Q1.
The practice of rulers protecting consumers is not a phenomenon of modern India. Kauṭilya's Arthaśhāstra includes instructions for the traders trading in clarified butter (ghee). It mentions that buyers shall be given 1 / 50 part more as mānasrāva to compensate for the reduction in quantity owing to (the ghee)…sticking to the measuring can.
Answer
This little rule, more than two thousand years old, is doing exactly what a modern weights-and-measures law does — making sure the buyer actually receives what the buyer pays for.
The problem it solves. Ghee is thick and sticky. When it is poured out of a measuring can, a film of it clings to the inside of the can. So a buyer who pays for one measure of ghee carries home slightly less than one measure. Nobody has cheated; the loss is caused by the ghee itself.
The remedy. The trader must add an extra 1/50 part — called mānasrāva, literally the “flow of the measure” — to make up for what sticks.
1 ÷ 50 = 0.02 = 2%
On 50 units measured out, the buyer gets 1 extra unit
Buy 1 kg (1000 g) of ghee → extra = 1000 ÷ 50 = 20 g → the buyer takes home 1,020 g
Buy 5 kg → extra = 5000 ÷ 50 = 100 g → the buyer takes home 5,100 g
On 50 units measured out, the buyer gets 1 extra unit
Buy 1 kg (1000 g) of ghee → extra = 1000 ÷ 50 = 20 g → the buyer takes home 1,020 g
Buy 5 kg → extra = 5000 ÷ 50 = 100 g → the buyer takes home 5,100 g
Why it is remarkable:
- It is a consumer-protection law, not a tax or a price rule. Its whole purpose is the buyer's fair measure.
- It is precise — a stated fraction, not a vague instruction to “be generous”. Precision is what makes a rule enforceable.
- It is practical — it accepts that some loss is unavoidable and simply decides who should bear it: the seller, not the buyer.
- It shows the state taking responsibility for honest weights and measures — precisely what the paragraph just above it says the government does today for packaged goods.
Why it happens: in any market the seller knows more about the goods than the buyer does. A buyer cannot see the ghee clinging inside the can. Rules like mānasrāva — and, today, the FSSAI mark and the printed net quantity — exist to close that gap in knowledge, so that trust does not depend on the honesty of each individual trader.
Did you know? The chapter adds a warning immediately after: governments make rules so that markets work fairly and consumers are not exploited, “however, too many rules can make it difficult for markets to function properly”. The Arthaśhāstra's rule works because it is small, clear and easy to follow.