Monday Musings - Episode 182 - Bhishma's five golden arrows
MONDAY MUSINGS SEASON 2 – EPISODE 182
Story of Bhishma’s five golden arrows
7th November 2022
We enjoyed two short stories from Mahabharatha both appearing in the same Shanthi Parva and both narrated by Bishma to Yudhishtra but with two contrasting messages. The objective is to convey the message that the moral is based on the context rather than the face value.
Mahabharath has many such short stories, not many would have heard. Let us see few such short stories and learnings from these stories. This story of ‘Five golden arrows’ is quite interesting and meaningful. Do you know that Bhishma would have killed all the five pandavas and the Kurukshetra would have got over in a jiffy but for the foolishness of Duryodhana.
?Duryodhana was always doubtful about the loyalty of the elders Bhishma and Dronacharya.?They sided with the Kauravas in the kurushshetra war because of their bonding to the kingdon But Duryodhana thought they always remained committed to the cause of the Pandavas. After a few days of the gruelling war, Duryodhana thought that Bhishma was not giving his heart and soul for the sake of the Kauravas in the war.
Duryodhana confronted Bhishma in the night and derided him. An upset Bhishma could not say anything. In a moment of rage, he took five arrows from his quiver, meditated for a while and put his life force in those five arrows. Bhishma then gave them to Duryodhana saying that those arrows are powerful enough to kill all the?five pandavas the next day and promised him that they would not fail because he had put his years of penance and life force in those five arrows.
Bhishma asked Duryodhana to return the arrows to him. Duryodhana instead retained the arrows and promised him that he would hand over the special arrows back to him during the start of the war the next day. He doubted if Bhishma played a trick on him and hence wanted to retain the arrows.
Meanwhile, Lord Krishna received the news of the incident through his spies. He quickly called Arjuna and instructed him to seek the boon from Duryodhana which was due. The flashback about this boon goes like this.
Arjuna once rescued Duryodhana from the hands of Gandharva soldiers who had captured Duryodhana. Duryodhana was defeated and captured. Arjuna fought with the Gandharvas and rescued Duryodhana. Grateful Duryodhana asked Arjuna to ask for anything in return for his help. Arjuna did not ask anything at that time.?
Lord Krishna instructed Arjuna to utilize the opportunity and remind Duryodhana about the boon due to him.?Arjuna met Duryodahna and asked for the five arrows given by Bhishma in return for the boon promised to him in the earlier instance. Duryodhana was a true warrior and never broke a promise. He reluctantly gave away the arrows to Arjuna.
As Arjuna left, Duryodhana rushed to Bhishma and requested him to make another set of divine arrows to kill the pandavas. Bhishma laughed and said that it would not be possible as he had already used his entire lifetime learnings in creating those five arrows. Special performance cannot be repeated again and again. However, he promised Duryodhana that he would fight with his full heart and soul.
Bhishma, of course could not produce the magic the next day. How would he when his leader is continuously distrusting his loyalty and performance.
It is criminal to distrust a faithful and that too a high performer. Bhishma was affectionate of the pandavas but everyone including Duryodhana knew that he was committed to the kingdom.?It is improper for a leader to suspect a faithful perfomer.
There are some more learnings from this story. We will see in the next episode of Monday Musings
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Courtesy - The New Indian Express
Deepika and Santosh Shet, who are in their 30s, quit their IT jobs to set up a startup that provides quick solutions to the problem of watering gardens when people are away from home.?
The?watering automation tool, developed by the Shet couple, runs on an IOT (Internet of Things) platform and can be controlled through a website or a mobile app from any corner of the world.
The invention is the result of the hard work and persistence of Deepika and Santosh, who worked on the tool for almost a year. The couple, who have loved plants since their childhood, realised that working couples in cities were reluctant to keep plants in balconies as they get no time to water them amid busy work schedules and while travelling.
“The IT job gave me everything. I worked and travelled across the world as a software developer at the mid-management level during my IT career that spanned over 15 years. But the last two years before I quit the job, I realised that I should not be here,” said Santosh.
He decided to quit his high paying IT job to pursue his passion. Deepika, who had taken a break from her IT job to take care of their child, did not think twice before seconding her husband’s biggest decision of their life.
But life was not as easy as expected for the next several months as they sat down to invent the tool. It took a lot of time and lots of struggle.
“The device needs to be left in the open exposed to rain and Sun. It was a challenge to make sure that water and air does not seep in. There were a lot of issues related to the circuit design. Finally, we did it,” said the couple with pride.
“Our mission is to make watering easy and at the same time reduce water wastage. Our model consists of a device connected to the Internet which in layman’s terms is an Internet-connected tap. This device has been fine-tuned to conserve energy. It operates on alkaline batteries that last for six months or more. The user is also provided with an app for his phone that notifies the user when the battery runs out or when the overhead tank is empty. In the backend, our website is used to store watering history. The main differentiating factor is the visibility of watering for the user. He/she can also remotely switch on or off the device. We are also developing algorithms that can do this based on the weather patterns,” says Santosh.
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COVID2121 Updates
COVID2121 story has been completed and the cover design has been completed. The book is going through the editorial review. Since the review is coming out very well, I am not putting any pressure to complete the review quickly. The novel should be available in your hands within a month from today.
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