October 2016
एतद्बभ्रुकचानुकारिकिरणं राजद्रुहोऽह्नः शिर- श्छेदाभं वियतः प्रतीचिनिपतत्यब्धौ रवेर्मण्डलम् । एषापि द्युरमा प्रियानुगमनं प्रोद्दामकाष्ठोत्थिते सन्ध्याग्नौ विरचय्य तारकमिषाज्जातास्थिशेषस्थितिः ॥
Mankha, the great poet from Kashmir, wrote his epic-poem Srikanthacharitam and presented it in an august assembly. He even won critical acclaim for it. Then arose a desire among the scholars present there - having witnessed Mankha’s skills in composing...
Long before Superman or Batman, there was Hanuman, the original superhero. But he wasn’t just all brawn. He was a consummate all-rounder. He was intelligent, patient, compassionate, ready to help, graceful, devoted to a larger cause, humble, and of course immensely strong. Born in a family of monkeys, to King Kesari and his wife Anjana, Hanuman grew up to be multi-skilled. His pivotal role in the Ramayana is known to many. He is revered not only...
The Influence of Alexander
(continued)
When a great emperor decentralizes a vast kingdom, if he doesn’t use his absolute sovereignty to establish friendly relationships and maintain constant communication with all the regions, if he doesn’t keep his eyes and ears open all the time, his empire will collapse. We get examples for this in Ashoka’s time itself. Why, even in the case of the ambitious Alexander who set out to conquer the world and...
This is a summary of the speech that I delivered on Sunday, 29th April 1953 on the occasion of unveiling a portrait of Prof. Bellave Venkatanaranappa, one of the founding members of the Basavanagudi Union and Service Club.
Prof. Bellave Venkatanaranappa has become a recipient of our eternal gratitude and respect for many reasons. Those reasons can be divided into three broad categories: first, he was a founder of this club; second, he was an...
Buried beneath and interspersed among the numerous layers of terse and detailed philosophical expositions are the thousands of amazing stories in the Upanishads. It is indeed a tragedy of our modern education system—that treats the human as no better than a component of economic production—that these stories have completely vanished from our school syllabi, supplanted instead by mindless Christian moral education.
It’s not far-fetched to apply...
यद्वक्रेण पथा प्रयासि सततं यद्वासि विद्वन्मन-श्चौरी यच्च करोषि पूर्वसुकविप्रौढिप्रथोत्पुंसनम् ।तस्माद्भारति सद्भिरत्रभवती तीक्ष्णेति संभावितातूर्णं पार्श्वममुष्य पार्थिवमणेरभ्येहि शुद्ध्यर्थिनी ॥
Once, there lived a poet who resolved to not compose verses on petty issues, and do it only in praise of Shiva. This poet Mankha (also known as Mankhaka or Mankhuka), hailing from Pravarapura in Kashmir, lived in the 12th century. He composed an epic-...
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That the principles of धर्म (Dharma) will have to align and follow the principles of natureis indicated in a timeless proverb. The same proverb also says that the principles of both are the not the same. For man, the principles observed in nature alone do not suffice. The process and principles about about earth, water, heat, wind, clouds are not appropriate. The living...
A short documentary on K. Shivarama Karanth, a consummate polymath who brought laurels to Kannada literature. He received the prestigious Jnanapeeth award for his novel 'Mookajjiya Kanasugalu'.
The Magadha Kingdom
With this background, when we see the Magadhan kingdom, we find that the Shishunagas ruled there first. Then came the Nandas. The last king of the Nanda dynasty was Dhanananda. Starting from Mahapadmananda to Sunanda, everyone was gone. The stories that have been traditionally narrated indicate that the nine Nandas were contemporaries. We find that in some version of the story, it is Mahapadmananda and his eight children,...
बिंदुद्वन्द्वतरङ्गिताग्रसरणिः कर्ता शिरोर्बिन्दुकं कर्मेति क्रमशिक्षितान्वयकला ये केऽपि तेभ्योऽञ्जलिः । ये तु ग्रन्थसहस्रशाणकषणत्रुट्यत्कलङ्कैर्गिरां उल्लासैः कवयन्ति बिल्हणकविस्तेष्वेव संनह्यति ॥
We have seen that Bilhana, the great poet from Kashmir, travelled the entire country. He visited many places like Vidharbha, Malava and Vanga, and finally came to Kalyanakataka in Karnataka, which was then ruled by Vikramaditya (the sixth), one of the...