Chankya's Chant (15 page)

‘Where is Prime Minister Shaktarji?’

‘He’s already been taken to Pipplivan where Senapati Maurya awaits him. He needs to be kept secure from the king and there’s no safer place than the camp of Senapati Maurya. Acharya, you’re also to proceed to Pipplivan immediately. The alarm will have been sounded and the royal guards will be searching for you. I have a horse waiting.’

‘But what of Katyayanji? I have to meet him and apologise for having unleashed my temper in Dhanananda’s court,’ said Chanakya.

‘He knows you too well, sir. He’s also on the side of truth and justice. He believes, however, that he can do much more to eradicate Dhanananda and his abominable government by being inside rather than outside. He says that you’re the tiger that will attack Dhanananda from the outside while he’s simply the germ that will create a storm inside Dhanananda’s stomach!’

In the quiet of the dark night—not unlike the dark night when Chanakya had cremated his father and fled— they set off for Pipplivan on horseback.

It was still a few hours before dawn when they reached Pipplivan—not much more than a cluster of huts and mud-brick houses located along the banks of a stream. The Lilliputian horsemen led him to one of the slightly larger houses. The senapati was awake and conferring with someone who got up and left the moment their party arrived.

Senapati Maurya was relieved to see Chanakya safe. He bowed before the acharya and said ‘Magadha needs you, O wise teacher. Help me rid my motherland of the leeches that are sucking her dry!’

‘The time’s not yet ripe, Senapati. The only great achievements that make it to the pages of history are those to which tremendous thought and preparation have been given.’

‘I await your guidance, revered teacher. But come, you must be tired. And your wounds and scratches need to be cleaned. I’ll ask my wife to provide clean garments and some breakfast. Please follow me, I’ll show you where you can bathe.’

‘Better treatment than I would have expected at the hands of a
vrishala
,’ thought Chanakya to himself. Maurya was considered a vrishala—an outcaste Kshatriya —by upper-caste Brahmins such as Chanakya. Maurya’s father had abandoned the strict caste hierarchy of Hinduism to adopt the ways of the great teacher, Gautam Buddha. The senapati had eventually returned to the folds of Hinduism but would permanently bear the mark of Hindu indignation towards the prodigal by being branded a vrishala.

Bathed, dressed, and morning prayers concluded, Chanakya sat on the little terrace outside Maurya’s hut. The senapati’s wife had placed before him a simple breakfast of millet porridge and hot milk. The sun had just risen and peacocks were dancing in the garden outside, their iridescent blue-green plumage fanning out to reveal their mysteriously beautiful feathered eyes. This was the land of peacocks, and Maurya derived his own family name from them—
mor
—peacock.

Outside the house, a group of young boys was busy in a game of role-playing. One of them had tied a scarf around his head and had tucked a peacock feather into his headband. He was the make-believe emperor, sitting atop a large rock. The other boys standing around him were either subjects or court officials.

‘Attention! The court of the wise and benevolent Maharaj Chandragupta, Emperor of the world, is now in session. Come and be heard!’ droned a boy playing the role of prime minister and standing by the king’s side.

‘O great King. I’m in trouble. My neighbour sold me his well but he continues to draw water from it. Please stop him,’ pleaded a boy acting the part of the aggrieved.

‘Who is the seller of the well?’ asked the miniature king.

‘I am, my lord. But I sold him the well, not the water inside it. Please let your justice prevail,’ replied another boy, slightly older.

Addressing the senior one, the king grandly pronounced, ‘You’re right. You sold the well, not the water. This would mean that you’re wrongly keeping water in someone else’s well. Please empty it! Next case!’

Chanakya chuckled to himself. He was watching this little drama with great interest. He decided to join the fun. He got up from the terrace where he was seated, walked up and stood before the king with folded hands.

‘Yes, Brahmin? What is it that you want?’ asked the boy seriously.

‘O illustrious King, I’m a poor Brahmin. I need milk and ghee for the
yajnas
—the rituals—that I perform but I have no cow. Please assist me, O protector of the land,’ said Chanakya earnestly.

‘Treasurer! Give this Brahmin a cow,’ commanded the king as the mock official came forward to hand Chanakya a pebble—the substitute cow.

‘But I don’t have any money to pay for it, my king,’ explained Chanakya.

‘O Brahmin. If your offerings to the gods are inadequate, how will the bounty of my kingdom be adequate? And if my kingdom is not prosperous, from where will I collect taxes? And if there are no taxes, what will happen to the treasury and the army? Who will defend the kingdom if there is no army? So, you see, I am not doing you a favour. I’m simply guaranteeing my own prosperity!’ explained the intellectual giant of a boy.

Chanakya smiled and blessed the boy. ‘Who are you, child?’ he asked.

‘I am Chandragupta. The son of Senapati Maurya.’

‘Shall I take you to meet Shaktarji?’ enquired the senapati emerging from the house. Chanakya nodded. It was time to meet his departed father’s dearest friend —a comrade for whom Chanak had laid down his very life.

The old man that Chanakya saw was frail and battered. Years of deprivation, foul living conditions, food unfit for human consumption, sickness, and brutal repression had taken their toll on the former prime minister. Chanakya’s memories of Shaktar were of an aristocratic and sophisticated noble, always impeccably dressed in the finest silks and adorned with the richest of gold and diamond amulets, rings and necklaces. He could barely recognise what once used to be the second-most powerful man in the kingdom.

Chanakya prostrated himself before Shaktar and the old man asked him to rise. When Chanakya got up and saw Shaktar’s face, the octogenarian had tears in his eyes. He reached out his hand to place it on Chanakya’s head to bless him affectionately.

‘You’re the only son that I have left, Chanakya. My real sons are all dead. And my daughter—Suvasini— whom you loved so dearly, is worse than dead. Your father never broached the topic but I knew that he wanted you and my daughter to eventually marry, merging both families into one.’

Chanakya remained silent.

‘What terrible conjunction of planets in my horoscope has produced this endless nightmare? My wife, dead; my best friend Chanak, dead; my sons, dead; my daughter, a concubine of Rakshas; my body, shattered and weak; the kingdom—in the hands of a psychopath!’ continued the old man as his misery flooded over.

Chanakya gripped Shaktar’s hand and said, ‘The nightmare shall end soon. I promise. But you need to stir yourself from this troubled slumber. One must awake, see the rays of the sun, and realise that it was all just a terrible dream. Help me, Shaktarji and senapatiji.’

‘What do I possess that can help you, Chanakya?’ asked Senapati Maurya.

‘Chandragupta.’

‘And what do I have that can possibly help?’ asked Shaktar.

‘The dwarves.’

The kings of Magadha knew that an army moves on its stomach. The royal treasury—the
rajakosh
—was even more critical than the army itself because the treasury was the fuel that propelled the fighting machine. Mining was a state monopoly so all the gold, silver or precious stones mined in the land automatically found their way to the rajakosh.

The protection and security of the rajakosh was achieved in various ways. The official state treasury would always be located in the capital but be built in such a way that access to the prized metals and gems would be through three underground floors of trapdoors and removable ladders. The wall and floors of the underground structure would lie encased in an extra-thick layer of stone so that any ambitious tunnel thief would find his access permanently blocked. The treasury would usually be located in the northern quarter of the capital, sandwiched between the royal residence and the city’s main temple. Concentric circles of guards would police the treasury day and night, while sharpshooters with bows and poisoned arrows would man the innumerable towers that surrounded the rajakosh. It was instant death for any thug seeking material gratification.

The other measure of security was to decentralise the rajakosh and to create secret troves in remote locations. Usually, condemned prisoners would build such remote treasure hides and would be executed shortly thereafter. With the exception of the king and his prime minister, no one would know the whereabouts of such clandestine stores. Very often, the actual storehouse would be built in a pit underground with narrow secret passages for access. On purpose, many of these would be built to prevent access to a full-grown adult and, often, the only way to reach the store would be by sending down trained dwarves. The hoard would usually be camouflaged with dense vegetation, snakes, scorpions and wild animals let loose in the environs to discourage bounty-seekers.

Chanakya knew that the previous prime minister, Shaktar, would be aware of any covert repository of Dhanananda, and that the key to accessing the prize would be Katyayan’s dwarves.