OUR SANSKAR?
These days viewers are flood with ads steering them to the many mythologicals on TV with the tag line “ teach the kids sanskar “, especially from the Ramayan. Now, let’s get a bird’s eye view of some of what the Ramayan and the Mahabharat have to teach our kids: Those dirty old men like Dashrath and Shantanu had so little control over themselves that they went to any extent, made any promises with disastrous political impact for their countries, merely to bed the next nubile young woman who caught their fancy. The net result was that Ram spent 14 years wandering the forest, making conquest after conquest there and returned home to dump his pregnant wife so he could get on with ruling his kingdom. (Wonderful family planning since she never got pregnant during the jungle sojourn). Divorce goes a long way back in our society, does it not? So does deceit in the manner in which Ram dealt with Sigrid; and the rewards of family disloyalty with the way Ram received the brother of Ravan. In...