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00:00king's blessings several times. He would speak slowly, he would speak less, but he would
00:06communicate to you about these sort of things. There's also another scholar who is again
00:13no more with us. I've never met him also. But what a beautiful description of what the
00:21Indian thought imagined women to be. This actually came as an introduction to a book
00:30which was on Lalitha Sahasranama. It is in English. The introduction to that book on
00:37Lalitha Sahasranama was written by somebody called D.S. Sarma. He explains how he imagines
00:46the virtuous, the able, the skillful, the artful, the fighting woman of India is. That
00:55actually tells you, wow, imagine a society which can have a perception of a woman with
01:04these beautiful qualities and is seen as virtuous because she is able to stand up for her family,
01:12her community, her country, but this is what is her achievement. Now that kind of a perception,
01:21if a community, if a country, if a civilization has it, can it treat its women differently?
01:29There can be aberrations, no doubt. But that perception which D.S. Sarma has written is
01:35something worth reading. I would request you, if not in one go, it's worth reading
01:41and understanding that this is that civilization which has literally sort of imagined what
01:49its women is. No doubt, no doubt, we've heard about various different stories. And there
01:55are just not warrior princesses or queen about whom we know since last 200 years. But women
02:04warriors were also brought to the front of the war. I know in North India, Deepavali
02:10is celebrated on a particular time. In South, at least from Tamil Nadu, I can say, we don't
02:16celebrate Deepavali as Rama reaching Ayodhya. For us, it is Naraka Chaturdashi, which is
02:25on the Chaturdashi day and it is on the morning and that celebrates Narakasura's Vada, meaning
02:34killing Narakasura. And who does the killing? Everybody would say, and I for a very long
02:41time would have also said it, that it is Shri Krishna. No. He brings Satyabhama to fight.
02:49He's only behind. Because there's a curse that he won't die of a man. So, unless she
02:59could have been such a warrior, even Shri Krishna wouldn't have brought her to the
03:05front and said, fight that man out, that Asura out. There are enough such examples. So, we
03:13didn't look down upon, you know, what is this Shri Krishna such a warrior, he couldn't fight
03:18this man, this Asura. No. If it requires to use a woman's valor, it was accepted in our Dharma.
03:30That is the flexibility that Dharma offers us. And that's where Dharma doesn't deny woman's role.
03:41It doesn't look at man or woman. It looks at Dharma to be performed. And many a times,
03:47women have been brought to the forefront to perform that Dharma, which you don't see them
03:52very often doing. And also this kind of a narrative from the West would also speak about,
03:58no, no, this was all upper caste, poor class, never. And there was a very big social or
04:10treating as second class people who didn't fall within the broad contours of good conduct and so
04:18on. Even that is a false campaign. And it involves woman and therefore I'll elaborate.
04:25I'm sure you would have heard of Jabala. Her son, she herself didn't know who was a father,
04:35who was his father, because she was working as a Dasi. But she didn't deny the boy Satyakama,
04:44her son, access to education. And if she didn't deny, how did she provide it then? Because after
04:53all, when you go, went to a guru, the guru asks, who's son are you?