In the previous episode, we had witnessed the continuation of Bhishmachaarya’s important accord on “Raaja-Dharma” to Yudishtra as part of the “Shaanti Parva” of the Mahabharata. Amidst this discussion, we’re witnessing thirty-six important qualities of a leader, which Bhishmachaarya is listing one after the other. In this, we’ve witnessed around thirty of them, leaving us with just a few more to analyze. In line with this discussion, we’ve witnessed yesterday that as a leader, one should always enable others to perform “Dharma-Kaaryam” and should not be a stumbling block for the same. Secondly, we’ve also seen Bhishmachaarya explaining to Yudishtra that while attacking an enemy who is a stranger, it is important that a SWOT analysis is done about the enemy before going for the kill. If an attack is launched without analysing the strengths and weaknesses of the enemy, probability is extremely high that we would end up on the losing side!
Next, Bhishmachaarya is going to talk about a very important point here, which is directly applicable for Yudishtra’s context. He says thus, “Oh Yudishtra! Once you’ve declared that the other person is your enemy and you’ve killed him in the war, you should never regret this act later! You should move on with your next work, without feeling bad or sad about it!” This is an extremely important point and in fact, this entire “Shaanti Parva” discussion commenced with this only! Readers might remember – Yudishtra was feeling let down after he had waged war and killed Duryodhana and the others at Kurukshetra. The entire Kaurava clan of Duryodhana faced destruction and with this, Yudishtra had lost complete interest in ruling the Hastinapura kingdom, with nobody around! This is where Bhagawan Krishna wanted Bhishmachaarya to engage with Yudishtra, so that Yudishtra can learn several key aspects of “Dharma”, in a bid to boost his confidence. Now after this long talk, Bhishmachaarya comes to the main point here. He cryptically explains to Yudishtra that there’s no point cribbing about Duryodhana’s demise, because he was Yudishtra’s designated enemy. Moreover, by killing Duryodhana in the war, Yudishtra had never deviated from “Dharma”. In fact, he has only acted per the “Raaja Dharma”, because Duryodhana was a designated enemy. Killing an enemy in the war is never against “Raaja Dharma” by any means! For instance, in today’s context too we have our Indian army guarding our territorial borders from Kashmir in the north till Arunachal in the east. If there’s a confrontation bid from the enemy side (Pakistan or China), our brave Indian jawans live up to the expectation and fight. In this confrontation, there will definitely be loss of lives. However, this will not be considered “Adharma”, because the greater cause is to protect the entire country from the enemy. Rather, if the enemy is let free per “Ahimsa Paramo Dharmaha”, it poses a grave threat to the entire population of the country, isn’t it? Thus, during the confrontation, there might definitely be loss of lives, and there’s no point in mourning this loss. This is exactly what Bhishmachaarya is explaining here. If a designated enemy is neutralized in the war, it is definitely an act of “Dharma”, and there’s no point repenting over it!
With this, we’ve witnessed thirty-five qualities of a leader and now Bhishmachaarya is going to explain one last quality of a leader – The thirty-sixth. Here he explains thus, “Oh Yudishtra! You’ve to be calm and composed with those people who are helping you out during critical situations. In other words, you should never show anger or aggression towards such people. However, with those people who do bad for you, it is dangerous if you go soft on them!” This is an extremely important last pointer that Bhishmachaarya is explaining here. This is what we call in today’s leadership terminology – “Controlled Aggression”. We should know where to show our aggression and where not to! For those who think and do good for us (our well-wishers), we should be extremely respectful and grateful to their contributions for our success and well-being. However, if there are people who outrightly do acts that are detrimental to us, we should never shy away from showing our anger and aggression. Being soft with them will only encourage them to do more and more bad things for us! Hence, Bhishmachaarya explains that a leader should understand how to channelize his anger and aggression towards the deserving people!
So for today, let us understand up to this point wherein we’ve discussed all the thirty-six important qualities of a leader! We shall commence a new topic of discussion in the next episode and witness what Bhishmachaarya has to say next! Stay tuned! 🙂
The Indian Dharma 