Synopsis The present monograph throws much new light on the problems connected with the study of the Arthasastra and the Indica. Its author Professor S.R. Goyal believes that Vishnugupta Kautilya whowrote the Arathasastra was different from Chanakya, the Prime Minister of Chandragupta Maurya and that Kautilya flourished more than five centuries later than Chanakya. In the light of these suggestions the author has studied afresh several aspects of the Arthasastric material, specialy those conneted wit the religious condition, numismatic data, state capitalism, law of succession, provision for emergency taxes, administrative terms, etc. In his critical study of the Indica also Professor Goyal has thrown several new suggestions. He has shown that the Indian Heracles of Megasthenes as described in relation to Mathura should mainly be identified not with Vasudeva-Krshna but with Manu-Vaivasvata, that the Indian Dionysus of Megasthenes is a composite god, that the Pauranika genealogies as known today existed more or less in the same form in the early Maurya age and that the testimony of Megasthenes regarding the absence of the art of writing in India when h visited the country is correct. He has also analysed afresh the reference made to the seven ‘castes’ and also to the Brahmana and Sramana ascetics by Megasthenes. Thus the present work throws numerous new and challenging ideas for the consideration of Indologists, specially those who are interested in finding out what was the cultural condition of India when Megasthenes visited this country and Kautilya wrote his Arthasastra.