I look forward for the evening 8:30 for the last few months. Guess what, I will be in front of the tele, watching Mahabharatam. I don’t have the slightest intention to advertise the programme. I have seen BR Chopra’s Mahabharatam, however, that was much at my younger age. I probably was more distracted by the graphics and less experience in life. So I had lesser understanding of the underlying concept and the take away. Watching Mahabharat now in my forties, gives a slightly different perspective of the take-on. Number of saints who have spent years researching on the epic, finally concluded “Mahabharatham is an ocean”. Swami Vivekananda relates… Bhavad Gita (integral part of Mahabharatham) to a pack of match box, with millions of match sticks. Any stick will fire. As long as you don’t strike the match stick against the right surface, nothing will fire.

Binding Vs Buy-in

During the Mahabharat time, there was no one in the world who could have fought and won Bishma. Adding on to that, he is the son of Ganga and had the boon that he could die at his wish (icha mrithu). Similarly, all the sons of Pandavas who fought against Dhronacharya were his students. He had number of celestial weapons and there was absolutely no one in the world, who could have won him at that time. Karna had his Kavacham and Kundalam, was a gifted warrior. Additionally he was given a celestial weapon by Lord Indra, which would have killed Arjuna…. Salliyan was a great warrier as well…. Despite having all these super powers, Kauravas lost the Mahabharata war.

Bishma was not in favour of Dhridarashtra ruling Hasthinapur. Dhridarashtra was to handover the kingdom to Pandavas (Dhridarashtra was only a care-taker king), at the right time, which he refused to do. He was not in favour of the number of taxation policies, all the traits and treacheries by Sakuni and Dhuriyodhana. He was never in the favour for the dice game and for the war. He was convinced that righteousness was with Pandavas and heart in heart, he wanted Pandavas to win, though he was fighting for Khouravas. All these suggest that neither Dhridrashtra nor Dhuriyodhana never had a “buy-in” from Bishma for the war. Bhisma was “bound” by the wow he had given to his father and to Dhridrastra. He wanted to leave the battle field at several occasions, but dragged himself to stay on the war front only because he was “bound”.

It was a similar story for Dhronacharya who never had a buy-in for the war or for the leadership of Dhridrashtra or Dhuriyodhana. Dhronacharya wanted his favourite student Arjuna to win. He was bound by the woe he has given to his wife that he will protect his son Aswathama and be with him all the time. Ashwathama stood by his friend Dhuriyodhana.

Karna was bound by his friendship to Dhuriyodhana, even though he was aware that his fight was for unrighteousness. Even before the war, Karna knew that he is the eldest of the brothers of Pandavas. So heart in heart, he never wanted to kill any of Pandavas. He was forced by Dhuriyodhana to use the celestial weapon on Gadodgaja, which he had reserved that to kill Arjuna, which was the only objective of his life. His objective was not to win the war for Khauravas, but to kill Arjuna.

Salliya came to the Kurukshetra on the invitation from Pandavas to fight for Pandavas, however his arms were bent and he fought with Kouravas only because of the binding, but with no commitment. Bishma, Dhronacharya, Karna all fought for Kauravas, not because they were bought-in to the cause for which Khauravas were fighting for, but only because they were bound by their allegiance either to the Khauravas dynasty or to the friendship of Dhuriyodhana.

If all these great maharathis had fought the war with a complete buy-in, for the cause of the war, and to win, there was absolutely no chance that Pandavas to have won the war.

Taking this as an analogy to the modern world, be it a family or running a project at work, it is important to have all the parties involved to have fully bought-in to the objective. The head of the family should have a buy-in from the entire family for running the family efficiently. Similarly a Project Manager should not only ensure that he hires all maharathis (who are experts in their field), but also ensure that every member of the Project should be fully bought-in to completing the Project with utmost quality and efficiency. Using ones weakness to stay on the project, will no doubt help to keep people on-board, however won’t help to bring-out the best from the individual. Without bringing the best from maharathis, the project is bound to fail.

Will look at having Lord Krishna on your side in the next…