What the Majestic Ajnapatra of Amatya Ramachandra Pant Teaches us about 18th Century Hindu Polity:

Amatya Ramachandra Pant, Shivaji's Finance Minister authored an extraordinary Ajnapatra or Royal Edict giving guidance to Sambhaji II.

IN COMMON PARLANCE, AN AJNAPATRA means a royal edict issued on a variety of matters including administration, gifts, deeds, ratifications of say, a business charter, etc. In other cases, it was also a document meant for guidance on these matters in the sense that it was not binding.

One such brilliant if not encyclopaedic Ajnapatra was written by the for…