Indian Judicial Systems

Was there a rule of law in ancient India? Let the texts speak for themselves.
In the Mahabharata, it was laid down " A King who after having sworn that he shall protect his subjects fails to protect them should be executed like a mad dog."
"The people should execute a king who does not protect them, but deprives them of their property and assets and who takes no advice or guidance from any one. Such a king is not a king but misfortune."
These provisions indicate that sovereignty was based on an implied social compact and if the King violated the traditional pact, he forfeited his kingship. Coming to the historical times of Mauryan Empire, Kautilya describes the duties of a king in the Arth-shastra thus : "In the happiness of his subjects lies the King’s happiness; in their welfare his welfare; whatever pleases him he shall not consider as good, but whether pleases his people he shall consider to good."
The Principle enunciated by Kautilya was based on a very ancient tradition which was already established in the age of the Ramayana. Rama, the King of Ayodhya, was compelled to banish his queen, whom he loved and in whose chastity he had comlete faith, simply because his subjects disapproved of his having taken back a wife who had spent a year in the house of her abductor. The king submitted to the will of people thopugh it broke his heart.
In the Mahabharata it is related that a common fisherman refused to give his daughter in marriage to the King of Hastinapur unless he accepted the condition that his daughter’s sons and not the heirapparent from a former queen would succeed to the throne. The renunciation of the throne and the vow of life-long celibacy (Bhishma Pratgyan) by Prince Deva Vrata is one of the most moving episodes in the Mahabharata. But its signifiance for jurists is that even the sovereign was not above the law. The great King of Hastinapur could not compel the humblest of his subjects to give his daughter in marriage to him without accepting his terms. It refutes the view that the kings in ancient India were "Oriental despots" who could do what they liked regardless of the law or the rights of their subjects.