Chanakya's Chant

  The spymaster standing before Dhanananda was nervous. How had he allowed himself to be suckered into this double game, he wondered. He anxiously adjusted his wrap as he waited for Dhanananda to finish reading the note that had purportedly been seized from a messenger leaving Rakshas's camp and heading out to Kaikey. The expression on Dhanananda's face was one of seething wrath. His lips seemed to be mouthing the words written on the scroll in order to convince himself that they were real.

  ‘O great King Paurus. Magadha's prime minister, Rakshas, sends greetings. I am on my way to your land. I come in my personal capacity, not as a senior functionary of the Magadha government. I have heard wonderful stories of your bravery, wisdom, and honour. If you deem fit, I would like to discuss an alliance between us that could be to our mutual advantage. It would allow me to grow in stature while expanding your borders significantly. It is critical, however, that this conversation remains confidential. I look forward to receiving your invitation for a meeting at the soonest. Your humble servant, Rakshas.’

  ‘How do we know that the letter is genuine?’ asked Dhanananda, hoping that it would turn out to be a forgery.

  ‘There can be no doubting the authenticity, my lord,’ said the spymaster. He stepped forward and handed over Rakshas's ring. ‘This was enclosed in the scroll to prove his credentials to the king of Kaikey.’

  ‘That traitorous fiend!’ Dhanananda screamed. ‘I want the scoundrel captured and brought back here to stand trial. He betrayed my trust and friendship. I made him the most powerful official in the kingdom and this is how he repays me. The ungrateful wretch! Even if it means sending the army to get him, do it!’ he ordered.

  ‘My dearest Suvasini. I have succeeded in my efforts to get Rakshas out of Magadha. With him gone for several months, there's now no obstacle to our sweet union. I long to kiss you and hold you in my arms. Do not have any fear. Rakshas shall not return from his trip. My men have orders to kill him before he returns to Magadha. What are you waiting for? Come quickly. Your servant in love, Dhanananda.’

  The message was clear. Rakshas looked at the ring bearing Dhanananda's royal insignia, which had been found inside the rolled parchment. He knew it! The priapic bastard wanted him dead so that he could claim Suvasini for himself. He had gifted him the finest cunts in the kingdom but the lascivious rascal only wanted the one woman that Rakshas coveted—his Suvasini.

  Enough! He had spent his life pimping for Dhanananda and instead of being appreciated he was being hounded like a wild animal. He thought about how he could get even and then had a brilliant flash—Chanakya!

  ‘You're a fool! When eating hot porridge you should always start from the outer edges which are cooler, and not from the centre which is steaming hot,’ the mother chided her little son as she nursed his scalded fingers. Chanakya, sitting outside Dandayan's hermitage, watched the little drama unfold as Dandayan's housekeeper scolded her child.

  Dandayan's ashram was a quiet example of nature's bounty. Surrounded by dense trees, the hermitage was located on the banks of a sparkling stream and the air had a magical quality that was difficult to describe—a mystical combination of fresh air, the scent of pine, eucalyptus, and the sacred smoke of holy fires. Seated next to Chanakya was Chandragupta who was also fascinated by the theatrics of this simple everyday occurrence. When he looked away, he saw Chanakya smiling at him. ‘What is it, acharya?’ asked Chandragupta. A smile from Chanakya usually meant that he was plotting something. It made Chandragupta uneasy.

  ‘I've been strategising this all wrong,’ said Chanakya at length. ‘This uneducated and illiterate mother is more intelligent than me. She's expounded the perfect military strategy that I, the wise and learned Chanakya, could not define.’ Chandragupta was confused but he decided to stay quiet. Usually his teacher would explain himself without further prodding.

  ‘Until today, my focus has been on Magadha and the coronation of you, Chandragupta, as its emperor, but now I see that I was mistaken. Magadha is the centre of the porridge. We first need to tuck into the smaller kingdoms along the peripheries. Magadha will follow much more easily,’ explained Chanakya. ‘The only two large kingdoms that could have posed a challenge to Magadha are Kaikey and Gandhar. Both have now been neutralised owing to our strategy of divide-and-rule. And within Magadha, Suvasini has succeeded in driving a wedge between Dhanananda and Rakshas. I expect to see Rakshas here with us in a few days. He sent me intimation of his imminent arrival a few days ago. Who could have thought that the manipulative Rakshas would one day be our ally? Politics makes strange bedfellows!’ laughed Chanakya.

  ‘But acharya, Magadha still remains the most powerful kingdom in north Bharat. With over two hundred thousand infantry, eighty thousand cavalry, eight thousand chariots and six thousand war elephants, it will be difficult to capture Magadha. Even Alexander's own men are afraid to cross the Ganges!’ exclaimed Chandragupta.

  ‘Ten soldiers wisely led will beat a hundred without a head,’ said Chanakya. ‘War is all about deception. Direct force is a poor solution to any problem. That's why it's used only by little children!’

  Their deliberations were suddenly interrupted by the sound of trumpets and the dull thud of marching soldiers. ‘Sinharan!’ called out Chanakya. ‘See who it is. Quick!’ he whispered urgently as Sinharan drew near.

  ‘It's the mighty Alexander himself,’ said Sinharan clambering down the lookout tree. ‘He's come to pay his respects to Sage Dandayan.’ Alexander was atop his favourite horse, Boukephalus. A Thessalian horse-breeder had offered the steed to Alexander's father, King Philip II, for three thousand talents, but not one of Philip's horse-trainers had been able to mount the untamed stallion who would buck and throw any rider that attempted to scale him. Alexander was the only one who had succeeded. He had kept the horse ever since. Boukephalus had seen more countries and wars than most of Alexander's lieutenants.

  Alexander dismounted as his retinue reached the ashram, and they were led to Dandayan and his followers, who were performing their yogic exercises. One particular routine involved stamping their feet on the ground. They continued with their routine, oblivious to the arrival of the godlike Alexander. Sitting at a distance, Chanakya chuckled to himself. This would be fun.

  Alexander was dressed in a short Sicilian-style tunic with a heavily embossed leather belt wrapped around his quilted linen breastplate. He wore a highly polished helmet with a great white plume, and a matching gorget embedded with gems around his slender throat. His sword, a toughened yet agile blade, a gift from a Cyprian emperor, hung casually by his side. Through interpretation by Sasigupta, an Afghan tribal leader and now a key lieutenant in the Macedonian army, Alexander asked Dandayan what the significance of their stamping the earth was. Dandayan's reply was explicit. ‘O great King of kings, a man can possess only so much of the earth's surface as this, the extent that one steps on. You are mortal, like the rest of us, and yet wish to possess more and more ground. You will soon be dead, and in that state you will own just enough earth as needed for your burial.’

  Alexander went pale. His lieutenants gasped at the temerity of the sage and braced themselves for the worst. Instead, a moment later, Alexander pulled himself together and shrugged the words off. He knelt before the wise and naked Dandayan who was now sitting in a lotus position. ‘Please come with me, O wise sage. Be my personal advisor. I shall cover you in gold and you shall not want for anything,’ he pleaded. Alexander knew the importance of enlightened teachers. His mother, Olympia, had appointed Leonidas, a stern relative of hers, as his tutor, and his father, Philip, had put the adolescent prince under the tutelage of the Greek philosopher, Aristotle. Alexander had always maintained that his father and mother had given him life but that Leonidas and Aristotle had taught him how to live.

  ‘Alexander, if you're the son of God, then why, so am I. I want nothing from you, for what I have suffices. I desire nothing that you can give me; I fear no exclusion from any blessings, which may perhaps be yours. Bharat, with the
fruits of her soil in due season, is enough for me while I live. And when I die, I shall be rid of my poor body—my unseemly dwelling!’ replied the sage. Alexander had finally met his match.

  He rose, hands still folded in obeisance before Dandayan. ‘I still need your blessing, great sage. I need you to bless me that I may be victorious in battle,’ asked Alexander.

  ‘My son, you have my blessing. May you be victorious in the battle that rages within you!’ declared the sage, knowing that it wasn't exactly the blessing that Alexander had asked for.

  The battle that raged within had deeply affected morale in his troops. Alexander's men had left Macedonia to teach Persia a lesson. They had not only conquered it but also subjugated it. They had silently accepted Alexander's transformation into a Persian shahenshah and had tolerated his whims and fancies. They had pushed onward into Bharat, had overcome Gandhar and Kaikey, but now their king wanted them to fight battles in faraway Magadha, never even part of the Achaemenid Empire, and to march through the intolerable rains in the excruciating summer heat. Mutiny was as as inevitable as Alexander's turning his back on Bharat.

  ‘Chanakya, my friend, how wonderful to see you again,’ lied Rakshas, as he embraced his nemesis.

  ‘Rakshas, your mere presence gives me confidence and happiness,’ the Brahmin fabricated in his turn.

  ‘Dhanananda has crossed all limits of decency,’ complained Rakshas.

  And you're such a decent human being, it goes against your moral conscience, thought Chanakya caustically to himself. ‘Dhanananda's court is no place for honourable people like you—those who wish to lead an honourable but pleasurable life,’ Chanakya said aloud, silkily.

  ‘The problem is that most things in life that are pleasurable are usually illegal, immoral or fattening,’ joked Rakshas as he sat down on the mattress profferred to him.

  ‘The lesson for today, dear Rakshas, is that between two evils you should always pick the one that you haven't yet tried. I happen to be that particular evil,’ suggested a smiling Chanakya. ‘Now, let's examine, what it is that I can do for you, and then we can calculate what it is that you can do for me.’

  ‘Always the teacher!’ laughed Rakshas.

  ‘And always right,’ interjected Chanakya seriously. ‘Dhanananda covets the love of your life,’ he began.

  ‘Yours too, as I understand it,’ commented Rakshas warily.

  ‘I'm not your competition, Rakshas. Look at me. Can I, a dark, ill-featured, pockmarked, crooked-toothed, uncouth Brahmin compete with you—the immaculate, suave, and cultured prime minister? You have my promise that I do not fancy Suvasini. She's yours, provided that Dhanananda's out of the way.’

  ‘But how will that happen? He's firmly entrenched on the throne. He has Bharat's largest armed force at his command—a force so terrifying that even Alexander is being forced to turn back.’

  ‘Battles needn't be fought on battlefields, my friend. I've always believed that wars are better fought without soldiers and unnecessary bloodshed,’ said Chanakya softly.

  ‘Do you have a plan to end all wars, acharya?’ asked Rakshas.

  ‘O Rakshas, everything is always all right in the end. If it isn't all right, then it isn't the end,’ said Chanakya simply as he looked into his new ally's eyes.

  The house on Shiva street, in the eastern district of Pataliputra, was an unassuming structure. The neighbours knew it to be a dancing school run by a former courtesan. The simple single-storey house was built around a covered courtyard used by the girls who stayed within to practise their art. The principal of the institution was an elegant lady in her fifties. It was said that she had once been the chief courtesan of Dhanananda and that a wealthy patron had paid more than twenty-four thousand panas to secure her release from royal employment.

  The students were girls from modest backgrounds who needed a vocation to support themselves and their families. They would usually enter the institution at ages six to eight and would be taught a variety of arts including painting, poetry, music, dancing, singing, cooking, and drama. No expense was spared either on their training or in their living standards. They were provided with the best accommodation, clothing, food and comforts. Their principal and their teachers were kind and understanding.

  However, there was one golden rule that could never be broken. They each had to drink a glass of specially formulated milk every evening. The milk would be of varying colours, textures, and taste. Each lactic potion was specifically mixed for a given girl and the principal herself maintained detailed records of who drank how much of what. The girls could lead a pampered and sheltered existence provided they did not question this single stricture that applied to them automatically the moment they walked through the portals of the school.

  Between ages six and eight, the girls who showed no visible signs of pubertal development would be given one kuduba of powder-blue milk formula each day. As they progressed to ages eight to ten and their breast buds began to appear, they would be given two kudubas of a saffron-orange brew every day. From ten to twelve, as their pubic hair began to grow, the daily dosage of the concoction went up to three kudubas of a pistachio-green mixture each evening. During the twelve to fourteen period, as their underarm hair began growing and their hips started widening in relation to their waists, the daily ration went up to one prastha of a cherry-pink milk sherbet. Between ages fourteen and sixteen, as they went into ovulation and menstruation, they would be fed two adhakas of an almond-brown lactic potion daily.

  Anyone researching the institute closely would have come upon an even more interesting fact: all the girls, without exception, were born on Tuesdays during the seventh lunar day of vishaka. They possessed unfortunately potent horoscopes that guaranteed that any man they cohabited with would die. They were known as vishakanyas—or poison maidens.

  An audit investigation into the largesse that funded the establishment would have revealed something even more curious. The entire corpus had been donated by a foundation called The Peacock Trust, the founders of which were Chanakya and Senapati Maurya. An apt name, given that Maurya owed his name to the peacock—mor.

  ‘We need control over Mallayrajya,’ said Chanakya. ‘And we have the perfect candidate in Sinharan, whose father—the legitimate ruler—was murdered by his brother so that he could ally with Paurus. If Sinharan were in power, it would give us a much-needed base to station our troops.’

  ‘We have sufficient hands, acharya. Let's mount an attack,’ suggested Chandragupta quite predictably.

  ‘That would be foolish. Never interrupt the enemy while he's in the process of making a mistake,’ counselled the shadowy Brahmin.

  ‘And what mistake is Mallayrajya making?’ asked a puzzled Chandragupta.

  ‘Not making. About to make.’ ‘About to make? Acharya, as usual you're talking in riddles.’

  ‘The kingdom of Mallayrajya is about to surrender itself to us,’ said Chanakya, leaving Chandragupta dumbfounded.

  The cottage of Nipunaka was eerie. For one thing, it was built at the edge of a deserted cremation ground. For another, it was surrounded by ghostly banyan trees from which hung numerous symbols of the black arts— skulls, dead animals, earthen jars of alcohol, knives smeared in vermilion blood, and other offerings to the countless unexplained negative forces that ruled Nipunaka's dark world. An eccentric practitioner of esoteric medicine, pharmacology, sorcery, astrology and psychology, Nipunaka wore black robes and a garland fashioned from the skulls of infants. His rituals supposedly involved human sacrifice and tantric sex.

  Chanakya was not impressed by the trappings of magic. He couldn't give a horse's fart if Nipunaka wanted to dance upon a corpse in the middle of the night while pouring wine into a ritualistic fire. To each his own, he reasoned. What Chanakya did believe in was the power of fools and the folly of group psychology.

  ‘What brings the renowned Chanakya to my humble abode?’ asked Nipunaka, bowing low.

  ‘Don't be humble, Nipunaka. You're not that great. H
umility is better left to kings!’ Chanakya advised him.

  Nipunaka laughed. It was a sinister, menacing laugh that seemed to echo through the dark forest. ‘You obviously have one of your naughty schemes taking shape inside that fertile mind of yours,’ chuckled Nipunaka. ‘Will I get to sacrifice a virgin?’

  ‘No one's a virgin, Nipunaka. Life screws them all,’ said Chanakya playfully. Nipunaka laughed again. The sound that emerged was even more dreadful as the weird doctor of ghoulish sciences expressed his enjoyment of the joke. Chanakya had the uncanny ability to plumb the lowest depths of the human mind. It was his greatest asset.

  ‘This is my disciple, Sinharan,’ Chanakya said indicating his companion. ‘He's the rightful heir to the throne of Mallayrajya. I need your help to win it back for him.’

  ‘I am a simple tantric, O acharya. I can perform a sacred ritual so that he's able to ascend the throne,’ suggested Nipunaka helpfully.

  ‘I don't really give a rat's ass about those perverted orgies you organise every once in a while at some poor fool's expense,’ commented Chanakya. ‘I need your skills in psychology, drama, theatrics. Not your usual evil incantations,’ he continued while placing a bag of gold panas in front of the mad scientist.

  Nipunaka smiled, quietly this time. ‘What exactly do you have in mind, acharya?’ he asked as he picked up and tucked away the bag of gold deftly in a swift, wellpractised motion.

  ‘Sinharan here would like to share some secrets about Mallayrajya with you. Listen to him very carefully and memorise whatever it is that he has to tell you,’ instructed the sagacious Brahmin.