Timeless Lessons in Citizenship and Governance from "The Nitopadesha"—Part 1: The Jewel of Citizencraft

The ancient republic of Chakrapuri, much like most modern democracies, faced a growing problem: its young citizens were disengaged from civic life. Consumed by personal interests and fleeting pleasures, they began to neglect the very responsibilities that upheld their freedoms. The elders of Chakrapuri feared that without an active citizenry, their republic would inevitably fall prey to the ambitions of monarchs, losing its cherished liberties.

Desperate to revive the civic spirit of their youth, the elders sought the wisdom of Nitina of Takshashila, a renowned teacher of citizencraft. They invited him to Chakrapuri, hoping he could instill in their children the principles of governance and public duty. Arriving in chains, bound by fate as much as by man, Nitina made his way to the Peepal tree at the heart of Chakrapuri. There, he began his lessons—not just for the young, but for all who wished to listen.

Thus was born The Nitopadesha—a collection of interwoven, Panchatantra-esque stories filled with talking animals and shrewd moral lessons. Beneath these fables lie deep insights into governance, economics, and statecraft—ideas that still resonate in contemporary economics textbooks nearly two millennia later.

By sheer chance, a Tocharian translation of The Nitopadesha survived the destruction of Takshashila and, centuries later, found its way to Professor Asfandyar, a scholar from Afghanistan. In what can only be called an improbable twist of fate, he handed it to Nitin Pai of The Takshashila Institution, a modern-day policy wonk who, much like his namesake Nitina, was dedicated to teaching the art of statecraft.

Reading The Nitopadesha today feels almost surreal. Many of its ideas align with what we now understand in economics and governance, as if its wisdom has quietly shaped societies for centuries. Roman historians like Tacitus may have drawn from Nitina’s teachings while shaping the very foundations of Western political thought. The subcontinent, however, has largely forgotten these lessons.

Until now.

This article is the first in a four-part series exploring The Nitopadesha and its timeless lessons in citizenship and governance. We begin with the first book, The Jewel of Citizencraft, examining the core principles that make and sustain prosperous republics. As Bibek Debroy notes in his foreword:

… had the drafters of India’s Constitution been more familiar with the fox’s maxims [the lessons of citizencraft from The Nitopadesha], the fundamental duties section might have been crafted differently.

It is time we rediscover these lessons, not as a relic of the past, but as a guide for the future.

Where to Live?

The most difficult endeavor for the human-born
Is to achieve the balance of moderation.

… Examine what you have been told,
… Hold them to the lamp of critical enquiry
And proceed as reason directs.

Nitina begins his lesson with the story of Rajinidatta, a humble crow bound by fate yet striving to change it—much like himself. The first book of The Nitopadesha is structured as stories narrated by Rajinidatta, each offering a lesson in governance.

In the first story, The Donkey Who Settled in the Mountain Realm, the key insight is that it is better to live where there’s a rule of law and no one is above it. A realm without laws cannot protect its people; a realm where laws are applied unequally breeds corruption and decay.

A land without laws is doomed to descend into poverty, dishonesty, and barbarianism.

Contrary to what we might believe, greed is a powerful driving force in human affairs. Greed can be a catalyst for ambition and progress. If people had no self-interest, many would lack the motivation to build, trade, or innovate. However, unchecked greed leads to destruction.

Finding the moderate amidst the extremes is a recurring theme throughout the book. The second story, The Duck Who Caught Two Fish, illustrates what happens when greed is left unchecked by personal discipline and societal norms. The second lesson in this story is that greed must be managed, not eliminated, and channeled for the greater good.

Tragedy of the Commons

The second story, The Duck Who Caught Two Fish, is a lesson in managing public goods—the commons. Left to their own devices, the ducks living in the Hardinatataka pond quickly turn selfish, thinking:

If there are fewer fish in the pond, it is better for me to catch as many as I can, for the others will surely not spare any.

This short-sighted, SELFMAXXING™ attitude is widely prevalent today. It is the very reason we often ask, “Why can’t we have nice things?” without realizing that when everyone looks out solely for themselves, the collective good collapses.

At its core, the lesson from the story is this:

Good conduct is the balance of swaartha (self-interest) and para-artha (public interest).

A citizen must balance self-interest and public interest. But expecting everyone to do so voluntarily is naive, as Chandramani, Rajinidatta’s listener, rightfully points out. Instead, to ensure that self-interest does not undermine society, three things are necessary:

1. The society must uphold its laws and reinforce them through rewards and punishments.
2. The ruler must ensure that laws are just and applied fairly to all.
3. The individual must prioritize public interest over personal gain.

For those who wish to change society for the better, the first step is not to expect others to change but to hold themselves to a higher standard of accountability than the rest of society. Yet, to truly protect the commons, cooperation is key, a lesson that leads us to the next story.

Better Together

Without cooperation no individual can truly be secure
Without cooperation no individual can truly be prosperous
Without cooperation no individual can truly be happy
Without cooperation, security, prosperity and happiness
are like fireflies and shooting stars,
now here and now gone.

The third story, The Bund That Fell Short, demonstrates an important lesson: without cooperating for the common good, no society can prosper. A community that fails to set aside differences and work toward shared goals will crumble under its own divisions.

Cooperation does not mean everyone bears an equal burden; it means each carries their fair share based on their abilities. However, the benefits and burdens of cooperation are rarely distributed evenly—which seems unjust. When pointed this out, Rajinidutta offers a fitting reply:

Cooperation is not simple addition and subtraction. It is greater than the sum of its parts. … the best cooperation is the one that improves fairness.

Cooperation is not about achieving perfect equality but about ensuring fairness in outcomes. When people work together, the collective benefit is both fairer and greater than what any individual could achieve alone.

Societies are often diverse and dissimilar, and bringing people together for the common good is not always easy. So, how do we ensure cooperation? The wise sages offer two guiding principles:

1. Society must uphold cooperation as a virtue by recognizing those who contribute to the common good as worthy and discouraging those who selfishly free-ride on the system.
2. Individuals must demonstrate a willingness to cooperate not because they are coerced but because a thriving society depends on it.

This story makes it clear that cooperation is necessary to achieve harmony. But it isn’t sufficient on its own. For a society to function, each citizen must also understand and fulfill their duties, a lesson the musicians teach us in the following story.

Stay in Your Lane

The names in these stories are amusing. In this one, The Musicians and the Celestial Buffalo, we have Trisong! I wonder if these names were in the original text or if they were altered in translation?

Moving on to the key lesson:

… the world is in harmony when everyone does their own duty and no one interferes with others’ duties.

It is essential not only to fulfill your own duty but also to avoid interfering in others’ roles. Most well-intentioned people understand, at least in principle, the former—doing their job well—but few recognize that overstepping into another’s domain can be just as harmful as neglecting one’s responsibilities.

This is especially hard in societies where people often fail to do their duties properly, leading others to feel they must step in and compensate. In Indian philosophy, dharma is about doing what is yours to do and expecting others to do what’s theirs. Adharma, on the other hand, is intruding into others’ duties. A prosperous and harmonious realm depends on everyone staying within their proper roles—this applies not just to individuals but also to institutions.

A government should not be running businesses (something the overreaching Indian government would do well to learn), just as businesses have no business making and enforcing laws (should a social media company dictate what information can be shared?). Overreach in governance often leads to inefficiency and stagnation, and doing one thing usually comes at the cost of being unable to do something else far more important.

Duties and rules are deeply interconnected. Rules shape society—and bad rules often do more harm than good. This brings us to the next lesson.

Outcomes Not Intentions

Many lessons from The Nitopadesha are counterintuitive—not just for ordinary citizens but even for policymakers. When I first started learning public policy analysis, I had to retrain my intuitions and lean into these ideas.

Perhaps the most counterintuitive of them all are these two lessons from The Crane and Her Employees:

1. A bad rule is often worse than no rule.

2. Rules should be evaluated not by their intentions but by their outcomes.

Bad rules fail because people don’t follow them. Over time, those who break bad rules also start breaking good rules. This erodes the legitimacy of laws, creating a world where those who disregard morality and rules succeed—and soon, everyone follows their lead. Corruption, for example, is not just an ethical failure but also a symptom of bad rules.

A common defense of a bad policy is: “The policy was good and well-intentioned, but the implementation failed.” Often, the blame is shifted to society for not following the rule rather than acknowledging the policymakers’ fault in not accounting for its implementation and enforcement. If a policy causes more problems than it solves, then regardless of its good intentions, it was a bad rule to begin with.

Bad rules often share common characteristics:

1. They are impossible to enforce. While “let’s ban drinking alcohol!” sounds good on paper, it keeps causing more problems than it supposedly solves.

2. They interfere with the proper roles of the market and society. The go-to action of the Indian government is to enter businesses themselves—but can you blame them when that’s what people expect?

3. They create an illusion of effectiveness rather than actual results. While the mandatory helmet rule was intended for safety, many people cheat the system and wear unsafe, slightly better than baseball caps helmets just to avoid fines—meaning the law is followed in form, but not in spirit.

Societies filled with bad rules breed cynicism and distrust in governance. This is why citizens must be aware of and criticize such rules instead of blindly trusting leaders and turning them into heroes.

That’s a lesson the citizens of Oravela fail to learn in the next story.

Heroes Belong in Films

The story of The Mongoose Who Was Wise and Just is the finest lesson in The Nitopadesha. It talks about the dangers of hero worship and the corrupting nature of power:

It is in the nature of power to corrupt its holders, and nothing hastens the corruption as uncritical praise.

When citizens start seeing their leaders as unwavering heroes, they open the door to dictatorship. Instead, citizens must view their leaders as fallible individuals, open to criticism. No leader is too important to be exempt from scrutiny, and those who fear criticism are tyrants.

As a great thinker once said:

Eternal vigilance is the price of liberty.

If power inevitably corrupts, the best way to keep it in check is by devolving power to lower levels. Interestingly, the Indian Constitution gives significant decision-making authority to the lower levels of government—the panchayaths and the municipalities—to function as self-governing institutions (we recently made a People’s Master Plan for our municipality).

Having such a deep understanding of the principles of democracy and devolution in—by all means—ancient times makes me think of the knowledge we must have lost over the centuries. It is like when I was in Rajasthan, where everything reminded me of our glorious past, and everything hinted at a society in decline.

A society improves through the constant critique of its rulers. Just as a rule should be judged by its outcomes and not its intentions, a ruler should be by the consequences of their actions.

We learn more about this in the following story.

Unintended Consequences

From the story of The Monkey and the Fearsome Four-Eyed Dogs, we learn two important lessons:

1. While intentions are important, actions must be judged by their consequences.

2. The best action is the one that expects the most benefit and the least harm, i.e., the marginally better action.

Good intentions don’t always lead to good outcomes. Besides, it is often difficult to determine the true intentions of an action, but it’s much easier to evaluate the consequences of that action.

… in all matters of public interest, one must judge things from the calculation of consequences.

Even with the purest intentions, seemingly good actions can produce unintended consequences that may harm society. A prime example is the relatively recent alcohol ban in Kerala (and in other states and countries throughout history). While the intentions were noble (reducing alcoholism and related physical and mental health consequences), the actions justifiable (closing down bars), the actual consequences were a drug epidemic and the revival of organized crime in the state.

… the virtue of a doer itself does not guarantee good outcomes.

Being well-intentioned, virtuous, and dutiful does not guarantee positive outcomes. One must also be vigilant about the consequences of their actions and use them as a metric of success. Outcomes also depend on how citizens and leaders conduct themselves, as Ratrideva, the wise old owl, reminds us in the last story.

Words Shape Worlds

The final story in the first book of The Nitopadesha, The Owl’s Amulet, takes place in the wonderful tree named Sambhashadri—a tree so magnificent that it is home to millions of birds and animals, with flowers so colorful that “it is said that the royal peacocks use them to dye their plumage.”

Truly a fitting setting for a final lesson:

… the condition of a society is only as good as its discourse.

The quality of discourse is the most important factor wherever public debate and dialogue matter. When discourse deteriorates—becoming polarized, hostile, or dishonest—the realm ends up in a sorry state, as the leaders and rulers of such a society are bound to make the same mistakes as their fellow citizens.

… compassionate hearts and polite tongues lead to well-being, prosperity, and happiness.

This is true even when civility is not reciprocated because the alternative is disorder and anarchy. When people communicate with respect and empathy, they build a foundation of trust and cooperation—both essential to a thriving society.

The Essence of Citizencraft

Thus concludes the first book of The Nitopadesha.

Like you and me, Rajinidatta and Chandramani sit in contemplation before Chandramani asks, “O Rajinidatta, what is the essence of it all?”

To summarize the timeless lessons from The Jewel of Citizencraft:

1. Live where there’s a rule of law and no one is above it.
2. Balance self-interest with the public good.
3. Cooperate for the common benefit of society.
4. Fulfil your duty and don’t interfere in others’ duties.
5. Evaluate rules by outcomes, not intentions.
6. Stay critical and vigilant of your leaders.
7. Judge actions by consequences.
8. Converse by being polite, civil, and mindful.

The second book of The Nitopadesha, The Thread of the Science of Prosperity, gets into the intricacies of markets and is filled with lessons in economics. But that’s an inception of stories for another time.