Radhakrishna Pillai is a Professor of Philosophy at Mumbai University. As a teacher of leadership, he is also a big fan of Chanakya. He has written 7 books on his ideas – and his ambition is to write a 100. Chanakya, was a nickname which came to him as he was the son of Chanak. His real name was Vishnugupta, though he is referred to as Kautilya also, probably his surname that came from his village. Chanakya’s claim to fame is his treatise – the Arthashastra. This was a manual written by him for use by rulers. It was written around 2400 years ago – and like the Mahabharta and Ramayana – it was revised over the centuries by its practitioners. The book disappeared from the horizons of history till 1905 – when a manuscript was discovered in Tamil Nadu – and was translated into English by Prof Ramashastry.
Arthashastra talks of life in general – with a strong focus on economy and philosophy. As with manuals, it’s quite transactional – with 180 chapters – full of bullet points. But the best part of the book is a poem at the end of each chapter, which acts as a summary. It is quite autobiographical in a way that it reflects Chanakya’s own life story and learnings. Pillai saab has written a book called Chanakya Katha – which is on the lines of the Amar Chitra Katha comics sans the pictures. Was happy to be loaned a copy of the book by my friend Ganesh – and a quick scan of the book tells us of the very interesting story of a short tempered teacher-philosopher who is insulted by his king – Dhananand – and vows to unseat him. The short temper is matched with some long term thinking. One of Chanakya’s strong points was knowing his Maryada – or limits. He knew what he could not do – which was implementation. He also knew what he was good at – training and mentoring. So he sets about to find a good mentee through whom he would unseat his old boss. The unseating happens – the mentee – Chandragupta – goes on to expand his kingdom to become one of the historically largest kingdoms in the sub-continent.
Chanakya continues his mentoring for 2 more generations – trains Ashoka, Chandragupta’s grandson – and then goes on to retire and start a gurukul in the forest. In between training his students, he gets the idea that if the dynasty has to benefit from his learning, then it would be a good idea to pen down his thoughts – and that is the story of the Arthashastra.
After Radhakrisna’s talk got over, we had a Q & A. I asked him about the death of the Maurya dynasty – implying that over the generations we can be assured that there will always be one rotten egg. His response was that even if the dynasty died, the ideas lived on. Met with the very impish Sawani Shetye outside the BORI Auditorium, who informed me that the dynasty actually continued – in the same way that the Peshwas continued the tradition of Shivaji. Though through a coup – their General / Prime Minister – Pushyamitra Shunga took over – and founded the Shunga dynasty. Did some research and found that the Shungas were relatively quite small – and over the years they too petered out. So Chanakya’s manual probably required some updating with times – not being as eternal as Pillai saab claims it to be.
However some of his truisms still continue to be relevant. Will discuss a few that impacted me.
– Don’t destroy before you create. We have seen this happening in the Gulf war, and lately in Syria.
– Our biggest FDI comes from Japan. Through Buddhism we have a strong historical culture connect with them. Yet, America dominates current Indian culture!
– Politicians and business families prefer arranged marriages as they consider marriage as an important tool in empire management. One of Chandragupta Maurya’s queens was the daughter of Selecius, Alexander’s top general.
– Great ideas are not enough for revolutions. They should come to people who have funding.
– Parenting is a role – not an identity
– Prajadharma is more important than rajdharma. We as citizens need to be aware of our own duties rather than what our ruler’s duties are.
– Society needs the lazy, or else where would all our art come from? Tukaram Omble, held on to the rifle of Kasab, enabling him to be overpowered by the other police officers. Tukaram was injured by Kasab’s firiing as he freed his rifle – and died. Tukaram was the Inspector who nobody wanted in their station – corrupt, drunkard. His kaal had come – and he did his duty! Never consider anyone as useless in this world.
– There is an interesting translation for passion in Hindi – swadharma.. Pillai recommended a movie which illustrates this – Ek Doctor ki Maut. Here is an interesting link about the story of the movie –
If you want to see the film – here it is
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5OqFMGCMwDk – You don’t win a silver medal, you only lose gold. So take up only those battles that you are confident you will win.