In the previous episode, we had witnessed Bhishmachaarya continuing his lengthy accord on the “Ganatantra-Raajyam”, wherein he is talking about the origin of “Raaja Dharma” as a whole. We’ve seen over the past two episodes as to how Bhagawan Brahma authored the “Brahma-Shaastram”, which is considered as the fundamental text for all kinds of “Raaja-Dharma”, including the “Ganatantra Raajyam”. In this, the main point that Bhagawan Brahma is highlighting is that, for a “Ganatantra Raajyam” to be successful, people of the country should be united as a collective society, rather than being divided amongst themselves. If the latter happens, the “Ganatantra Raajyam” will start collapsing, as people will be more interested in fulfilling their own selfish needs, by compromising the nation’s interest as a whole. This is exactly what happened to our “Akhanda Bhaaratam” as well. As we’ve seen yesterday, our “Akhanda Bhaaratam” in the geography map was spread across from Iran / Gulf countries in the east, all the way till Cambodia / Indonesia in the west. However, as time progressed, several kings became selfish with their needs and aspirations, and this enabled outside invaders (Including the Muslim invaders and British) to wreak havoc in our country. Ultimately, what we see today as “Bhaarata Desha” is not even 50% of the “Akhanda Bhaaratam” which we know of! This is exactly what happens when people are unaware of the significance of the “Ganatantra Raajyam” and when people are not united. Hence, “Unity” amongst people as a collectivistic society is very important when it comes to “Ganatantra Raajyam”.
As Bhishmachaarya mentions this, he now goes to the second important point when it comes to the success of “Ganatantra Raajyam”. Bhishmachaarya explains thus, “Oh Yudishtra! Along with unity, the entire collectivistic society should strive towards achieving a common goal (“Purushaartham”). If different people start striving for different goals, the unity gets broken, and ultimately this would pave the way for invaders to “divide and rule” the society!” This is an extremely important point here – Even in today’s context we can relate this very well. For instance, in the game of Cricket (Commonly followed in our country), we follow this point – As Cricket is a “Team game”, the ultimate goal for the team as a collective unit is to win the match for our country. Instead of this, if a batsman is batting in the 90’s, and he needs another 5 to 6 runs to score a century, we might have seen in a few cases wherein the batsman will slowly start giving importance to his personal milestone. Because of this, he will start wasting several deliveries until he reaches the 100-run mark. In this course, the team starts going down in performance, isn’t it? Especially if this is a limited-overs match, every delivery counts. Thus, we can see here that if personal milestones (Goals) start gaining prominence, the team goal starts taking a backseat.
Similarly, we can see this in our past history as well – When the Britishers came to India in the pretext of developing “trade relations” with us, there were a few kings who acted as spies for the British. Little did these kings realize that the Britishers were trying to “divide” us and create rifts amongst us. Unknowingly, these people started working in favour of the Britishers, for their personal accomplishments, thus compromising the country’s interest as a whole. This resulted in the Britishers slowly and steadily capturing India and especially during the 1890’s and early 1900’s, the country was looted left, right and centre! Several components of our wealth were abducted by the Britishers mercilessly, and because of lack of unity, we were reduced to mute spectators to this widespread anarchy! Thus, these are important lessons which we should learn from our history. The blunders committed by our ancestors should not be repeated by us. We as a country should stay united at all times, to keep divisive forces at bay! If we’re failing to stay united as a society and as a community, we are going to fall prey to external invaders.
This is the same thing which happened with the Hindus as well. It is quite unfortunate to see in today’s context too that the most disintegrated and non-united community in the whole world is the Hindu community. If we’ve to protect our “Sanaatana Dharma” from divisive forces, we should stay united. As proud “Bhaaratiyas” from across the length and breadth of our “Bhaarata Desha”, we should stand united to fight those who try to destroy our “Sanaatana Dharma”. This, unfortunately, has become the order of the day today. It has become a fashion with some political parties in India to demean and malign our “Sanaatana Dharma” in the garb of “Secularism”. We should first realize that India (Our “Bhaarata Desha”) is a land of “Sanaatana Dharma” and nothing else! Of course, other religions can thrive and people following them can live peacefully here. But the core of India is “Sanaatana Dharma”. We as a Hindu community should never compromise our identity at any time. We may become technically and technologically advanced in many spheres, but our core should remain the same! We should always be rooted to our “Sanaatana Dharma” at all times and this is important not only for our progress, but for the progress of the entire nation as a whole!
So for today, let us understand this important point that Bhishmachaarya is stressing, and we shall take this discussion forward into the next episode as well! Stay tuned! 🙂
The Indian Dharma 