Loyalty Archives - understand-culture

Panna Dhai

In 1536 Banvir assassinated Vikramaditya of Mewar. The young prince Udai Singh was in the care of his nurse, Panna Dhai. She put her own son, Chandan, in the prince’s bed. Banvir ne Chandan ko rajkumar samajhkar maar dala. Banvir killed Chandan, thinking he was the prince, a Rajasthan history guide writes in Hindi. Udai Singh was taken to safety in Kumbhalgarh.

The story is taught in schools. The Sanskrit textbook Deepakam for the seventh grade has a chapter on her, titled Veerangana Pannadhaya, the heroine Panna Dhai.

The Same as the Staff

In July 2024, after India won the T20 World Cup, the Board of Control for Cricket in India shared a prize of Rs 125 crore. The 15 players received Rs 5 crore each, and the members of the support staff Rs 2.5 crore each. The board had set aside Rs 5 crore for the head coach, Rahul Dravid.

Dravid asked for Rs 2.5 crore instead. “Rahul wanted the same bonus money as the rest of his support staff. We respect his sentiments,” a source in the board told Business Standard.

Modi’s Hanuman

In October 2020, during the Bihar assembly election, Chirag Paswan of the Lok Janshakti Party described himself as Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s Hanuman. “The prime minister lives in my heart….I am like his Hanuman,” he said, as the Deccan Herald reported.

In the Ramayana, Hanuman is the devoted servant of Rama. The BJP’s answer was less warm. It called him a vote katua, a vote cutter, the Deccan Herald reported.

Kattappa’s Oath

In Baahubali: The Conclusion (2017), the warrior Kattappa kills Amarendra Baahubali. Kattappa has sworn loyalty to the rulers of Mahishmati. “Bound by oath to serve the kingdom, Kattappa helplessly lures Amarendra” to his death. The order comes from the rulers, Sivagami and Bhallaladeva.

Before the second film, the question “Why did Kattappa kill Baahubali?” had been “on everyone’s mind since 2015,” The News Minute wrote.

Tests of Loyalty

The Arthashastra, the ancient treatise on statecraft attributed to Kautilya, tells the king to examine his ministers “by offering temptations.” Book 1, chapter 10, is titled “Ascertaining by Temptations Purity or Impurity in the Character of Ministers.”

In one test, the minister is told: “This king is unrighteous.” In another, he is urged to murder the king “in view of acquiring immense wealth.” In a third, he hears: “The queen is enamoured of thee.” The translation is by R. Shamasastry.

Rama in His Heart

A popular picture of Hanuman shows him tearing open his chest. Inside, “everyone is stunned to see Rama and Sita literally in his heart,” as one retelling puts it.

Its origin is less clear. The scene “does not appear in Valmiki’s Ramayan,” the Indian site Shikshanam notes, and it says that the scene is also missing from the Ramcharitmanas. It notes that the scene appears in the Krittivasi Ramayan, a Bengali retelling of the 15th century. That origin rests on this one source.

Loyal to Duryodhana

In the Udyoga Parva of the Mahabharata, before the war, Krishna offers Karna a place on the side of the Pandavas. Karna refuses. “I cannot venture, O Janardana, to behave falsely towards the intelligent son of Dhritarashtra,” he says in the Ganguli translation. “I have, O Krishna, enjoyed sovereignty for thirteen years, without a thorn on my side.”

Later his mother, Kunti, makes the same request. Karna answers her: “How can I render that friendship of Dhritarashtra’s sons utterly futile?”

Name, Salt, Flag

Naam, namak, nishan. Name, salt, flag. The phrase is widely cited as the honor code of the Indian soldier. The Indian site Chanakya Forum explains the three words. Naam is “to uphold India’s and his regiment’s reputation.” Namak is “to repay the debt of having eaten the salt of this piece of Earth.” Nishan is to honor the national flag “and the regiment’s flag/emblem.”

The Sandals on the Throne

In the Ramayana, Prince Bharata is offered the throne of Kosala after his elder brother Rama is sent into exile. Bharata refuses it. He goes to Rama in the forest and returns with Rama’s sandals.

He places the sandals on the throne to represent Rama. For fourteen years he governs the kingdom as regent, from the village of Nandigrama, until his brother returns.

Loyal to the Emperor

In one of the Akbar and Birbal tales, the emperor Akbar praises the brinjal, and his minister Birbal praises it too. Birbal even sings two songs about it. A few days later Akbar finds a brinjal dish tasteless. Birbal now says that the vegetable is unhealthy.

Asked why he changed his mind, Birbal says that he is loyal to the emperor, not to the brinjal. One retelling puts it this way: “I am beholden to you, not to the Brinjal.”