Apaddharma is the law for times of distress. A section of the Shanti Parva of the Mahabharata is devoted to it. In one of its stories, the sage Vishvamitra takes a haunch of dog’s meat from a Chandala, an outcaste. The Chandala objects: “He who would regard dog’s meat as clean food, I think, would in matters of food abstain from nothing!”
Vishvamitra answers: “When one’s life, however, is in danger there is no sin in accepting such a present or eating such food.”