Pancha Tantra also known as Panchopakhyana is an anthology of fables, parables and stories. The Pancha Tantra is one of the oldest collected works of stories. It was translated from Sanskrit into Persian in the sixth century and from Persian into Arabic in the ninth century. It was afterwards decoded into Hebrew, Greek, Latin and Syriac. From these versions successive translations were made into all the languages of modern Europe, until it became universally known as Pilpay`s Fables. The raconteur of the stories is in the Arabic language is called Bidpai and it does not have any resemblance with the Sanskrit language. But it is definite that the name Pilpay, by which the work is known in Europe, is a corruption of Bidpai.

The Arabic translation of the Pancha Tantra is called Kalila was Damna. It is thus designated in allusion to two jackals, which act in a striking part in the first story of the Arabic version, and which we recognized in the Sanskrit and Canaries under the forms Karnataka and Damanaka. The most accepted Persian translation is not the one which was fits made, but the one written at the beginning of the sixteenth and known under the Anwar-i-soheili. This was later rendered into Turkish with the title of Humayun Nameh.

The Sanskrit personification of the Pancha Tantra is termed as the `Hitopadesa`, which means `Salutary Instruction`. This has been translated into English for its popularity through so many ages, amidst such various nations, is evidence of intrinsic merit. Moreover the pictures of domestic manners and human nature which it presents, however tinctured by national peculiarities, must have been recognized as universally true, as well as diverting; or they would not have been naturalized in the west as well as in the east. In addition stories serve to illustrate, there must have been much which secured the acquiescence of all mankind, or the remarks would have been left to enlighten the Joists of India alone. These merits, however, were such as admitted of transfusion into other languages; the merits of its composition are those which have chiefly recommended its preservation by the Press, and its circulation amongst the cultivators of Sanskrit literature.

There is a great variety in the manuscript copies of the Pancha Tantra. Many differences occur in the various stories. In some versions the residence of the king is in Mahilaropya, a city in the south of India. Again in the Canarese version of the Pancha Tantra follows the Hitopadesa in making the residence of the king in Pataliputra on the Ganges.

The king was believed to have three sons who were deficient in ability and application. He made this known to his counselors and sought their advice. He asked them that there is no use of sons who neither has knowledge nor virtue. A learned Brahman who was present offered to relieve the king of his anxiety by taking the princess to his house and instructing them perfectly. He then composed in their benefit these five chapters, Mitra Bheda, that means Dissension of friends; Mitra Prapti, acquisition of friends; Kakolukfya, inveterate enmity; Labda Nashta, loss of advantage; and lastly Asamprekshya karitwa, that means inconsiderateness. By reading these five chapters in six months the princes became highly accomplished and knowledgeable. Also the five chapters became famous throughout the world.