ABSTRACT
Chandragupta and Chanakya, also known as Kautilya, were exiles from the Nanda Kingdom of Magadha who, after Alexander’s death in 323 BCE, began to take advantage of the relative chaos. While Chandragupta made major advances in terms of the area he controlled, it was Asoka who, through a number of ruthless and bloody campaigns, managed to control nearly the entire subcontinent of India. India was a major power that reached from the Caspian Sea to the Bay of Bengal and north to Kabul not through a hierarchy, but through what will be identified as a more relational approach. As Watson points out, while Hinduism was a great source of unity and community between many different cultures, the ideas of the Greeks and Buddhists were arriving in India and offered Chandragupta the opportunity to create an empire “based on Indian practice, but Persian in scope”.
