UNDERSTANDING KAUTILYA'S STATECRAFT AND MANDAL THEORY

Kautilya’s Arthashastra is very less researched or under researched scripture of ancient India. During the course of study this fact was established after going through the literature available on Arthashastra by both Indian and foreign authors or thinkers. Most of them agree that there is much more to be done in this area. The present study is an endeavor to do the same. If we want to understand the working of Indian state so far can Arthashastra be a guiding manual; this is a query that has been explored in the study. Also there is a need to study and explore & re-explore our ancient scriptures to gain fruitful inspiration from them for our future domestic and foreign policy endeavors. I am grateful to ICSSR for giving me an opportunity to do the same. During the course of the study both Arthashastra and related literature was read re-read and reinterpreted in the light of the topic of the project. The method adopted was Hermeneutics which denotes study for understanding and interpretation of ancient text. The book based on the final report of the project is submitted before the readers with the hope that more work would be done on Kautilya’s Arthashastra in future.