Stories from Mahabharata by H. H. Shri 1008 Shri Satyātma Tīrtha Swamigalu

Story:

There once lived a middle aged Rishi who was doing severe penance in the forest.  

He was doing penance for a long time and one day when he was meditating, a bird did its droppings on his head.  He looked at that bird with anger and that moment the bird was burnt to death.  He was sorry the bird died because of him but since it was already dead he was not able to do anything about it.  On hindsight he was also happy that he had achieved a level in his penance that he could burn other beings by simply looking at them with anger.

He then prepared to gather alms for his next meal and started going door to door in a near by village asking for food.  In one of the houses, a highly pious Pativrata woman asked him to wait so that she can give some food for him.  This woman was highly devoted to her husband and her elderly in-laws and had their complete blessings. By the time she could bring the food to the her husband had arrived from work and hence she took care of her husband by giving him some water and took care of him for some time before she could come back to give the food the the Rishi who was waiting.  Since it was getting delayed the Rishi grew restless and yelled out 'Are you giving me the food or do I continue to the next house?' .  There was some arrogance in his voice probably because of his newly acquired power to burn down the bird.  The woman apologized for the delay and asked for forgiveness but also add 'Please don't think of wasting your energy to burn me down like you burnt the bird as it will not work on me'.    The Rishi was startled and immediately realized his mistake.  He apologized to her and asked how in such a young age she had acquired such a power.  What penance she had done to achieve this.  For that she replied the only penance she had done was being devoted to her husband and in-laws.  She further asked him to meet a hunter in a near by village who can further clear his doubts.  

The Rishi then getting the address of that hunter from the woman reached the shop of that hunter in the near by village.  The Rishi waited for him near the shop till he closed the shop for the day and approached him.  The Hunter was very courteous to the Rishi.  He then invited the Rishi to his house and took very good care of his guest.  He gave a lot of respect to him because of his age.  He later continued that he knew about the incident about the burning of the bird and the incident that happened in the village with the woman.   Astonished again by what the hunter said he asked him the source of his power and how he achieved it.  The hunter continued that he ran his business in a very truthful way.  He made sure he was selling quality product for his customers with nominal profits.  He further continued that he also took care of his aged parents who could not move on their own.  It was because of their blessings that he was able to acquire such power.  

He further spoke about the Rishi's past. 

'You had started out of your home town to the forest to do penance.  You have achieved a certain amount of power because of your penance.  But you had left your blind parents behind at your home who are struggling to carry out their day to day life.  Please go back to your home and take care of your parents.  There is no big penance than taking care of your parents and in-laws.  There is nothing one can not achieve with the wholehearted blessings of his parents and elders'.  

The Rishi quickly realized his folly and returned back to his home and started taking care of his parents.  

--This story was narrated by asmad guru H. H. Shri 1008 Shri Satyātma Tīrtha Swami of Bangalore. 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0gL116A_3VY

Concluding points:

• This story basically advises people to respect elders and take care of old parents and in-laws with love.
• Another point made is that a guy may think he is an expert in his field and it may get to his head at times.  But in reality other people from humbler background may have achieved more than him.
• Also you may be on a quest for something precious and travel far and wide in search of it but it may already be very close to you.

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I heard the Swamiji's speech in Kannada and was very fascinated by the story.  Since out Swamiji has followers across different states including TN, AP and MH in addition to KA, I wanted to translate his story in English so that it can reach my relatives who could not understand Kannada.  I apologize for any  mistake or misinterpretation I may have done. Hari Hi Om .

Is Indian Media Misusing its Freedom?

This blog is in response to the contest "Is Indian Media – Misusing its Freedom?" organized by "Blogadda" in association with Pringoo.


The Indian media has undergone vast changes in the past two decades since liberalization.  According to some estimates, there are around 400 channels in India today.  With news channels mushrooming every day, each one of these channels try to grab the spotlight using sensationalism.  We have had 'Sting Operations' exposing corruption in defence deals, match fixing in cricket and even on communal riots instigated by the ruling party.  While it is understandable that corruption being such a big issue in our country it may even be the right thing for the media to do but sometimes, they tend to cross that line.  I will try to bring some instances to the light which are a cause of concern.

Tamil Nadu.  The state ruled by two very strong regional parties... DMK and AIADMK..  National parties cannot dream of winning the majority of the parlimentary seats without piggybacking on either of these two parties.  While at the national level, the liberalization of the media leads to immature and irresponsible reporting.. here, media bias has gone to a completely different level.  Each of these parties own their own satellite television and their news channels (Sun TV and Jaya TV respectively) which cover only the news of their leaders.  If they report about the opposition leader it is usually hate rhetoric accusing him/her of everything under the sun.

It gets really interesting when the election results are announced.  The two channels report complete different results with people unable to believe either of them.  Either one of them declare results favorable to them and show results as if they are winning the election and one has to turn on the Hindi or English news channels to get the accurate picture. 

Once, during the last rule of ADMK, the DMK chief was arrested at his residence at mid night which sent shock waves across the nations.  Visuals of M Karunanidhi being dragged and kicked were broadcast within hours on Sun TV.  There were also audio of him screaming "They are killing me.. They are killing me" heard.  At the same time Jaya TV was showing footage denying the dragging and kicking.  Each of them telecast interviews of  forensic experts claiming the other channels footage was doctored.  This kind of biased reporting only makes the common man to shut himself off from the daily happenings around him and he looses interest in politics and democracy.

These channels not only target the opposition party leaders but any individual who is slightly critical of them.  In Sun TV, there is a program that reviews latest tamil movies.  One such review was particularly harsh on a comedy movie starring Sathyaraj.  It claimed that the movie was the worst movie ever made and the actor was  not fit for acting and so on.  On watching the movie, we found that that actor had made fun of the TV program which unduly criticized movies.  His claim was, these channels were extensively using movie content to fill their 24 hour time slots and hence should mellow down their criticism as it affected their profits and a lot of hard work goes into any movie.  Now, seeing all this makes one loose faith that he is living in a free democratic country and resembles more like a police state run by a dictator.

A few years ago, there was a new TV channel which exposed a sex racket run by a Government school teacher in Delhi.  It aired a sting operation and an interview of the alleged victim.  This led to a widespread outrage and protesters damaged vehicles and clashed with police.  They even entered her school and assaulted her even ripping off her clothes.  The teacher was immediately suspended and charges for immoral trafficking were framed.  Later it was found that the victim was actually an aspiring journalist and she had faked the entire sting operation.  It was also found that the teacher was innocent but by that time, the damage was done.  I would rate this incident as the all time low in the history of Indian media. Even for Tamil Nadu standards.

It is said that in a democracy, media is one of the pillars.  The reason is in a democracy, people decide who to rule the country.  For that, they need to be well informed about what is happening in the country and media is the only channel at their disposal.  But it is also a very disturbing fact that this media can be bought by money.   A person/ political party with the right amount of money can mend and bend public perception by controlling the media and become the leader of a country.  This holds good not only to India but everywhere around the world. 

While all these misuse happen in India, I am not totally pessimistic about this issue and I believe since the media is still growing with time and proper regulation this issue can be addressed.  Our media needs to mature a lot but the situation is not that bad after all.  This issue is there even in developed countries like the US.  US, which prides itself in declaring as the 'leader of the free world' has one of the most biased media one has ever seen.  The media businesses are controlled by six major corporations and nothing comes out which they deem not fit to report.  Yes, they have their own versions of Sun TV vs Jaya TV in MSNBC and Fox News.

 Reuters is a company based in UK which is one of the world's biggest media companies.  Its news is respected and accepted to be unbiased worldwide.  This company has a unique rule that no individual is allowed to own more than 15% of the company's shares so that this company's tradition of objective and unbiased reporting is not compromised.  Now, our country has its own share of media companies with good reputation which produce news content of the highest quality.   We just have to encourage them to continue doing the same good work,  Our political leaders should have the vision to frame laws to regulate the media coverage so that it can be a real pillar of our democracy and this will be the solution to strengthen the media in our country.

Winner of Blogadda contest