded as an authority in
the Benares school, and his own translator, Mr. Colebrooke, said of him that "we have not here
the same veneration for him, when he speaks in his own name" (Strange's Hindu Law, Vol. II, p.
176.) Mr. Colebrooke, himself, as I have said above, considered the Dattaka Mimansa to be a
work of authority. In a letter which he wrote to Sir John Royds on 14th March 1312, he said with
reference to that treatise, that it was "no doubt the best treatise on Hindu adoption" (Strange's
Hindu Law, Vol. II, p. 133). I need hardly add that Mr. Sutherland considered the Dattaka
Mimansa and the Dattaka Chandrika to be works of great authority. In the Preface to his
translation he said "the Dattaka Mimansa is the most celebrated work extant on the Hindu law of
adoption. Its author, Nanda Pandita, has attained considerable literary pre-eminence." "The
Dattaka Chandrika...is a work of authority, and supposed to have been the groundwork of Nanda
Pandita's disquisition" (Stokes' Hindu Law Books, p. 527). The reason why, among all others,
he selected the two works for translation was that, " justly or unjustly," they were held in
estimation, and that such was the fact I have shown from the references made to them by pandits
so far back as 1809 and 1810.

56. In approaching a consideration of any disputed question of Hindu law it is well to bear in
mind what Sir William Macnaghten truly said in his Preliminary Remarks (pages VI, VII and
VIII of the 3rd Edition) to his Principles and I Precedents of Hindu Law; "I apprehend that the
Hindu Law, in its pure and original state, does not furnish many instances of uncertainty or
confusion. The speculations of commentators have done much to unsettle it, and the venality of
Pandits has done more. * * * * * * Authorities are frequently cited in support of a particular
doctrine, which are indeed genuine passages of law, but applicable to a question wholly different
from the subject-matter. Again, authorities may be cited, which are both genuine and applicable
to the identical subject treated of, but which are of no weight in the particular province whose
doctrine should have been adopted. Further facility for evasion is gained by the confusion
between natural and civil obligations. This is the case in the Hindu Law, especially as it obtains
in the province of Bengal. It by no means follows that, because an act has been prohibited it
should therefore be considered as illegal. The distinction between the vinculum juris and the
vinculum pudoris is not always discernible."

85. The two most celebrated translators from Sanskrit into English of works on Hindu law and
the two most celebrated writers on subjects of the Hindu law in the early years of this century
were Mr. Colebrooke and his nephew Mr. Sutherland. Mr. Colebrooke was Judge of Mirzapur in
1796 and was in 1801 a Judge of the Sudder Court at Calcutta. In 1796 Mr. Colebrooke
published his translation of the Digest of Hindu Law, which is generally known as Colebrooke's
Digest. In 1810 Mr. Colebrooke published his translation of the Mitakshara. In Mirzapur Mr.
Colebrooke was in the midst of Hindus who are subject to the School of Benares. Mr.
Sutherland was in 1815 a Judge at Bhagalpur in Bengal. Bengal Proper, according to Sir William
Hunter's Imperial Gazetteer of India (see title "Bengal") is the country which stretches south-east
from Bhagalpur to the sea. As the term "Bengal" was used by Mr. Colebrooke, it did not include
Mithila (Behar) or the Province of Benares. Mr. Sutherland bad prior to 1815 held various
subordinate offices connected with the Courts. In 1819 Mr. Sutherland wrote his preface to his
translations of the Dattaka Mimansa of Nanda Pandita and of the Dattaka Chandrika. He was
then stationed at Monghyr, which is in Bengal. For some years prior to 1812 Mr. Colebrooke and
Mr. Sutherland had been corresponding with Sir Thomas Strange on questions of Hindu law,
and had been supplying him with references to cases on Hindu law in different Courts, with
opinions of Pandits on questions of Hindu law and with their own remarks upon such opinions
(see Sir Thomas Strange's Preface to his Hindu Law and the cases, opinions and correspondence
printed in the second volume of that work, edition of 1830). One of the greatest authorities in the
school of the Daya Bhaga, which is the prevailing school of Hindu law in Bengal Proper, was
Jagannatha Tercapanchanana. At some time between 1770 and 1796 he compiled, under the
superintendence of Sir William Jones, the Digest of Hindu Law, the translation of which Mr.
Colebrooke published in the latter year. According to Mr. Sutherland's Preface of 1819 to his
Translations of the Dattaka Mimansa of Nanda Pandita and of the Dattaka Chandrika, the
Dattaka Chandrika was supposed to have been the groundwork of Nanda Pandita's Dattaka
Mimansa. If the Dattaka Chandrika or the Dattaka Mimansa of Nanda Pandita or their
prohibition of the adoption of a sister's son, of a daughter's son, and of the son of a mother's
sister were accepted as of authority in Bengal Proper or in the Province of Benares, it is
impossible that the fact should have been unknown to Jagannatha Tercapanchanana and to Sir
William Jones when Colebrooke's Digest was being compiled; it is also impossible that the fact
should have been unknown to Mr. Colebrooke when he was translating that Digest in and prior
to 1796 and when in 1810 he published his translation of the Mitakshara : and it is also
impossible that the fact should have been unknown to Mr. Sutherland when in 1819 he wrote his
Preface to his translations of the Dattaka Mimansa of Nanda Pandita and of the Dattaka
Chandrika. I hope to show that the Dattaka Mimansa of Nanda Pandita, the Dattaka Chandrika,
and this alleged prohibition of the adoption of a sister's son, of a daughter's son, and of the son of
a mother's sister were not recognised as authoritative by Sir William Jones and Jagannatha
Tercapanchanana when Colebrooke's Digest was being compiled; were not recognised, as being
authoritative by Mr. Colebrooke when he was translating that Digest; that Mr. Colebrooke in his
notes to his translation of the Mitakshara in 1810 does not refer to any such prohibition, and does
not suggest that either the Dattaka Mimansa of Nanda Pandita or the Dattaka Chandrika had ever
been accepted as of authority in the School of Benares; and that in his Account of the Hindu
Schools of Law, which is printed at pages 315 to 319 of the first volume of Sir Thomas Strange's
Hindu Law, Edition of 1830, Mr. Colebrooke not only does not suggest that the Dattaka
Mimansa of Nanda Pandita and the Dattaka Chandrika were or that either of them was a work of
authority in the School of Benares, but he in fact assigned them, as works of more or less
authority, to another and a different school of Hindu law. I shall also show that so little was
known in 1819 as to the schools of Hindu law, or the districts, in which the rules Of the Dattaka
Mimansa of Nanda Pandita and the Dattaka Chandrika were accepted and followed, that Mr.
Sutherland in 1819, with the reserve of a judicial mind, stated, in the preface to his translations of
the Dattaka Mimansa of Nanda Pandita and of the Dattaka Chandrika: "But compiled, as this
work has been, under circumstances affording little facility for inquiry or collecting information,
he (Mr. Sutherland) has not, from an apprehension of misleading, attempted to debar or restrict
the operation of any particular rule to the limits of any particular tract of country: in fact, such
precision is scarcely to be attained"--(Stokes' Hindu Law-Books, page 528). I do not know when
Sir William Macnaghten wrote his Preliminary Bemarks to his Principles and Precedents of
Hindu Law; but that work was first published in 1829. I hope to show that nothing had
happened between 1796 and 1829, except the publication of Mr. Sutherland's translation of the
Dattaka Mimansa of Nanda Pandita in 1821, to justify, or even to suggest that there was any
foundation for, Sir William Macnaghten's statement in his Preliminary Remarks that on
questions of adoption the Dattaka Mimansa of Nanda Pandita "is held to be the infallible guide in
the provinces of Mithila and Benares." I hope further to show that at no time, the present
included, would that statement have been correct in fact, or anything but erroneous and
misleading.

91. It appears to me that a valuable means of testing the authority allowed to the Dattaka
Mimansa of Nanda Pandita before it had been translated in 1819 by Mr. Sutherland and of
testing the accuracy of Mr. Sutherland's views and of those who followed his lead as to the
importance in the Hindu community of that commentary may be afforded by ascertaining how
far its precepts were recognised and followed by Courts in the Provinces of the Presidency of
Fort William in Bengal before it was translated in 1819 and after it had been in existence for
nearly two centuries. The materials for such a test are few, but some exist. It has never been
suggested that Sudras were at any time prohibited from adopting a sister's son or a daughter's;
son. On the contrary, it has by some writers been maintained, I think erroneously, that amongst
Sudras the first object of adoption was the sister's or the daughter's son in preference to all
others. Similarly it was maintained, but erroneously, by some writers, including Nanda Pandita,
that amongst Brahmans when