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The Panchatantra is one of the best known classics of ancient India. Composed in Sanskrit giver 1600 years ago, its satirical stories of human foibles in animal garb soon round the world, being rendered into middle Persian around the 6th, into Arabic around the 8th, and into European languages by the 15th century A.D. These entirely secular tales of wit, virtue and wickedness, have retained their freshness and timeless appeal though number translation-over the ages. This book is new translation from selected for the tastes of today.

The translation A.N.D. Haksar, an Indian diplomat and educated at the Universities of Allahabad and Oxford. He has been India’s High Commissioner to Kenya and Seychelles, and Ambassador to Portugal and Yugoslavia. Studying and translating from the Sanskrit Classics since many years he has also translation play of Bhasa.

The Panchatantra is one of the best known Classics of ancient India. Composed in Sanskrit about 1600 years ago, its lively stories, assured but vivid prose punctuated by pithy verses, assured it a continuing place of province in classical literature the centuries. On account of its uncomplicated and easy to understand Sanskrit it was particularly popular as a text for beginners in the study of that complex language. Hence the misconception that it is suitable only for children On the contrary it has an appeal for all ages.

Panchatantra means five Books or Systems. It is a collection of nearly ninety stories and stories within stories. The characters in these fables are animals as well as humans. The settings are situations of everyday life in towns and villages, in palaces, on farms and in forests. The mood ranges from the didactic and Cynical to the ribald and comic. The Characters enact the foibles and follies, the virtues and the villainies of human conduct. They utter wise words and perform good deeds as well as indulge in every king of sharp practice. Set in ancient India, they could exist at any time or place.

The five books of the Panchatantra have the title: Losing Friends, Making friends, Of Crows Own, Loss of gains, and Rash action. The author was perhaps Vishnu Sharma, the narrator of the main story in the work. It is difficult to trace the city of Mahilaropya where it is set. Some scholars think it was in the Vakataka Empire in Deccan. The genre of the composition is the nidarshanakatha or illustrative story, which is satirical and intended to teach by example. As indicated at their beginning, the stories were composed to teach statecraft and the rules of politics in an attractive, simple and effective way. The Panchatantra is one of the first sets of stories to have traveled from one civilization to another though the medium of translation. It was rendered into Pehlavi or middle Persian in the sixth century A.D. on the orders or middle Persian in the Anushirvan. Thereafter it was translation into Syriac and later into Arabic in the time of the Caliph al-Mansur (A.D.753-84). The Arabic title Kalilah wa dimnah is considered to be derived from Karataka and Damanaka, the names of two jackals who play a leading part in come of the stories. Subsequent translation was made into Spanish and other European languages in a variety of foams. La Fontaine acknowledged the Indian he wrote his fable in seventeenth century France.

The Panchatantra is also of historic interest as, apart from giving interesting description of social life and attitudes, it also refers to earlier Indian writers like Panini, Chanakya and vatsyayana. The earliest extant version of its original text is believed to have come from eleventh century Kashmir. It was introduced to the modern would by German scholars in the last century. The best known English translations were made by the American orient lists F. Edgerton in 1924 and A.W. Ryder in 1925. Sixty five years later a selection of the Panchatantra tales for the modern reader is presented here in a new translation from the original Sanskrit text.

All these translation first appeared either in the “Statesman”, New Delhi, during 1988 or in the “National Herald”, New Delhi, during 1990. The translation would like to thank the Editors of both the newspapers for agreeing to their publication in book form. He is also grateful to his colleagues Shri Tajinder Singh and Shri M.L. Nankani for their help preparing the typescript. Above all, he thinks Shrimati Priti Haksar, his wife, for her unfailing support.