Book Spotlight: Nitin Pai | The Nitopadesha

It's wonderful to be on this show talking about books. If you look at Indian literature, classical Indian literature about civics, about economics, about politics, warfare, most of the books are written from the perspective of a prince or a king. The Mahabharata, of course, is about kings, it's about duties and actions of kings and princes and royal families, but very few people know that the Panchatantra is also meant as a book of instruction for princes.

The Hitopadesh is also a book of instruction for princes. So we've read about these stories in Amar Chitra Katha, Tinkle, Chandamama, etc. and maybe even in the original texts.

But it's always been a book of, you know, these books are books for princes. So I was looking for a book which could educate citizens and especially citizens of democracies who are important players in the running of the state, although the public perception is that the state is somebody else, which is the legislature, executive, police, judiciary and so on. But the citizens are almost, I mean, are integral parts of the state, they are more important than these other elements.

But there are very few Indian classics, which look at what citizens ought to do, the right way of behaviour for citizens, a sort of morality of citizens of a democracy didn't exist. So this book is really a book of moral tales for citizens, it's for citizens to act as citizens, for citizens who want to run for public office, citizens who want to get elected and citizens who want to be important members of the economy. What motivated you to write this book?

Motivation for the book

We teach public policy at Takshashila and at the time of writing this book, we'd probably been teaching for about 9 to 10 years and we teach, you know, case studies from economics, we look at the best curriculum out there, which is relevant to India and make sure that our students are familiar with that and our students learn from that.

But there were very few storybooks that I could recommend, right, it's one thing for you to read a textbook, you know, look at graphs, charts, equations and do problems at the end of chapter, it's one thing for you to read case studies, which are interesting to read, but the very few stories, lessons, which are told in the form of stories which are relevant to us. And that's one of the big reasons. So, in fact, in the end of the book, I've thanked all my students, who've been my GCPP  students and PGP students over the years, for many of the topics and themes in the books arose from conversations with students in the classroom.

Why did you choose stories as the format for this book?

See, stories at one level are the least resistance path to imbibe ideas, these are the oldest form of entertainment, oldest form of instruction, oldest form of cultural transmission in human history. So, they transmit sometimes very complex, very subtle ideas to unsuspecting people like kids and others, you know, over generations or periods of time. So, that's the route I've taken, right, so can we use very simple, very short stories like Aesop's fables to communicate difficult, complex, and sometimes very subtle ideas to people who are not really looking for an education, it's an entertaining session, you could read a book, you can read stories because they entertain you.

But somewhere, you know, maybe deviously or at a subliminal level, they also educate you. So, that's most of the plot in the book, like each story has a message, sometimes more than one messages, sometimes the message is open-ended, sometimes there is a very coherent conclusion. But one of the techniques I've used in the book is the Indian way of storytelling, which is nested, right, it's stories within stories.

The Arabian Nights most famously, you know, brought this to the rest of the world, Arabian Nights are also, the core Arabian Nights story is an Indian text, like the Panchatantra is like that, Mahabharata is like that, there are stories within stories. And that's the route I've adopted in this book. And more interestingly, each story is a puzzle, there are puzzles in each stories for people to find out, they are not explicitly mentioned, but anybody who reads the book very closely will find a clue to a puzzle in each of the stories.

Misconceptions Challenged

I think the biggest misconception is that the morality for rulers is the same as a morality for citizens. So, the problem with reading the Panchatantra or Mahabharata and using it as a blueprint for life is that those stories are written for kings. And in today's world, it will be about international relations.

So, when India deals with another country, it deals with another country as a state, so that its relations between states, you know, there are no international, there's no international government. So, the rules between states are usually amoral, there's no morality of any kind, its power is the only conversation, whereas relationships between individuals, relations between citizens are governed by morality, and there is a constitutional morality to this. And very often people who read Mahabharata or Chanakya Niti and say, I'm going to use Chanakya Niti in business, or in my personal life would be making a big mistake.

Because the rules that govern, you know, interpersonal relations are not the same as the ones which govern international relations. That's if I mean, if I can clarify that one big misconception, I think I'll be doing a lot of good to people, to ordinary people, especially who can get into trouble by trying to pretend that they're nation states.

Why the Book matters today

Mainly because I think, a lot of us don't know what the role of a citizen is in society, right.

We are very quick to point out the failings of political leaders, judges, public officials, law enforcement. But very often, we don't investigate our own failings as individual citizens, as well as citizenry as a whole, right. If our public streets are dirty and ugly, for public buildings are ugly, there's pollution in the air.

It's not only because that the politicians are greedy or the bureaucrats are not doing their job. It's because we are polluting these places, we are not treating them as public property, as our common property. In fact, we are shirking away from a sense of commonness.

So, it's very important for citizens, this is not a popular thing to say, you know, it's very easy to be popular by pointing at other people. But looking at ourselves in the mirror as citizens, as a citizen and as citizens as a whole, is an important part of bringing about the change that India needs. So I think that's probably the biggest thing I would expect from, you know, if I have my way and if my book is successful and people who read it, take it to heart, that's probably what I would expect that citizens look at themselves and see what's wrong with their own conduct.