अर्थापत्तिः — What Follows Unsaid: Implication

Arthāpatti, "what follows from the sense", is the device by which a text conveys what it does not state. All three authorities give the same definition — "what, unstated, follows from the meaning" — and three instructive examples. Kauṭilya: "one who knows the ways of the world should approach a king … through what is pleasing and beneficial", from which it follows that he should not approach him through what is unpleasant and harmful. Suśruta: when someone says "I shall eat rice", it follows that he does not want gruel. Cakrapāṇi: the prohibition of curd at night implies that it may be eaten by day. The same word names a means of knowledge disputed between the schools: the Mīmāṃsakas hold it to be independent — Devadatta, known to be alive, is not at home, so he must be outside — while the Nyāyasūtra reduces it to inference and charges it with being inconclusive. This article distinguishes two forms in the examples (implication by the contrary and implication from a choice), relates them to the Mīmāṃsā postulation and to Gricean implicature, and answers three objections: that arthāpatti is inconclusive, that it is only inference, and that it licenses reading into a text what is not there. It concludes that arthāpatti is the economy of a śāstra — saying one thing so that its counterpart need not be said — and that its discipline lies in the word arthāt: what follows from the sense, not from the reader's wish. Series: तन्त्रयुक्तिविमर्शः · Tantrayukti Studies, TY-2026/14. Loci: AŚ 15.1.29–31; Su. Utt. 65.20. Online version: https://sanskritmanthan.in/a/ty-14-arthapatti