After Alexander’s departure, the condition of northern India was full of chaos and confusion. Alexander had no plan to leave his acquired territories in India. He gave the charge of the region lying to the east of Jhelum to Porus. The region between Jhelum and Indus was assigned to Ambhi of Taxila while north Punjab and Kashmir were given to Abhisara. All these Indian rulers were acting as vassals of Alexander. Lower Sindh was kept under the charge of Alexander’s general Peithon while west Punjab was under Phillippns. The rest of north India was ruled by unpopular and oppressive Nanda ruler Agrames or Dhanananda.

The fate of north western India was somehow sealed in the post Alexander era. The uncertainty and confusion saw the rise of an ambitious youth called Chandragupta Maurya, who made a bid for mastery over north western India.

History is very unkind and unclear about the origin and ancestry of Chandragupta. There are three main theories about the ancestry of Chandragupta. According to Brahminical  writers Chandragupta was a sudra by origin while Buddhist tradition ascribe a Kshatriya lineage to him. The third view combines the above theories and suggests that Chandragupta was the son or grandson of a sudra wife of a Nanda king. However, the most acceptable view is, Chandragupta bore Kshatriya blood of Maurya clan in his vein. But he was brought up among commoners as his father a Maurya chief had died before Chandragupta was born. His widowed mother took shelter in Pataliputra and the young Chandragupta was reared among cowherds and hunters until he came across Chanakya who was impressed by his heroic potentialities. Chanakya took him to Taxila and gave him thorough education and training and equipped him with military royalty and generalship for a future royal office.

Chandragupta had hatched a plot to overthrow the Nanda king from the Magadhan throne but fled away and concealed himself after his design failed. Chandragupta reemerged from obscurity in 326-25 BC and came to meet Alexander in Punjab after he heard of Alexander’s conquest and glory and was fired by an ambitious plan to emulate his hero. He begged for Alexander’s alliance against the Nandas. Alexander was impressed by his heroic commitments but got angry with him due to his outspokenness and audacity. Alexander ordered to kill him but Chandragupta was too fast to be caught.

Chandragupta had the blessings and guidance of Chanakya or Kautilya and together they hatched a well designed scheme and waited for the opportunity to emulate Alexander. Soon after the news of Alexander’s death at Babylon in 323 B.C., Chandragupta and Chanakya raised the issue of nationalism and roused the people against the Greek invaders. The Greek garrison was driven away and Taxila captured. The appeal of nationalism had brought allies to Chandragupta. He raised an army from the war like republican tribes of Punjab and other north western areas who were opposed to Alexander and his Macedonian army. Since they miserably suffered under the foreign rule they were incited by Chandragupta to rise against the Greeks. Chandragupta’s first mission was to liberate the northwestern India from the clutches of the Greeks. The Indians were not very comfortable with the foreign rule. An undercurrent of Indian protest against the Greeks was on rise. The death of Alexander and the quarrel among his generals made the position of the Greeks very weak. Chandragupta mobilized the undercurrent to his full advantage. After Taxila, Chandragupta conquered Sindh in 321 B.C. Then he captured eastern Punjab after the assassination of Porus and extended his territories upto river Indus.

The next mission of Chandragupta was to overthrow the oppressive and unpopular Nandas from Magadha. Although his first attempt was a failure, the shock of defeat made Chandragupta more aggressive. He finally besieged Pataliputra and killed Dhanananda. The role of Chanakya in Chandragupta’s war against the Nandas was more significant. Now Chandragupta’s authority extended from Magadha to Punjab and Sindh.

While Chandragupta was consolidating his position over his newly conquered territories, he had an encounter with the former general of Alexander Seleucus Nikator who had acquired the Asiatic dominion of his master. Seleucus marched towards India in order to recover the lost territories of Alexander and had a war with Chandragupta in 305 B.C.  which is known as Seleukidian war. Seleucus was defeated    and forced to sign a peace treaty with Chandragupta by which Seleucus ceded a large part   of Afghanistan    including Herat, Kandahar and Kabul to Chandragupta and also gave his daughter married to him. In return Chandragupta presented 500 war elephants to Seleucus. As a mark of friendship Seleucus sent his ambassador Meghasthenes to the court of Chandragupta Maurya.

Now Chandragupta eyed on other parts of India. In course of time he annexed Saurastra, Avanti and parts of Konkan and Maharastra. Then Chandragupta extended the Mauryan empire   in the south upto Mysore and Nellore.

As such Chandragupta Maurya became the Raja-Chakravarti or the universal king. He brought about the political unification of India in a very short span of twenty four years of his reign. He founded an empire  extending from the borders of Persia in the north to Mysore in the south and from Bengal in the east to Saurastra in the west. During his hectic reign he had expelled the Greeks, repulsed the Seleukidian invasion, overthrew the Nandas and subjugated the whole of India. He is therefore said to be the first historical founder of a great empire in India. He not only recovered the invaded areas from the Greeks, he extended Indian territories upto the outskirts of Greece too. He is thus no less an imperialist than the Greeks and he is rightly called as the first Indian imperialist. The growth of his career from a fatherless kid to a self reliant youth and from a war hero to an emperor is a fascinating and fantastic saga in Indian history. His success is full of legends and dramas.

He was not only a great conqueror, he was a remarkable civil administrator too. His kingship was characterised by benevolent civil government. Welfare of people was his basic principle. His administration was governed by the basic tenants of Kautilya’s Arthasastra.

Chandragupta Maurya had no lust for power although he was one of the most powerful kings in Indian history. He abdicated the throne in favour of his son Bindusara and retired to Shravan Belagola in Mysore where he courted death by starving himself in about 300 B.C. after reigning for 24 years. Chandragupta’s short span of rule however entitle him to the rank of greatest and most successful kings in Indian history.

Chandragupta owed his success largely to Chanakya (Kautilya) who was the master mind behind each of the steps he took. Chandragupta’s story is incomplete without the involvement of Chanakya. Chanakya was the friend, philosopher and guide of Chandragupta Maurya who made a commoner, a king and conqueror. Chandragupta’s heroism combined with Chanakya’s shrewdness and expediency was responsible for the establishment of the mighty Mauryan empire. Chanakya was clever, wise and foresighted while Chandragupta was bold, aggressive and determined. Together they wrote a successful story in Indian history which is not repeated as yet.