IPLE ASSIGNMENT -1

Kanikas Lessons in Leadership to

Dhritarashtra: Rule2- Use speech as a tool
for deception

Submitted by:
Garima Raghuwanshi
H14142

IPLE ASSIGNMENT -1
Table of Contents
Background ................................................................................................................................ 2
Rule: The meaning ..................................................................................................................... 3
Applicability in Modern Organizations ..................................................................................... 4
Shreyas vs preyas ................................................................................................................... 4
Anrishamsya .......................................................................................................................... 5
Lokasangraha ......................................................................................................................... 6
Productivity and organizational growth ................................................................................. 6
Employee motivation and commitment ................................................................................. 6
Stress levels ............................................................................................................................ 7
Conclusion ................................................................................................................................. 7
References .................................................................................................................................. 8

IPLE ASSIGNMENT -1
Background
In Mahabharata when Yudhisthira is crowned the prince of Hastinapura kingdom by
Dhritarasthra, he is not happy as his son Duryodhana will lose the chance to become the king.
According to him just because he is blind, his son to pay off for it by not being able to qualify
for the kingdom. He becomes jealous of the Pandavas and takes advice from Kanika to deal
with this situation as Pandavas has become very famous as they have earned many empires in
victories.
Kanika who was also known as Kalinga was one of the inner circles of King Dhritarasthra.
He was well known for his knowledge in politics and had expertized to counsel. He was an
expert in knowing the evil policies used in politics and was a strategist introduced to
Duryodhana by Shakuni. His advice convinced Dhritarasthra to support his son in his evil
deeds. By telling a story of a slick jackal which lived in forest and who mastered the art of
tricking others, Kalinga shared some of the rules a leader should follow. The principles are
from the monologue of Kanika to Dhritarasthra on how to treat the enemies. According to
him, King should use Sama, Dama, Danda, Bheda to save his kingdom. Sama means use
conciliatory speech, dana means to do charity or buy them, danda means by giving
punishment to others and bheda means to use the policy of divide and rule.
One of the principles which is a part of Sama neeti is
Vmtrea vinta syd, hrdayena yath kura
This translates to Use speech as a tool for deception
This rule follows Sama Neeti and is means to use conciliatory speech to deceive the enemies
be it the father , son or other relatives.

IPLE ASSIGNMENT -1
Rule: The meaning
The above rule from Kanika neeti means that Confine your sweetness to your words. In your
heart, be like the dagger. This implies that while the one is angry, do not let others know it
from your speech or body language. One should always bear smile on their face to deceive
others and dont ever reprove anyone with signs of anger. One should use sweet and humble
speech before he strikes and even when he is striking others.
There are many examples of this in Indian history. One of the tale describing this rule is that
of Lakshagraha planning by Duryodhana. When Duryodhana knew that Yudhisthira is named
as the prince of the Hastinapura Kingdom, then he got insecured of his own position. He was
very jealous of Pandavas fame and valour. He wanted the kingdom for himself at any cost
and his uncle Shakuni advised him the only way is by killing all the Pandavas. Duryodhana
with the help of a famous architect Purochana created a house made of lac which could be
burnt easily. He made this house for Pandavas and this house has only front entry door and no
other route for exiting. To gain the power or kingdom, Duryodhana planned to conspire
against his own cousins and aunt. He planned all this but was very polite to Pandavas. His
sweet words were to just deceive the Pandavas. He requested them to go to Varnavrat house
and relax there as they all were tired because of their long journey to Bharat and after
conquering so many kings. He was so humble while talking that he had his true intentions
inside his heart.
Outwardly Duryodhana was being humble and was using his sweet words to hide his jealousy
and anger. But inwardly his heart was like a razor and his true intentions were to get rid of
Pandavas so that he can be the King of Hastinapura Empire. Even after following the
Kalinga Neeti , Duryodhana was not successful in his attempt to kill Pandavas as Vidur who
was one of the ministers found out about the conspiracy. The point here is one should be able
to identify who their real enemies are and then only use this principle in the rare cases.

IPLE ASSIGNMENT -1
Applicability in Modern Organizations
In todays organizations the mildest form of this rule if lying which is present everywhere in
businesses. Lying produces results in business whether its an advertisement or a sales pitch.
Many advertisements are made to deceive the consumers and create demand for the product.
When a salesperson tries to sell a product, he uses softness and sweet words to convince the
customer to buy the product. Here the main purpose of the salesman is to sell the product and
not thinking about the possible consequences of it for the customers. Similarly when the
company is advertising its product it just focuses on the positives and hide much important
information from customers otherwise they wont buy them.
For example in case of Maggi the company has hidden the crucial information about its lead
content. To be the leader in noodles market, it deceived crores of consumers about the
harmful health effect it could have on them. Here the principle applied since the use of
sweetness that is nice advertising and in reality it was like a dagger which hurt many
consumers. The lead content was way above the permissible level and ultimately it lead to the
ban of the product. It brought bad name to the company and the consumers trust was broken.
There have been many other instances where many people gained the trust of consumers or
other people in the organization and used sweet speech just to deceive the public from their
true intentions. But wherever this is applied in long term the results where devastating.
Many of the companies show they have reached their profit aimed each year. When a
business is performing well, the expectations of customers start increasing and when the
performance of business is not up to the mark, there are chances of share price being at the
risk of getting decreased. This might also cause risk to many peoples job. The companies thus
try to release provision when the situation is not good financially and bad news is carried
forward to a good profit making year. Thus these lies or being sweet when there might be
crisis situation for customers paramount to being like a dagger in heart to save their
competitive position in the market. The applicability of rule and its consequences can vary
and its implication with respect to some ideas relevant to Indian leadership philosophy is as
follows:

Shreyas vs preyas
This rule which is used to gain power for oneself by hiding the truth from others about ones
intention can bring in fame or power to the person in short term. There are many instances of

IPLE ASSIGNMENT -1
business frauds using this principle like Satyam case where the CEO Ramalinga Raju used
his position to manipulate the financials to seek wealth for him. The board of governors , the
employees and the customers had faith in Ramalinga Raju. He was very humble and there
were no instances when his intentions were doubted. By being polite in tone and using his
humbleness to hide the truth he was able to gain benefit for short amount of time. The
financial reports were not doubted at all as he played very well. But when the truth came out
he had to bear the consequences. So shreyas which imply short term, in this case the short
term consequences were good as people might be deceived for some period of time but the
long term consequences were very bad. They not only affected the person following the
principle but also the others. This others included the employees who had to lose their jobs,
the clients whose projects failed and they lost millions of money and the reputation of the
company which suffered as the trust of millions of people were broken.
When a person possesses power, he has the responsibility to perform his duties well as many
people look at him and his actions. Many peoples trust is tied to him but is this person is
using this to gain benefit for him and to harm the other stakeholders then it can never bring
happiness in long term. When two people work in an organization and the first person gets
his/her work done by being sweet and humble and doesnt give the required credit to other
person then it will lead to failure of trust. If you are working in the same organization for a
long period of time then you will bear the consequence as the people will come to know
about it eventually.

Anrishamsya
This ideal means following non cruelty and non-exploitation. The principle of using words as
a tool for deception is actually a way of exploiting others by hiding the real intentions from
them. When one employees ultimate goal is to get promoted in the company and he uses this
principle, he might be very sweet in taking help from others and make excuses which would
look genuine to take advantage of other nave people. The people will eventually help him
even though this person being their competitor as the first person will appear to a good friend
on face but all this is done just to take advantage of others. The final goal when satisfied that
is to gain promotion, this person will not care about the other people and this will ultimately
be a failure of trust. Thus this principle doesnt follow anrishamsya and its exploitation of
others as well and being cruel to others.

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Lokasangraha
The ideal focusses on common good. The principle focusses on hiding the feeling of anger
and being sweet and when time allows be like a dagger or strike others. It focusses on
harming others with proper planning and plotting. Thus the main intention here is to harm
others. So it wont lead to common good. In situations like military assignments, where a
militant is guarding his country and his dharma is to save the country, this principle might be
helpful. For example suppose a militant who enters the other country and identifies the
terrorists, then the military personnel can deceive them using his principle and ultimately
harm them or kill them which will eventually lead to fulfilment of his own dharma. So the
main task should be to identify who the real enemy is. In organizations where people should
actually trust one another so that the work environment in amiable, if this principle is applied
then people will start distrusting each other and this will eventually lead to the loss of
productivity and companys growth.

Productivity and organizational growth

Now a days companies focuses more on collaboration and team building and suppose in a
team if one person just to gain power consider others as enemies and uses this principle, it
will not only harm them in present but also future. The group dynamics will suffer and people
will always try to find intentions of people who are even genuinely sweet and humble. So the
speech should be humble always but one should not hide the anger. There might be situations
were one gets angry from other and instead of confrontation if he makes it a purpose to take
revenge then no one will gain from this. The team productivity will suffer and the motivation
level of employees will come down. Instead if the angry mood is confronted then he might
actually get to know about the true intention of other people related to situation and he might
understand their situation and the matter will close then and there. Since the environment is
very competitive it is good to not share everything with everyone but one should also not
keep benign intentions for others. It will only hamper the organizational growth. An
organization can function very well when the employees are efficient and if the employees
work in teams then mutual trust is very important. So this principle will harm the
organization culture and team spirit.

Employee motivation and commitment

The employees when join the organization their work requires them to focus on their skills
and competencies and to develop them. Employees motivation depends on their interest in
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IPLE ASSIGNMENT -1
the work and the work environment. When an employee gets rewarded according to his
performance he gets motivated. When the people focus on politics and try to manipulate or
deceive others by sweet talk and striking from back then this will lead to failure of trust and
employees attention will be diverted to these tactics instead of focussing on their skills and
performance level. The commitment level will decrease as people will not be that committed
to their job as they were earlier. As in the case of Satyam or Enron scam, the employees
productivity would have drastically come down because of the disclosure of financial fraud
and thinking about the companys as well their future.

Stress levels
Its already difficult to maintain work life balance because of the work load and the stress
level of employees is high as compared to in last few decades. In this scenario if they have to
bear the pressure of politics and think about tactics to overcome such harmful politics then it
will not only affect their productivity but also lead to increased stress levels. They will not be
able to freely express their problems with others and they might be under the impression as
this information can be used by the other person. This vile politics technique to be like a
dagger shows that one should not trust other and treat others like enemy. Many people are
competitors of employee but one should not focus on eliminating them but instead improving
oneself to raise their level and shine among others.

Conclusion
The use of this principle either in Mahabharata by Duryodhana or in modern organization by
employees can lead to short term happiness of eliminating the competitors but in long term it
will lead to harm of ones reputation and increase the stress level. In the competitive scenario
if one instead of focusing on improving the skills and improving the efficiency focusses on
evil ways to eliminate competitors, he must be doing his own loss as he will not be able to
grow. Instead one should focus on improving the skills which will help in long term and are
not just to satisfy short term motives.

IPLE ASSIGNMENT -1
References
http://www.sacred-texts.com/hin/m01/m01143.htm
http://dhayton.haverford.edu/blog/2013/02/08/forgeries-lies-and-deception-in-history/
http://bizshifts-trends.com/2014/08/17/business-lies-damn-lies-deceit-untruths-fibs-ceosworkers-customers-men-women-lairs-lairs/
http://indiafacts.co.in/modern-bharatas-failure-to-recognize-kanika-neeti/
http://www.indianmirror.com/history/mahabharatha/wax-palace-pg1.html