In the annals of Indian History, the Mauryan Empire (c 317 – 185 B.C. E) is a grand chapter replete with drama, deceit, and danger. With a population of fifty million people, the Empire, at its zenith, was larger than the Mughal Empire (centuries later), and the British Empire even. In fact, it is said that its capital, Pataliputra (near modern Patna), “was about twice as large as Rome under Emperor Marcus Aurelius”.

In order to maintain law and order in a large empire like this, Kautilya — Chandragupta Maurya’s mentor and prime-minister— composed Arthaśāstra, a radical treatise on the polity. Written in a caustic, sententious style, this exhaustive text of 6000 sutras is divided into 15 parts and 150 chapters, and is a fantastic window into the intricacies and intelligence of statecraft.

Arthaśāstra is often compared to Machiavelli’s The Prince. Max Weber said:

“Truly radical Machiavellianism is classically expressed in the Arthaśāstra of Kautilya: compared to it, Machiavelli’s The Prince is harmless!” 

Indeed, there is much that is common between Kautilya and Nicolo Machiavelli— ruthless, razor-sharp intelligence, rational, practical perspective, and an obstinate dedication to the common good. Both the works are branded as scandalous for both purport the adoption of brutal means to accomplish common good— a groundless accusation for actions of leaders must be judged based on their consequences, not before.

Consider an example from Sun Tzu’s The Art of War.

“Sertorius, fighting a battle in Spain, killed the one who reported the death of one of his officers, for fear if he said the same thing to others, he would dismay them.”

Abraham Lincoln is another example. Lincoln, who suspended habeas corpus during the Civil War, said,

“I am fighting to preserve the Constitution. In order to save the whole thing, I may temporarily need to violate one small piece of it. But would I be more faithful to my oath if I let the whole Constitution go down to defeat for the sake of preserving one of its clauses?”

In other words, one must break some eggs if one must make omelets.

Arthaśāstra and The Prince are intelligent, irrefutable treaties. Yet, there are many points of differences between them: one of them is Kautilya’s insistence on the use of an elaborate institution of espionage; Machiavelli is curiously silent on this matter. Spies, Kautilya insists, are the “eyes and ears of the king”. Echoes of this sentiment is reflected in George Washington’s words,

“The necessity of procuring good intelligence is apparent and need not be further urged… For upon secrecy, success depends in most enterprises of the kind, and for want of it, they are generally defeated, however, well planned…”

According to Kautilya, spies had to be used for two reasons— internal policing and war. For this, he classified spies into two categories— fixed (samstha) and wanderer (sancāra) spies.

Fixed spies were of ten types: spies under the guise of fraudulent disciples/student-spies (kāpatika), recluses (udāsthita), householders (gṛhapatika), merchants (vaidehaka), ascetics (tāpasa, classmates/colleagues (satri), fire-brands (tīkṣṇa), poisoners (rasada), and mendicant women (bhikṣukī).

Student-spies reported of wickedness in the kingdom. Spies stationed in shops ascertained if the expenditure incurred in shops was ordinary or extraordinary. Householder spies ascertained the fair collection of taxes and the fair accounting of villagers’ lands. Merchant spies determined the quality/price of royal merchandise and checked the taxes levied on them. Ascetic spies gathered information about the honest and dishonest proceedings amongst the villagers.

Fixed spies were also used to ascertain the character of ministers and other members of the king’s council.

“It is possible to know even the path of birds flying in the sky but not the ways of government servants who hide their (dishonest) income”

Kautilya wrote, and established four tests for this purpose:

a. A test on grounds of greed or the test of artha:  Spies must incite a minister to murder the king to acquire immense wealth; each minister must be asked: “this attempt is to the liking of all of us; what dost thou think?” If a minister refuses to co-operate, he is considered pure, and can be appointed to fiscal positions— in charge of the treasury, tax collection, revenue generation and other functions in the management of finances. 
 

b. A test based on physical lust or pleasure, or the test of kāma: A woman-spy, under the guise of a highly esteemed member of the harem of the king, must allure a minister saying, “the queen is enamored of thee and has made arrangements for thy entrance into her chamber”. If the minister discards the proposal, he is pure, and can be appointed to oversee the functioning of enterprises like pleasure houses, harems, gambling, liquor production, etc. In addition, these candidates are also best suited to manage the king’s own living and working quarters. 
 

c. A test based on fear, or the test by bhaya:  With the intention of sailing on a commercial vessel, a minister must induce all others to follow him. Apprehensive of danger, the king must arrest them all, and the spy-minister must incite the others saying, “the king has betaken himself to an unwise course; well, having murdered him, let us put another in his stead. What dost thou think?” If a minister refuses to agree, he is pure, and can be appointed in defense departments, protection and security areas of the government.

d. A test on grounds of virtue/righteousness or the test of dharma: Spies must instigate each minister saying, “this king is unrighteous; let us set up in his place another king who is righteous; what dost thou think?” A minister who refuses to co-operate is pure, and can be appointed for duties that require ethical rigor and also to take difficult decisions of violent punishments.

Kautilya recommended the ones who passed all the four tests to be granted ministerial or senior positions within the king’s cabinet.

Fixed spies also had another task: to make sure that the prince— the heir to the throne— did not fall into wrong habits. Kautilya believed that instilling ethical values in a child kept him ethical later in life, so when the prince, under temptation, turned towards women, impure women in disguise had to scare him. When he turned to liquor, spies had to adulterate his drink to scare him. When he turned to gambling, spies under the guise of fraudulent persons had to scare him. When he turned to hunting, spies in the guise of highway robbers had to scare him. Thus, fixed spies kept the prince in check. According to Kautilya, dharma — the development of the capacity to follow one’s conscience, to look beyond self-interest and show benevolence toward others — was as important as learning professional skills.

Wandering spies were of four types: orphans who depended on the state (samsargavidyāsatrinaḥ).), bravados willing to risk their lives (tīkṣṇa), widows, ascetic women (parivrājikā), and poisoners (rasada). These spies were sent to different kingdoms to gather information about their on-goings. Kautilya believed that it was the moral duty of a king to increase prosperity, judicial fairness and national security; he constructed a complete conceptual framework to achieve these objectives. 

Internal policing aside, spies were used in war to defeat enemies. According to Kautilya, “an assassin, single-handed, does the work of a whole army or more.” Napoleon, too, shared the same opinion. “A spy in the right place,” he said, “is worth 20,000 soldiers on the battlefield.” So, spies could be used to assassinate enemies through various means— hiding “inside the image of a deity or a hollow wall”, making something heavy fall on the enemy, etc.

Another method to defeat an enemy without a full-scale battle was to arrange for the enemy to quarrel among itself. Beautiful women could be used to instigate fights among officials. Spies in the guise of astrologers could tell high officials that he had all the marks of a king, and at the same time, arrange for a spy in the guise of a cook or a waiter to tell him that the king had ordered him or her to poison the high officer. “Thus, with one or two or three means the king should incite the high officers one by one to fight or desert the enemy king.”

Yet another military tactic was misinformation. Spies could be used as messengers to tell enemy troops, “Your fort has been burnt down or captured; a revolt by a member of your family has broken out; or, your enemy or a forest chieftain has risen (against you).” Similarly, misinformation could be used to inspire one’s own troops— spies could announce fabricated victories and fictitious defeats of the enemy. In the guise of astrologers, spies could be used to proclaim the king’s omniscience and association with divine agencies, and to fill the enemy’s side with terror. Every kind of superstition was useful— spies who had infiltrated the enemy side could use animal blood in order to “cause an excessive flow (of blood) from honored images of deities,” and then interpret that as a sure sign of future defeat for the enemy, etc.

Shocking? Yes. Justified? Yes. Because it is important to remember that Kautilya ferociously opposed power for power’s sake. A large section of Arthaśāstra deals with the characteristics of a just monarch, and the methods to train him to be one. In the opening pages of this text, Kautilya says,

“In the happiness of his population, rests the ruler’s own happiness; in their welfare lies his welfare; he shall not consider as good whatever pleases him but he shall consider as good whatever pleases his population.”

Kautilya fought to become a law-giver, not a law-breaker; his claim was that it is not possible for the majority of the people to live safely in an ordered society unless the ruler does whatever it takes to protect them from external enemies and to keep the peace at home. In Machiavelli’s words,

“A wise prince, then, is not troubled about a reproach for cruelty for which he keeps his subjects united and loyal because, giving a very few examples of cruelty, he is much more merciful than those who, through too much mercy let evils continue, from which result murders or plunder.”

Kautilya had a grand vision for building an empire that was prosperous, secure, stable and based on fairness, and Arthaśāstra is a treatise designed to instruct kings everywhere to achieve the same.