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Dr. KRS Murthy has developed many new paradigms through out his life. The areas include literature, theatre, music, films, TV, poetry, fine arts, advertising, public relations, brainstorming, science and technology. He has lectured on many literary topics, science and technology topics, business and management topics, music and theater, and creativity in many countries of the world. He is the founder of Virtual Think Tank (VTT). VTT is a forum for creative thinkers. Please contact Dr. Murthy if you want to be associated with VTT. Click here to Read more about Dr. Murthy.

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Open Letter to Veda Vyasa

Respected Veda Vyasa,

I am writing this letter to you on my behalf and on behalf of many of your admirers over many centuries. Even when I was a very little kid, I have wondered about you and what type of a person you were growing up. What influenced you to write Mahabharat? Was there any influence in your life that triggered you to think of writing this great epic?

Many people believe that you were mostly documenting what you saw happening around you. Some even think that you may only started writing. They believe that other poets added many more verses to your original work. Did you have many of your disciples helping you in writing, with you as the editor? Do you think many others after your life have added to your original verse, to bring it to this size of the worlds longest verse? I know it is a stupid question. How could you know what happened after your death? You can at least tell us what you wrote and what was your actual contribution.

There are many areas of the epic that concerns many of us. I will tell you one at a time. I will ask you about the characters in your epic. I will also ask you about some of the events.

As you know, there are many inconsistencies in your characters. The moral and human values in your story are below the standard of our expectations. If the royal families and the leaders of the society during those times had questionable value system, ordinary citizens, who need to look up to them as idols, would have been suffering from much worse cultural life quality. Sometimes, we wonder about the societal values and the social infrastructure during your time, with the assumption that your writing reflects the society. You also justify many wrong things through your characters.

One of our serious concerns is to do with women in your epic. Starting from Mother Ganga, you have misrepresented women and their attitude to marriage, motherhood and basic humanness of women. Mother is the most sensitive person for any child compared to all others, including the father. As we all know mother will give up anything for the good of the child. Mothers are never selfish and temperamental especially when it comes to her children. Our culture regards Mother Ganga with the highest regard. What made you think of the way you have characterized her? Do you realize that you have set a very bad example of motherhood just at the beginning of your epic?

Let us talk about your mother, Matsyagandha. Was it common for Rishis, who are revered for their knowledge, maturity and self-control to take advantage of women out of wedlock? You have narrated similar questionable practices throughout Mahabharat in case of Kunthi, Draupadi and Gandhari. The situations and instances are different, but the underlying impression you give is not to be proud of our women in those days. Let us also agree that it takes two hands to clap. Men were worse in this regard. Arjuna, Bheema and other leading characters had many women in their life. The children they fathered were "legitimate" from the point of view of social structure depicted in your epic. Both Pandavas and Kauravas let Draupadi be stripped in the royal court. Was this a practice in the culture that you had witnessed in real life? What kind of impression does it give if people from other religions read about this? I have serious problems in this particular case whether it is a true story that you documented, or it was just your wild imagination. I get a bad impression about you especially if it is your imagination. How could Ganesha write this type of narrations and incidents when you were depicting? Bear in mind that he was expected to understand this scene before writing. Do you remember that Ganesha is believed by us not to be thinking of topics like this? I do not really get as much of a bad impression on Dushyasana or Duryodhana about this event as I would get of you and Ganesha. I strongly feel that this event is all your imagination. You probably needed some worldly emotional outlet away from your position as a sage. You were dreaming of many things forbidden for a sage, taking the excuse of being a poet.

Wait, if you are answering that it is all just your reporting of a real story. Please think seriously before you take that escape. I will catch you in other parts of the epic that could never have happened. You can only run, but can't hide from me. I will use your own techniques back to you to pull you out of hiding. Do you remember of the scene you wrote when Duryodhana hides submerged in water away from Bheema? Do you remember that Bheema used severe accusation techniques to pull Duryodhana out? You know that Duryodhana got so upset hearing the taunting accusations so much so that Duryodhana started to profusely sweat even while submerged in water!

The character of Draupadi creates a big question mark on the marriage laws and practice of your time. Was it really common to have a woman share many brothers? Did it not look stupid to the citizens in that kingdom? Yudhistira probably did not mind this part of your story, even though he was called Dharmaraja! I am sure Draupadi had a smile on her face all the time!

Let us get to your role in the story. You were born out of wedlock. You come back and "sanction" your stepbrothers' wives with pregnancy. I know what you might say now! You were requested by your mother to do so. You were respecting her wishes as a “good” son! The family tree needed to continue. Give me a brake, or explain! It was never a royal family tree in the first place. Bheeshma became the step-grandfather and guardian to your family tree. You go back to your meditation and writing. The Pandavas and the Kauravas really belong to your lineage, which is mixed already. Your father was an ascetic and a sage, while your mother was a fisher woman. How could the Pandavas and Kauravas be of royal lineage? Kunthi bears four children by the magic of divine gift, and decides to abandon her first son. Does Kunthi’s character not look suspicious to your readers? She served a great sage in “respect”. The sage “granted” a good looking, well endowed virgin with “boons” to have children by invoking great mythological nature gods. She delivers Karna through Immaculate Conception. What was the role of Pandu when the Pandavas were born, if it is all a “gift” granted by the great sage in the name of powerful nature Gods like Sun, Yama (the God of death / time), Indra (the King of the heavens), and Ashvini twin Gods?

Let us take the role of Krishna. Before we begin, please tell me if he is a God or a human being with all the human weaknesses! You make him do so many things throughout the epic, and you even try to provide divine justification to most of his manipulative games.

Here comes the basic question directly posed to you as a straight arrow from me. Try to defend if you can! Was it all imagination, and a poetic expression of your inner desires?

We are still forced to believe by our parents, teachers and religious leaders that good always wins, and scores victory over evil. You even call the Mahabharat war as "Dharma Yudhdha". Are you preaching us through your great writing that manipulation is really necessary to win a war, and mostly everything in our life? History has taught us that good does not always win. By the predominance of major events in history, good does not win all the time. Many times, both sides are not completely good anyway. One has to really start taking a balance and start weighing good and bad on both sides. The conclusion really is:

There is good and bad on all sides and all aspects of life. Good and bad are really in the eyes of the beholder.

I am not arguing against goodness. I am not favoring badness either. I am only trying to bring a perspective.

Mahabharat war was really a mess that you created. The rules of the war were not followed by either side. Krishna's manipulative mind, many times unfair and cunning, had only one goal: His side has to win, at any cost. He did not care who died on either side. It was like a chess game. It does not matter what you sacrifice on your side, as long as you protect the king. Your only aim is to make the king on the other side immobile. Indeed, you achieved it. You had Duryodhana left alone to defend at the end. By advising Bheema to ignore the rules of the dual, you really broke the thighs of Duryodhana and made him immobile, and left him to die. Another trick you played as the author is making the king on your side, Yudhistrira (Dharmaraja), an idealist, but one who lacks martial skills. He did not have to fight. He only had to have two brothers, Krishna as the manipulator and lie as required.

Do you realize that I am not attacking your characters, but only the poet who created and developed them? You are no doubt the most skilled poet ever born on this earth. I am only questioning your contorted morality that may have influenced you characters and their development.

I have another serious doubt about you and your claims. Tell me now who was the real scribe for you when you wrote Mahabharat? You want us to believe you that Ganesha came down from the heaven (or wherever it is!) to be your scribe. Are you trying to imply that you wrote it really non-stop? By making such claims your story becomes unbelievable. You were a human being, even though a very creative poet, with all the human desires, dreams and weaknesses. You wanted an outlet to your humanness. It does not matter to me if you took breaks and had one or more disciples scribing when you dictated. My complaint is about how your mind worked.

Throughout your story, only people of royal lineage get to win. What kind of a day did you have when you wrote about Ekalavya? Did you not toss and turn in your sleep that night after you wrote of his thumb being sacrificed? Who did you pattern the character of the royal military teacher Drona? Did you know of a teacher so cruel and a teacher who realized that pupil with no teacher can master archery better than his best disciple?

Guess what! I do not have Ganesha as my scribe. I am a human being. I need to take a break. Don't you dare sneak out on me or go back to your meditation, Oh great sage! I will be back with my questions on Karna. You really need to meditate with a true concentration to answer my questions on Karna!

Bye, for now. I will back soon. Don't go away too far! Take a good relaxing break!

Murthy

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