Gurcharan Das
After Karna’s Death, the great war of Mahabharata comes to a quick close. Almost all the great warriors on the Kaurava side are gone.
In Mahabharata, Krishna firmly believes that once you make the fateful decision to go to war, then you must win at any cost.
One must accept both sides of Krishna, no matter how paradoxical or contrary
Some Scholars believe Krishna was a Kuladevata, an ethnic and family god of a confederation of Rajput clans. He was also probably a “Patron God of the Pandavas”
Once the peace negotiations fail and preparations for the war begin, the epic Mahabharata lays down elaborate rules of warfare in Bhishmaparvan. Lest anyone forget, it repeats them several times.
Dharma’s world of moral haziness and uncertainty is far closer to our experience as ordinary human beings than the narrow and rigid positions that define debate in these post-9/11 fundamentalist times.
The idea that an ancient Indian concept might offer insight into the nature of markets is, on the face of it, bizarre.
Dharma places restraints on buyers and sellers. Because you are a person of dharma, I readily accept a check from you.
India’s power has always been ‘soft’, not expressed through military conquest, but in the export of goods and ideas.
India experienced a ‘golden decade’ of growth from 2002 to 2012 when GDP growth averaged over eight percent a year.
I grew up in this atmosphere with a liberal attitude - that is a mixture of scepticism and sympathy for my tradition. Why then do I feel uneasy about being a liberal Hindu?
“I am a Hindu, but”, he said, and he went into a winding reply about his beliefs. He hastily added that he was an Indian first.
Crime and punishment is the central theme of Ashwatthama’s story in the Mahabharata.
The Dharma Shastras accepted Kama’s positive qualities but decreed that it had to be confined to marriage and procreation.
Although he did not shoot a single arrow, Krishna won the war for the Pandavas through cheating.
As the war of Mahabharata progresses and Kaurava’s brilliant commanders fall one by one, we begin to sympathize with them.
