1. On choosing the right people: the minister problem
The Kural's chapter on ministers, Amaichchu, in the Porul section, is essentially a hiring framework. Thiruvalluvar argues that a ruler's single most consequential act is selecting who sits closest to the decision. He does not mean loyalty. He means tested judgment: someone who has seen failure, understood it, and corrected course. The Tamil word he uses, amaichchu, carries the sense of someone who holds things together structurally, the way mortar holds stone.
