Tuesday, March 23, 2010

Jai Siya Ram - Rama, revisited.

On the occasion of Ramanavami, almost the entire Hindu population in North India celebrates the festival with great fervour and enthusiasm. As a run up to the day, the devout amongst them keep fast, for the preceding week and provide a lavish feast of poories, chhole and sooji ka halwa to seven or nine young girls(who haven’t attained puberty) on the eighth day or ‘ashtami’. On the ninth day or the day of the ‘Ramanavami’ time is taken out, by the people, to visit the nearby Ram temples. This is the rough outline of activities connected with the festival as I’ve gleaned from our maid, Meena’s, efforts over the past few days. Incidentally, she’s given strict instructions to her children that they’ll not visit her brother’s place(he too resides in Arjan Vihar, with his family) because his children did not partake in the feast given by her this morning! So much about God, prayers towards ‘appeasement’ of God and human being’s narrow, selfish ways of living life!!

However, my doubts and impressions about Rama go beyond all these normal happenings. One is all too aware that Rama is the eighth ‘avatar’ of Lord Vishnu in this world of ours and he has been universally accepted as the perfect human being, in his thoughts and actions, thereby earning the sobriquet, “maryaada purushottam”. From what I’ve assimilated of the ‘Ramayana’, I’ve been impressed with his tremendous love for his father, his all encompassing love for his mother, stepmothers and brothers with no dilution of intensity –be it a relationship by bloodline or otherwise!

His love for his wife was total and never once did he ever doubt his wife’s love for him nor her fidelity. Be that as it may, once he’d ascended the throne of his kingdom, to satisfy the doubts expressed by his subjects about the purity of Sita, his wife, he ordered her trial by fire. According to my ‘narrow minded thinking’, this is where I’ve my doubts about his qualification to retain the sobriquet. Or was he, after all, a common man like you or me who gets carried away by others’ opinions?

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