---
type: Concept
bundle: mimamsa-dharma
bundle_version: 0.10.0
id: adhikara
title: Adhikāra
iast: Adhikāra
devanagari: अधिकार
description: 'The eligibility or qualification that makes a person the addressee of a given injunction and the recipient of its fruit, fixed by desire-for-the-result and capacity; NOT authority over others, NOT a legal right, NOT caste status by itself.'
darshana:
- Pūrva-Mīmāṃsā
text_source: Mīmāṃsā Sūtra 6.1.1
tags:
- adhikara
- mimamsa
- eligibility
- ritual-agent
not:
- term: 'authority or power over others'
  why: 'In ordinary speech adhikāra means authority or jurisdiction. In Mīmāṃsā it means the agent''''s qualification to undertake an enjoined act, who the injunction is addressed to, not power wielded over anyone.'
  instead: 'Render adhikāra as eligibility or qualification to perform a rite, not authority over others.'
- term: 'a legal right or entitlement-claim'
  why: 'It is not a claim held against others; it is the standing that makes an injunction binding on this agent, typically desire for the stated fruit plus capacity plus the absence of a bar.'
- term: 'caste status by itself'
  why: 'While classical texts tie some adhikāra to varṇa and āśrama, adhikāra is the technical structure of who-an-injunction-binds, defined by desire-for-result and capacity; reducing it to caste flattens a hermeneutic category into a sociological one.'
related:
- /concepts/phala.md
- /concepts/niyoga.md
- /concepts/vidhi.md
timestamp: '2026-07-08'
okf_version: '0.2'
license: CC BY-SA 4.0
---

# Adhikāra -- अधिकार

**Not:** authority over others, a legal right, caste status

## What It Actually Means

An injunction like "one who desires heaven should sacrifice" does not bind everyone; it binds whoever satisfies the adhikāra, here desiring heaven and being capable of the rite. Adhikāra thus answers "to whom does this apply?" and is fixed by the injunction''s own terms, chiefly the desire for the result and the capacity to perform, with disqualifications removing it. It is the hinge between the impersonal injunction and the particular agent it obligates.

## Audience Metaphor

A prescription that says "for adults with the condition, take twice daily" binds only those who fit the description. Adhikāra is that "for whom" clause of a Vedic injunction: the standing that makes the instruction yours to carry out.

## Citations

1. Mīmāṃsā Sūtra 6.1 (the adhikāra books) -- see [references/mimamsa-sutra.md](../references/mimamsa-sutra.md)
2. Śāstra-dīpikā on adhikāra -- see [references/sastra-dipika.md](../references/sastra-dipika.md)
