A Note on Ṣāḍguṇya by Ludo Rocher

[Nityanand Misra]

Dear scholars,

I am looking for a PDF of the following article: Rocher, Ludo (1981). A Note on Ṣāḍguṇya. In Ācārya-Vandanā: D. R. Bhandarkar Birth Centenary Volume, ed. Samaresh Bandyopadhyay, 319–325. Calcutta: University of Calcutta. Please help if possible.

Nityānanda Miśra

[Nityanand Misra]

Found it on archive.org, thanks to a user on X

https://archive.org/details/dli.calcutta.11191/page/319/mode/1up

[Shreevatsa R]

This may be either well-known or irrelevant, but just in case it had escaped your attention: note that the beginning of Pañcatantra's Book 3, Kākolukīyam, has the crow king (Meghavarṇa) and his ministers discuss precisely these six, mentioning them both individually (sandhi-vigraha-yāna-āsana-saṃśraya-dvadībhāva) and by the general name (ṣāḍguṇya). (And even going beyond: ṣāḍguṇyād aparaḥ…)
And the Pañcatantra of course is described as a book on nīti (related to naya?), and begins with verses mentioning arthaśāstra (sakalārthaśāstrasāraṃ…) and naya (manave vācaspataye … naya-śāstra-kartṛbhyaḥ).

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[Nityanand Misra]

On Tuesday, 7 July 2026 at 8:22:20 pm UTC+5:30 Shreevatsa R wrote:

This may be either well-known or irrelevant, but just in case it had escaped your attention: note that the beginning of Pañcatantra's Book 3, Kākolukīyam, has the crow king (Meghavarṇa) and his ministers discuss precisely these six, mentioning them both individually (sandhi-vigraha-yāna-āsana-saṃśraya-dvadībhāva) and by the general name (ṣāḍguṇya). (And even going beyond: ṣāḍguṇyād aparaḥ…)
And the Pañcatantra of course is described as a book on nīti (related to naya?), and begins with verses mentioning arthaśāstra (sakalārthaśāstrasāraṃ…) and naya (manave vācaspataye … naya-śāstra-kartṛbhyaḥ).

Namaskāra, Sh. Shreevatsa,

Thanks for your kind email. It may or may not be well-known, but it is certainly relevant. 

I am aware of the discussion on ṣāḍguṇya in the third book of the Pañcatantra. The seventh expedient, beyond ṣāḍguṇya, is chala as per one of the two variant readings of the text.

Reading 1: evaṃ gate’pi ṣāḍguṇyād aparaś-chalo’pyupāyo’sti

Reading 2: evaṃ gate’pi ṣāḍguṇyād aparaḥ sthūlo’bhiprāyo’sti

Interestingly, later in the third book, Sthirajīvin calls his method the fifth expedient beyond the caturupāya (sāman, dāna, daṇḍa, and bheda). It seems the author of the Pañcatantra wanted to emphasise that the strategy of total deceit is beyond the textbook expedients which fall under the caturupāya and the ṣāḍguṇya. Although it may be argued that the strategy of chala that Sthirajīvin prevailed upon Meghavarṇa to follow is a kind of dvadhībhāva. 

While the term ṣāḍguṇya appears only in the third book (Kākolukīya), the six expedients are mentioned by name elsewhere also in the Pañcatantra. Damanaka mentions them to Karaṭaka in the first book (Mitrabheda), and the kaulikastrī (weaver’s wife) mentions them to the kaulika (weaver) in the fifth book (Aparīkṣitakāraka). This shows that the author of Pañcatantra was well familiar with the concept of ṣāḍguṇya. 

Book 1: tadenaṃ gatvā bhaya-kāraṇaṃ vijñāya sandhi-vigraha-yāna-āsana-saṃśraya-dvaidhī-bhāvānām ekatamena saṃvidhāsye

Book 5: aparaṃ mahatī kleśa-paramparaiṣā rājya-sthitiḥ sandhi-vigraha-yānāsana-saṃśraya-dvaidhībhāvādibhiḥ kadācit puruṣasya sukhaṃ na prayacchatīti

You are correct that the Pañcatantra is a Nītiśāstra/Nayaśāstra.

The other famed fabulous (pun intended) Nītiśāstra/Nayaśāstra, the Hitopadeśa, also has an implied reference to the ṣāḍguṇya in verse 2.75 (or 2.77): budhais-tyakte rājye na hi bhavati nītir-guṇavatī. The word guṇavatī is interpreted in some commentaries as referring to ṣāḍguṇya.

The Arthaśāstra, as you may be aware, discusses ṣāḍguṇya in the specific context of dealing with other kings (foreign policy). 

I am currently writing an article on ṣāḍguṇya. I will share the article with the list once it is published.