In the previous episode, we had witnessed Bhishmachaarya continuing his detailed accord on the “Aapad Dharma” to Yudishtra. He is currently amidst the narrative that during an “Aapad-Kaalam”, it is not wrong to make friends with even your fiercest enemies in order to combat the dangerous situation. Also, when it comes to protecting / securing people, it is important for the leader to secure himself / herself first, before trying to secure others. To illustrate these two points, Bhishmachaarya has narrated a beautiful story of the cat and the mouse. While the “Romasha” cat gets stuck in the hunter’s net, the “Palitha” mouse is cornered by the mongoose on one end and the chimpanzee on the other. When both of them were in danger, the Palitha mouse made friends with his fierce enemy – The Romasha cat by sitting beside it. This alarms the chimpanzee and mongoose and they fled from that place. However, when it came to saving the Romasha cat from the hunter’s net, the Palitha mouse did not show any sort of speed in biting away the pieces of the net. This was done in order to protect itself from the wrath of the Romasha cat. However, when the hunter rushed towards the cat, the mouse quickly bit through the net and freed the Romasha cat at the right time! This enabled the cat to flee away for its life, and so did the mouse! Thus, end of the day, both the cat and the mouse saved themselves from the wrath of the hunter!
The lessons are very clear here – As a leader, we should first know who our friends and enemies are. This is the first step. Secondly, within our enemies, whom can we approach at an appropriate time to make friends with? This is a very important point under leadership, especially during the “Aapad-Kaalam”. A leader should not be rigid at all times and not allow his / her ego to take center-stage. At times, the leader should bend, flex himself and think out of the box to come out of tough situations. If this smartness is not there, and if the leader is extremely rigid with his approach towards critical problems, chances are high that he would be sucked into it! At the same time, while making friends with enemies, a leader should know the limit to which this friendship should be taken to. The leader should not blindly trust and go behind an enemy-turned friend. He should know when to extend the friendship and when to cut off the ties!
Moving on thus, Bhishmachaarya is narrating the next important point as part of “Aapad Dharma” to Yudishtra. He says thus, “Oh Yudishtra! If you have a group of best friends / colleagues and if there is a fight that is breaking out within this group, it is very difficult to doze down the tension. If someone in your core group breaks away from you because of a feud, it is next to impossible to make this person come back with 100% friendship and dedication yet again. Once lost, is lost forever!” To highlight this point, Bhishmachaarya is narrating yet another small story of a bird named “Poojani” and King Brahmadatta. The Poojani bird and King Brahmadatta were very good friends and they usually spent a lot of time together, talking with each other over a range of things. As days passed by, the Poojani bird gave birth to its little one, and precisely at the same time, King Brahmadatta also had his little son. Hence, the bonding between the Poojani bird and King Brahmadatta increased and became more thick. As an everyday routine, the Poojani bird will bring some of the best fruits for the king’s newly born son and in turn, the king also fed the little one of the Poojani bird very nicely.
One day, when the Poojani bird had gone to pick up some fruits, the king’s little son did some mischief to the Poojani bird’s little one, and eventually it got killed! When the Poojani bird came back with the fruits, to its utter shock and dismay, it found the little one dead. Simultaneously, the Poojani bird also learnt that the king’s son was behind this heinous crime! Unable to control its grief and motherly pain, the Poojani bird quickly pounced on the king’s little son, scratched his eyes with its sharp beak and made him blind! Upon seeing the son losing his eyes, King Brahmadutta came running to check what had happened. Poojani bird was also sitting there and it explains the whole story. Upon hearing the Poojani bird’s narrative, King Brahmadutta was heart-broken – On one hand, his son has become blind, and on the other, his best friend had lost its little one forever! Now what does King Brahmadutta do? How is he going to console the Poojani bird for this humongous loss? Let us wait till the next episode to witness King Brahmadutta’s request! Stay tuned!
The Indian Dharma 