Shloka 9
Strategy and Survival — Chanakya Niti
यस्मिन्रुष्टे भयं नास्ति तुष्टे नैव धनागमः ।
निग्रहोऽनुग्रहो नास्ति स रुष्टः किं करिष्यति ॥
yasmin ruṣṭe bhayaṃ nāsti tuṣṭe naiva dhanāgamaḥ |
nigraho'nugraho nāsti sa ruṣṭaḥ kiṃ kariṣyati ||
One whose anger inspires no fear and whose pleasure brings no gain; who neither punishes nor grants favor—if such a person is angered, what can he accomplish?
FAQs
Within the broader Nītiśāstra tradition, the verse reflects a political-social environment in which fear (through coercive capacity) and benefit (through patronage) are treated as key instruments of authority. The formulation suggests that an individual lacking both the ability to punish and the capacity to reward would be regarded, in that historical logic, as having limited practical efficacy even when displaying anger.
Power is implicitly framed through two paired mechanisms: (1) generating fear when displeased (nigraha/bhaya as outcomes of coercive capacity) and (2) providing material gain when pleased (anugraha/dhanāgama as outcomes of patronage). The verse characterizes the absence of both as a lack of consequential agency.
The verse uses balanced antithesis (ruṣṭe vs. tuṣṭe; bhaya vs. dhanāgama; nigraha vs. anugraha) to present a compact typology of authority. The rhetorical question “kiṃ kariṣyati” functions as a concluding evaluative device, emphasizing that anger without enforceable consequence is treated as socially and politically ineffectual in the text’s idiom.