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Chanakya (ISO: , चाणक्य, ), according to legendary narratives preserved in various traditions dating from the 4th to 11th century CE, was a Brahmin who assisted the first Mauryan emperor Chandragupta in his rise to power and the establishment of the Maurya Empire. According to these narratives, Chanakya served as the chief adviser and prime minister to both emperors Chandragupta Maurya and his son Bindusara.
Conventionally, Chanakya was identified with Kauṭilya and synonymously Vishnugupta, the author of the ancient Indian politico-economic treatise Arthashastra. Arthashastra is now thought with high probability to have been composed by multiple authors during the early centuries of the common era—several centuries after the Mauryan period—the backdated identification with Chanakya to have served to add prestige to the work.
In all the four versions, Chanakya feels insulted by the Nanda king, and vows to destroy him. After dethroning the Nanda, he installs Chandragupta as the new king.
Chanakya had an Unattractiveness, accentuated by his broken teeth and crooked feet. One day, the Emperor Dhana Nanda organized an alms-giving ceremony for Brahmins. Chanakya went to Pupphapura (Pushpapura) to attend this ceremony. Disgusted by his appearance, the emperor ordered him to be thrown out of the assembly. Chanakya broke his sacred thread in anger, and cursed the emperor. The emperor ordered his arrest, but Chanakya escaped in the disguise of an Ājīvika. He befriended Dhananada's son Pabbata, and instigated him to seize the throne. With help of a signet ring given by the prince, Chanakya fled the palace through a secret door.
Chanakya escaped to the Vindhya Range forest. There, he made 800 million gold coins ( Karshapanas), using a secret technique that allowed him to turn 1 coin into 8 coins. After hiding this money, he started searching for a person worthy of replacing Dhana Nanda. One day, he saw a group of children playing: the young Chandragupta (called Chandagutta in Mahavamsa) played the role of an emperor, while other boys pretended to be vassals, ministers, or robbers. The "robbers" were brought before Chandragupta, who ordered their limbs to be cut off, but then miraculously re-attached them. Chandragupta had been born in a royal family, but was brought up by a hunter after his father was killed by an usurper, and the caused his mother to abandon him. Astonished by the boy's miraculous powers, Chanakya paid 1000 gold coins to his foster-father, and took Chandragupta away, promising to teach him a trade.
Chanakya had two potential successors to Dhana Nanda: Pabbata and Chandragupta. He gave each of them an amulet to be worn around the neck with a woolen thread. One day, he decided to test them. While Chandragupta was asleep, he asked Pabbata to remove Chandragupta's woolen thread without breaking it and without waking up Chandragupta. Pabbata failed to accomplish this task. Some time later, when Pabbata was sleeping, Chanakya challenged Chandragupta to complete the same task. Chandragupta retrieved the woolen thread by cutting off Pabbata's head. For the next seven years, Chanakya trained Chandragupta for imperial duties. When Chandragupta became an adult, Chanakya dug up his hidden treasure of gold coins, and assembled an army.
The army of Chanadragupta and Chanakya invaded Dhana Nanda's empire, but disbanded after facing a severe defeat. While wandering in disguise, the two men once listened to the conversation between a woman and her son. The child had eaten the middle of a cake, and thrown away the edges. The woman scolded him, saying that he was eating food like Chandragupta, who attacked the central part of the empire instead of conquering the border villages first. Chanakya and Chandragupta realized their mistake. They assembled a new army, and started conquering the border villages. Gradually, they advanced to the empire's capital Pataliputra (Pāṭaliputta in Mahavamsa), where they killed the Emperor Dhana Nanda. Chanakya ordered a fisherman to find the place where Dhana Nanda had hidden his treasure. As soon as the fishermen informed Chanakya about its location, Chanakya had him killed. Chanakya anointed Chandragupta as the new emperor, and tasked a man named Paṇiyatappa with eliminating rebels and robbers from the empire.
Chanakya started mixing small doses of poison in the new emperor's food to make him immune to poisoning attempts by the enemies. Chandragupta, who was not aware of this, once shared the food with his pregnant empress Durdhara, who was seven days away from delivery. Chanakya arrived just as the empress ate the poisoned morsel. Realizing that she was going to die, Chanakya decided to save the unborn child. He cut off the empress's head and cut open her belly with a sword to take out the foetus. Over the next seven days, he placed the foetus in the belly of a goat freshly killed each day. After seven days, Chandragupta's son was "born". He was named Bindusara because his body was spotted with drops ( bindu) of goat's blood.
The earliest Buddhist legends do not mention Chanakya in their description of the Mauryan dynasty after this point. Dhammapala's commentary on Theragatha, however, mentions a legend about Chanakya and a Brahmin named Subandhu. According to this account, Chanakya was afraid that the wise Subandhu would surpass him at Chandragupta's court. So, he got Chandragupta to imprison Subandhu, whose son Tekicchakani escaped and became a Buddhist monk. The 16th-century Tibetan Buddhist author Taranatha mentions Chanakya as one of Bindusara's "great lords". According to him, Chanakya destroyed the nobles and Raja of 16 towns and made Bindusara the master of all the territory between the eastern and the western seas (Arabian Sea and the Bay of Bengal).
Thomas Trautmann believes that the Jain version is older and more consistent than the Buddhist version of the legend.
Chanakya was born with a full set of teeth. According to the monks, this was a sign that he would become a king in the future. Chanin did not want his son to become haughty, so he broke Chanakya's teeth. The monks prophesied that the baby would go on to become a power behind the throne. Chanakya grew up to be a learned shravaka, and married a Brahmin woman. Her relatives mocked her for being married to a poor man. This motivated Chanakya to visit Pataliputra, and seek donations from the Emperor Dhana Nanda, who was famous for his generosity towards Brahmins. While waiting for the emperor at the imperial court, Chanakya sat on the emperor's throne. A dasa (slave woman) courteously offered Chanakya the next seat, but Chanakya kept his kamandal (water pot) on it, while remaining seated on the throne. The servant offered him a choice of four more seats, but each time, he kept his various items on the seats, refusing to budge from the throne. Finally, the annoyed servant kicked him off the throne. Enraged, Chanakya vowed to uproot Nanda and his entire establishment, like "a great wind uproots a tree".
Chanakya knew that he was prophesied to become a power behind the throne. So, he started searching for a person worthy of being a king. While wandering, he did a favour for the pregnant daughter of a village chief, on the condition that her child would belong to him. Chandragupta was born to this lady. When Chandragupta grew up, Chanakya came to his village and saw him playing "king" among a group of boys. To test him, Chanakya asked him for a donation. The boy told Chanakya to take the cows nearby, declaring that nobody would disobey his order. This display of power convinced Chanakya that Chandragupta was the one worthy of being a king.
Chanakya took Chandragupta to conquer Pataliputra, the capital of Nanda. He assembled an army using the wealth he had acquired through alchemy ( dhatuvada-visaradan). The army suffered a severe defeat, forcing Chanakya and Chandragupta to flee the battlefield. They reached a lake while being pursued by an enemy officer. Chanakya asked Chandragupta to jump into the lake, and disguised himself as a meditating ascetic. When the enemy soldier reached the lake, he asked the 'ascetic' if he had seen Chandragupta. Chanakya pointed at the lake. As the soldier removed his armour to jump into the lake, Chanakya took his sword and killed him. When Chandragupta came out of the water, Chanakya asked him, "What went through your mind, when I disclosed your location to the enemy?" Chandragupta replied that he trusted his master to make the best decision. This convinced Chanakya that Chandragupta would remain under his influence even after becoming the king. On another occasion, Chanakya similarly escaped the enemy by chasing away a washerman, and disguising himself as one. Once, he cut open the belly of a Brahmin who had just eaten food, and took out the food to feed a hungry Chandragupta.
One day, Chanakya and Chandragupta overheard a woman scolding her son. The child had burnt his finger by putting it in the middle of a bowl of hot gruel. The woman told her son that by not starting from the cooler edges, he was being foolish like Chanakya, who attacked the capital before conquering the bordering regions. Chanakya realized his mistake, and made a new plan to defeat Nanda. He formed an alliance with Parvataka, the king of a mountain kingdom called Himavatkuta, offering him half of Nanda's empire.
After securing Parvataka's help, Chanakya and Chandragupta started besieging the cities other than Pataliputra. One particular city offered a strong resistance. Chanakya entered this city disguised as a Shaivite mendicant, and declared that the siege would end if the idols of the saptamatrika were removed from the town's temple. As soon as the superstitious defenders removed the idols from the temple, Chanakya ordered his army to end the siege. When the defenders started celebrating their victory, Chanakya's army launched a surprise attack and captured the town.
Gradually, Chanakya and Chandragupta subdued all the regions outside the capital. Finally, they captured Pataliputra and Chandragupta became the emperor. They allowed the Emperor Nanda to go into exile, with all the goods he could take on a cart. As Nanda and his family were leaving the city on a cart, his daughter saw Chandragupta, and fell in love with the new emperor. She chose him as her husband by svayamvara tradition. As she was getting off the cart, 9 spokes of the cart's wheel broke. Interpreting this as an omen, Chanakya declared that Chandragupta's dynasty would last for 9 generations.
Meanwhile, Parvataka fell in love with one of Nanda's (poison girl, assassin). Chanakya approved the marriage, and Parvataka collapsed when he touched the girl during the wedding. Chanakya asked Chandragupta not to call a physician. Thus, Parvataka died and Chandragupta became the sole ruler of Nanda's territories.
Chanakya then started consolidating the power by eliminating Nanda's loyalists, who had been harassing people in various parts of the empire. Chanakya learned about a weaver who would burn any part of his house infested with cockroaches. Chanakya assigned the responsibility of crushing the rebels to this weaver. Soon, the empire was free of insurgents. Chanakya also burned a village that had refused him food in the past. He filled the imperial treasury by inviting rich merchants to his home, getting them drunk and gambling with a loaded dice.
Once, the empire suffered a 12-year long famine. Two young Jain monks started eating from the emperor's plate, after making themselves invisible with a magic ointment. Chanakya sensed their presence by covering the palace floor with a powder, and tracing their footprints. At the next meal, he caught them by filling the dining room with thick smoke, which caused the monks' eyes to water, washing off the ointment. Chanakya complained about the young monks' behavior to the head monk Acharya Susthita. The Acharya blamed people for not being charitable towards monks, so Chanakya started giving generous alms to the monks.
Meanwhile, Chandragupta had been patronizing the non-Jain monks. Chanakya decided to prove to him that these men were not worthy of his patronage. He covered the floor of the palace area near the women's rooms with powder and left the non-Jain monks there. Their footprints showed that they had sneaked up to the windows of the women's rooms to peep inside. The Jain monks, who were assessed using the same method, stayed away from the women's rooms. After seeing this, Chandragupta appointed the Jain monks as his spiritual counsellors.
Chanakya used to mix small doses of poison in Chandragupta's food to make him immune to poisoning attempts. The emperor, unaware of this, once shared his food with Empress Durdhara. Chanakya entered the room at the instant she died. He cut open the dead empress's belly and took out the baby. The baby, who had been touched by a drop (" bindu") of the poison, was named Bindusara.
After Chandragupta abdicated the throne to become a Jain monk, Chanakya appointed Bindusara as the new emperor. Chanakya asked Bindusara to appoint a man named Subandhu as one of his ministers. However, Subandhu wanted to become a higher minister and grew jealous of Chanakya. So, he told Bindusara that Chanakya was responsible for the death of his mother. Bindusara confirmed the allegations with the nurses, who told him that Chanakya had cut open the belly of his mother. Bindusara became enraged, and started hating Chanakya. As a result, Chanakya, who had grown very old by this time, retired and decided to sallekhana. Meanwhile, Bindusara learned the detailed circumstances of his birth, and implored Chanakya to resume his ministerial duties. After failing to pacify Chanakya, the emperor ordered Subandhu to convince Chanakya to give up his suicide plan. Subandhu, while pretending to appease Chanakya, burned him to death. Subandhu then took possession of Chanakya's home. Chanakya had anticipated this, and before retiring, he had set up a cursed trap for Subandhu. He had left behind a chest with a hundred locks. Subandhu broke the locks, hoping to find precious jewels. He found a sweet-smelling perfume and immediately inhaled it. But then his eyes fell on a birch bark note with a curse written on it. The note declared that anybody who smelled this perfume will have to either become a monk or face death. Subandhu tested the perfume on another man, and then fed him luxurious food (something that the monks abstain from). The man died, and then Subandhu was forced to become a monk to avoid death.
According to another Jain text – the Rajavali-Katha – Chanakya accompanied Chandragupta to forest for sannyasa, once Bindusara became the emperor.
Meanwhile, the fake emperor appointed Vararuchi as his minister. As the emperor's character kept deteriorating, a disgusted Vararuchi retired to a forest as an ascetic. Shakatala was then restored as the minister, but kept planning his revenge. One day, Shakatala came across Chanakya, a Brahmin who was uprooting all the grass in his path, because one blade of the grass had pricked his foot. Shakatala realized that he could use a man so vengeful to destroy the fake emperor. He invited Chanakya to the emperor's assembly, promising him 100,000 gold coins for presiding over a ritual ceremony.
Shakatala hosted Chanakya in his own house and treated him with great respect. But the day Chanakya arrived at the imperial court, Shakatala got another Brahmin named Subandhu to preside over the ceremony. Chanakya felt insulted, but Shakatala blamed the emperor for this dishonour. Chanakya then untied his topknot (sikha), and vowed not to re-tie it until the emperor was destroyed. The emperor ordered his arrest, but he escaped to Shakatala's house. There, using materials supplied by Shakatala, he performed a magic ritual which made the emperor sick. The king died of a fever after 7 days.
Shakatala then executed Hiranyagupta, the son of the fake emperor. He anointed Chandragupta, the son of the real emperor Nanda, as the new emperor (in Kshemendra's version, it is Chanakya who installs Chandragupta as the new emperor). Shakatala also appointed Chanakya as the imperial priest ( purohita). Having achieved his revenge, he then retired to the forest as an ascetic.
Nanda's prime minister Rakshasa escaped Pataliputra, and continued resisting the invaders. He sent a vishakanya (poison girl) to assassinate Chandragupta. Chanakya had this girl assassinate Parvata instead, with the blame going to Rakshasa. However, Parvata's son Malayaketu learned the truth about his father's death and defected to Rakshasa's camp. Chanakya's spy Bhagurayana accompanied Malayaketu, pretending to be his friend.
Rakshasa continued to plot Chandragupta's death, but all his plans were foiled by Chanakya. For example, once Rakshasa arranged for assassins to be transported to Chandragupta's bedroom via a tunnel. Chanakya became aware of them by noticing a trail of ants carrying the leftovers of their food. He then arranged for the assassins to be burned to death.
Meanwhile, Parvata's brother Vairodhaka became the ruler of his emperor. Chanakya convinced him that Rakshasa was responsible for killing his brother, and agreed to share half of Nanda's emperor with him. Secretly, however, Chanakya hatched a plan to get Vairodhaka killed. He knew that the chief architect of Pataliputra was a Rakshasa loyalist. He asked this architect to build a triumphal arch for Chandragupta's procession to the imperial palace. He arranged the procession to be held at midnight citing astrological reasons, but actually to ensure poor visibility. He then invited Vairodhaka to lead the procession on Chandragupta's elephant, and accompanied by Chandragupta's bodyguards. As expected, Rakshasa's loyalists arranged for the arch to fall on who they thought was Chandragupta. Vairodhaka was killed, and once again, the assassination was blamed on Rakshasa.
Malayaketu and Rakshasa then formed an alliance with five kings: Chiravarman of Kauluta (Kulu), Meghaksha of Persia, Narasimha of Malaya Mountains, Pushkaraksha of Kasmira Kingdom, and Sindhusena of Sindhu Kingdom. This allied army also included soldiers from Chedi Kingdom, Gandhara, Hunas, Khasas, Magadha, Shakas, and Yavana territories.
In Pataliputra, Chanakya's agent informed him that three Rakshasa loyalists remained in the capital: the Jain monk Jiva-siddhi, the scribe Shakata-dasa and the jewellers' guild chief Chandana-dasa. Of these, Jiva-siddhi was actually a spy of Chanakya, unknown to his other spies. Chandana-dasa sheltered Rakshasa's wife, who once unknowingly dropped her husband's signet-ring ( mudra). Chanakya's agent got hold of this signet-ring, and brought it to Chanakya. Using this signet ring, Chanakya sent a letter to Malayaketu warning him that his allies were treacherous. Chanakya also asked some of Chandragupta's princes to fake defection to Malayaketu's camp. In addition, Chanakya ordered Shakata-dasa's murder, but had him 'rescued' by Siddharthaka, a spy pretending to be an agent of Chandana-dasa. Chanakya's spy then took Shakata-dasa to Rakshasa.
When Shakata-dasa and his 'rescuer' Siddharthaka reached Rakshasa, Siddharthaka presented him the signet-ring, claiming to have found it at Chandana-dasa's home. As a reward, Rakshasa gave him some jewels that Malayaketu had gifted him. Sometime after this, another of Chanakya's agents, disguised as a jeweller, sold Parvata's jewels to Rakshasa.
Sometime later, Rakshasa sent his spies disguised as musicians to Chandragupta's court. But Chanakya knew all about Rakshasa's plans thanks to his spies. In front of Rakshasa's spies, Chanakya and Chandragupta feigned an angry argument. Chandragupta pretended to dismiss Chanakya, and declared that Rakshasa would make a better minister. Meanwhile, Malayaketu had a conversation with Chanakya's spy Bhagurayana while approaching Rakshasa's house. Bhagurayana made Malayaketu distrustful of Rakshasa, by saying that Rakshasa hated only Chanakya, and would be willing to serve Nanda's son Chandragupta. Shortly after this, a messenger came to Rakshasa's house and informed him that Chandragupta had dismissed Chanakya while praising him. This convinced Malayaketu that Rakashasa could not be trusted.
Malayaketu then decided to invade Pataliputra without Rakshasa by his side. He consulted the Jain monk Jiva-siddhi to decide an auspicious time for beginning the march. Jiva-siddhi, a spy of Chanakya, told him that he could start immediately. Jiva-siddhi also convinced him that Rakshasa was responsible for his father's death, but Bhagurayana persuaded him not to harm Rakshasa. Shortly after, Chanakya's spy Siddharthaka pretended to get caught with a fake letter addressed to Chandragupta by Rakshasa. Wearing the jewels given by Rakshasa, he pretended to be an agent of Rakshasa. The letter, sealed with Rakshasa's signet-ring, informed Chandragupta that Rakshasa only wished to replace Chanakya as the prime minister. It also stated that five of Malayaketu's allies were willing to defect to Chandragupta in return for land and wealth. An angry Malayaketu summoned Rakshasa, who arrived wearing Parvata's jewels that Chanakya's agent had sold him. When Malayaketu saw Rakshasa wearing his father's jewels, he was convinced that there was indeed a treacherous plan against him. He executed his five allies in a brutal manner.
The rest of Malayaketu's allies deserted him, disgusted at his treatment of the five slayed allies. Rakshasa managed to escape, tracked by Chanakya's spies. One of Chanakya's spies, disguised as a friend of Chandana-dasa, got in touch with him. He told Rakshasa that Chandana-dasa was about to be executed for refusing to divulge the location of Rakshasa's family. On hearing this, Rakshasa rushed to Pataliputra to surrender and save the life of his loyal friend Chandana-dasa. When he reached Pataliputra, Chanakya, pleased with his loyalty to Chandana-dasa, offered him clemency. Rakshasa pledged allegiance to Chandragupta and agreed to be his prime minister, in return for release of Chandana-dasa and a pardon for Malayaketu. Chanakya then bound his top knot, having achieved his objective, and retired.
Early on, the attribution to Chanakya has been questioned, and contemporary scholarship since 1965 rejects this attribution to Chanakya, regarding the Arthashastra as a compilation of a number of earlier texts written by various authors, which were compiled in a new text around the beginning of the Common Era; this text then underwent a major redaction or expansion at the end of the first century CE or in the second century. Patrick Olivelle states that the oldest layer of text, the "sources of the Kauṭilya", dates from the period 150 BCE–50 CE. The next phase of the work's evolution, the "Kauṭilya Recension", which compiled portions of these sources into a new shastra, can be dated to the period 50–125 CE. Finally, the "Śāstric Redaction" (i.e., the text as we have it today) is dated period 175–300 CE.
The Arthashastra identifies its author as Kauṭilya, a gotra or clan name, except for one verse that refers to him by the personal name of Vishnugupta. One of the earliest Sanskrit literatures to identify Chanakya with Vishnugupta explicitly was the Panchatantra (2nd c. CE).Mabbett 1964: "References to the work in other Sanskrit literature attribute it variously to Vishnugupta, Chanakya and Kautilya. The same individual is meant in each case. The Panchatantra explicitly identifies Chanakya with Vishnugupta." K. C. Ojha proposes that the traditional identification of Vishnugupta with Kauṭilya was caused by a confusion of the text's editor and its originator. He suggests that Vishnugupta was a redactor of the original work of Kauṭilya.
R. P. Kangle, writing in the 1960s, found the traditional attribution to the Maurya prime minister Chanakya acceptable, therefor dating the Arthashastra to Mauryan times. Critical scholarship after Kangle, such as Thomas Trautmann and Patrick Olivelle, following Thomas Burrow, reject this identification of Chanakya and Kautilya, as it is a later development from the Gupta Empire. Trautmann points out that none of the earlier sources that refer to Chanakya mention his authorship of the Arthashastra, and Olivelle notes that "the name Canakya, however, is completely absent from the text." The identification happens at the penultimate paragraph of the Arthashastra, which states, "without the explicit use of the name Canakya," that the treatise was authored by the person who rescued the country from the Nanda Empire," that is, the Maurya Empire prime minister Chanakya who played a pivotal role in the overthrow of the Nanda dynasty.
The Guptas tried to present themselves symbolically as the legitimate successors of the Mauryas, even using the names "Chandragupta" and "Gupta," a connection also made in the play Mudraraksasa, composed in the time of the Guptas. The verse seems to be a later interpolation, and Olivelle proposes that it was an attempt to identify the author of the political treatise, which was followed by the Guptas, with the renowned Maurya prime minister.
Several reasons are given for the persistent scholarly attribution to Chanakya, which from the beginning has been "heavily influenced" by this traditional attribution, and has led many scholars to an a priori dating to Mauryan times. One reason is the reception by Indian nationalists, who saw it "as evidence of a pragmatic and virile tradition of self-rule in India’s past." According to Trautmann, "nationalist aspirations seemed somehow fortified when the existence of strongly centralized empires and native schools of political theory was shown." Furthermore, the identification with Kautilya provided "a link to the most powerful dynasty in South Asian antiquity: the Mauryan Empire, and "given the absolute paucity of sources for this most intriguing era, many scholars seem unable to resist using the Arthaśāstra as a source for the period, despite a decided lack of supporting evidence." According to McClish, "the desire on the part of Indologists to possess just such a source seems to have exerted, in general, a strong influence on conclusions about the compositional history of the text."
Kautilya's works were lost near the end of the Gupta Empire in the sixth century CE and not rediscovered until the early 20th century, when the Arthashastra was discovered in 1905 by librarian Rudrapatna Shamasastry in an uncatalogued group of ancient palm-leaf manuscripts donated by an unknown pandit to the Oriental Research Institute Mysore. It discusses monetary policy and Fiscal policy policies, welfare, international relations, and war strategies in detail. The text also outlines the duties of a ruler.Paul Halsall. Indian History Sourcebook: Kautilya: from the Arthashastra c. 250 BC Retrieved 19 June 2012 Kautilya uses different terms to describe war other than dharma-yuddha (just war), such as Kutayuddha (unjust war).
Kautilya's work is thought of as an important precursor to classical economics.Waldauer, C., Zahka, W.J. and Pal, S. 1996. Kauṭilya's Arthashastra: A neglected precursor to classical economics. Indian Economic Review, Vol. XXXI, No. 1, pp. 101–108.Tisdell, C. 2003. A Western perspective of Kauṭilya's Arthashastra: does it provide a basis for economic science? Economic Theory, Applications and Issues Working Paper No. 18. Brisbane: School of Economics, The University of Queensland.Sihag, B.S. 2007. Kauṭilya on institutions, governance, knowledge, ethics and prosperity. Humanomics 23 (1): 5–28. and based on the identification of Kautilya with Chanakya, K.N. Jha considers Chanakya as the pioneer of the field of political science and economics in India, .L. K. Jha, K. N. Jha (1998). "Chanakya: the pioneer economist of the world", International Journal of Social Economics 25 (2–4), p. 267–282.
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