Page:History of India Vol 2.djvu/152

 122 CHANDRAGUPTA AND BINDUSARA The allusion to the measurement of lands as part of the duty of the Irrigation Department seems to indicate that a water-rate was levied, and the reference to sluices implies a regular system of canals. The inscription of the Satrap Rudradaman, engraved about the year 150 A. D. on the famous rock at Girnar in Kathiawar, on which Asoka, four centuries earlier, had recorded a version of his immortal edicts, bears di- rect testimony to the care bestowed by the central gov- ernment upon the question of irrigation, even in the most remote provinces. Although Girnar is situated close to the Arabian Sea, at a distance of at least a thou- sand miles from the Maurya capital, the needs of the local farmers did not escape the imperial notice. Chan- dragupta's brother-in-law Pushyagupta, who was vice- roy of the western provinces, saw that by damming up a small stream a reservoir of great value for irrigation could be provided. He accordingly formed a lake called Sudarsana, " the Beautiful," between the citadel on the east side of the hill and the " inscription rock " farther to the east, but failed to complete the necessary supple- mental channels. These were constructed in the reign of Chandragupta's grandson Asoka, under the superin- tendence of his representative Tushaspa, the Persian, who was then governor. These beneficent works con- structed under the patronage of the Maurya emperors endured for four hundred years, but in the year 150 A. D. a storm of exceptional violence destroyed the embank- ment, and with it the lake. The embankment was rebuilt " three times stronger >: