Tuesday 26 April 2016

Service To Man is Service to God



Service To Man is Service to God

Rabindranath Tagore in his Nobel prize winning book, Geetanjali writes-
“Leave this chanting and singing and telling of the beads,
Whom does thou worship in this lonely dark corner of the temple?
Open thy eyes and see thy god is not in front of thee!
He is there where the tiller is tilling the hard ground and where the path maker is breaking the stones.
He is with them in sun and shower and his garment is covered with dust.
Put off thou holy mantle and even like him come down on the dusty soil”
A very good afternoon to everyone present! Myself Devashish Palkar, an intern doctor working in Shree Krishna Hospital and I am here today to speak on the subject- SERVICE TO MAN IS SERVICE TO GOD!!
The search for the existence of god has perennially perplexed the human mind but in this beautiful poem, Rabindranath Tagore explains it succinctly that GOD RESIDES WITHIN EACH HUMAN BEING!!
Gandhiji had said, “Happiness resides in a poor man’s cottage and god in his heart! So, serving the man was equal to serving the god!”
If we abide by the ideology of Vedanta, every man is a reflection of his soul or atman which in turn is a reflection of Brahman , the creator himself.
A famous saint Rang Avadhut, conveyed the message of serving God amongst the human being by saying: “Paraspar devo bhav!”
If you classify animals by any classification, the list always ends with homo sapiens or in common parlance, we the men as the most evolved anatomically and physiologically.
And what better than serving the god’s most evolved creation?
Let’s turn the clock back to that era when Swami Vivekananda gave us this wonderful message.
It was a time when India’s greatest enemy, poverty was at its zenith which gave birth to blind faiths, discrimination, casteism and other forms of social evils.
It was a time when famines were more frequent vistors than rains a time when adulteration in all walks of life knew no bound and when landlords owned every piece of ground.
But as they say,''Cometh the hour, cometh the man!''
And thus it was the same time when metamorphosis of a prodigious boy Narendranath Dutt was taking place. The world came to know him as Swami Vivekananda.

Swami ji criss crossed the length and breadth of the country and discovered that though blind faith and false religious beliefs had left the masses downtrodden, they still had the same faith in God.
With this same faith, he attempted for spiritual unification as he believed- ''Just like all the rivers merge into one ocean, all religions lead to one god!''

He was a believer of the saying- ''Paropkaray punyay, papaay, parpidanam..'' meaning- ''Benevolence leads to bliss, malevolence leads to curse!''.
With this ideology of serving god by serving mankind, Ramakrishna Mission was founded on 1st May 1897.

It is only by the development of masses can India regain it's lost glory..
Sometimes, a poor man doesn't require sympathy, all he needs is a helping hand.
A hand that helps is better than the hand that prays..
So, if you really want to serve God, don't just sit in temples chanting mantras, and offering sweets and milk to the idol, instead feed it to the beggar outside the temple and god will be really happy.

Just like the electric current flows from higher to lower potential, similarly the people who have higher status in the society must come up and serve the lower sections of the society.
If the current just accumulates at the higher potential, then the bulb can't glow. Similarly, if all wealth and knowledge accumulate at hugher sections, the bulb of enlightenment will not glow and darkness will prevail.

We have many examples of people who dedicated  their lives to serve the mankind- Swami Vivekananda, Sai Baba, Mother Teresa, Mahatma Gandhi and many more.
Internationally too, we have had Melvin Jones, the founder of International Lions Club and how can we forget Henry-the Red Cross hero!?

These illustrious personalities taught us that- a candle loses nothing of its light by lighting another candle.
But in this era of highly competitive world, somewhere down the line, virtues of humanity and compassion have been overshadowed by ego and selfishness.
We say we are MANKIND, but are we really KIND to each other?

A famous Gujarati poet Meen Piyasi has beautifully written-
''Parmatma to pehlu puchhse
Koi nu sukh dukh puchyu'tu? 
Aa dardbhari duniya ma jai ne,
Koi mu aansu luchyu' tu?''

Mother Teresa said- ''In the end you will be judged not by your degrees and diplomas but by the question-''I was hungry and you fed me. I was naked and you clothed me.. I was homeless, you took me in..''
Friends- it's up to us how we answer this question, how we carry the torch of enlightenment and message of service forward. The onus is upon us.
And I believe, we, as doctors have an amazing opportunity to put these words into practice..Let's serve the mankind, let's heal the wounds and thereby let’s serve the god himself..

Thank you for reading.

Random thoughts: WHAT ARE WE REALLY?

What are we really?
Social animals who tuck the headphones in our ears and prefer solitude when in a bus and curse the loneliness when night falls and sleep eludes us.

What are we really?
So reluctant to change that we live the same year of our life every year.
So delicate that we pray for rain in the summer and for sun in the winter.

What are we really?
Lonely creatures loitering our way through on the face of earth in search of someone with whom we can share our stories?

What are we really?
We crave for friendships and yet we betray.
We crave for peace and yet we build missiles.

What are we really!?
We want to love and be loved and yet we are afraid it might never last forever.

What are we really?
Foolish mortal beings who are tempted to believe that anything can last forever!?

What are we really?

- Devashish Palkar
#Fiction

Wednesday 13 April 2016

''David and the Energy vampire!''

''David and the Energy vampire!''

You must have all read the story of David and Goliath but believe me this is a different story. Here, David is the Goliath and the villain is an all too powerful vampire, almost like the original David from David and Goliath.
Here is how it goes...

In a small village of faraway land, much before the earth was divided into countries, and when science had not established its foothold, people used to believe in the presence of demons and witches.
 There was this young man named David in one such part of the world. He was a shepherd by profession(that makes him David Shepherd- not the umpire- I know, an unnecessary joke! Let me go on with story.!) and a pretty good one at that. He had a total of 10 sheep which he used to take everyday for grazing in the lush green pastures every morning. In the middle of the pasture was a giant rock which overlooked the entire pasture and David thought it was the perfect and the only place to keep a watch over the sheep.
One day while the sheep were busy grazing and David was day dreaming sitting on his favorite rock, he saw a strange image behind the bushes. As David went closer, he saw the image turned into that of an ugly old man. At first, David paid no attention to that man and went back and sat on his favorite rock overlooking the pasture.
But later, the man started to irritate David by disturbing him in his favourite past time- day dreaming, by throwing tiny pebbles near the rock. David was angry. He started to curse and abuse the old man and to his utter disbelief, the man started to become younger and stronger with each abuse that David sent his way. David was afraid as the old man was now becoming younger and more powerful and had started throwing even larger stones his way. David cursed him further, the man became stronger.
Afraid of further consequences, David ran away and reached his village. A wise man in the village heard the story patiently and then chuckled, ''Oh. That must be an energy vampire! Just go back and ignore him, he will disappear!''
David was confused but he had nobody to trust other than this wise man. So he went back to the pastures where his sheep were grazing and began doing what he knew best- Day dreaming! And to his utter bewilderment, in a span of a few minutes, the giant old man had become the size of those little men from Lilliput in Gulliver's travels. David was surprised but he decided not to pay any attention to that man and diverted his attention to his sheep and day dreaming as he had been advised by the wise man. Within a few hours, the old man completely disappeared.
At the end of the day, David went back to his village happily having a euphoric feeling of defeating the energy vampire!

But David was wrong. That was the first day, the Energy Vampire had made its presence felt.
Since that day, man has been grappling with the same problem- The Energy Vampires. giving undue attention to things which he should not...


According to the laws of thermodynamics, there is a constant flow of energy through our bodies and this energy may manifest itself in many forms- actions, words and sometimes even thoughts which I believe are perhaps the most ingenious creations- things that differentiate Homo sapiens from other animals in the hierarchy of evolution. Thoughts, which are like waves in an ocean keep on coming and striking the shores of our conscious minds at their own will many a times end up distracting us from our work. And most of these thoughts though appear involuntary on the surface are in fact our own indirect creation deep down. These thoughts come to us when we give undue importance to a certain object or a person or an event which might be trivial in the hindsight yet acts as a power sucking machine taking away our positive energies and leaving us powerless and casts a gloomy spell on us.
These are the ENERGY VAMPIRES.

They could be anything and anyone- an object or a person, or someone whose remote presence disturbs you and every time you think of them, a part of your energy evaporates and is sucked up by these energy vampires.
In David's case, it was this innocuous ugly old man who got onto his nerves and ended up irritating David. The more energy you give to thoughts about them, the more powerful and energy sucking they will become.
The earlier you are able to divert your thoughts, the better it is.
 But I know this is difficult and we are all in some form and to some extent grappling with such everyday problems and that is what connects us on a deeper level as humans.

We might think and act differently, but our problems are humanely similar.


-Devashish Palkar

Sunday 10 April 2016

''Time to mute TV sets!''

''Time to mute TV sets!''



In a world governed by high decibel noise, Harsha Bhogle was always going to be a misfit, for he chose to speak softly in the most articulate manner with choicest metaphors rather than clinging on to clichés (as his profession demanded).
In a world governed so strongly by fanaticism, Harsha Bhogle was always going to be a misfit, for he chose to love the sport more than any particular team(as his profession demanded).
In a world governed by rage, Harsha Bhogle was always going to be a misfit, for he chose to describe emotions on the field rather than portraying himself (as his profession demanded).
In a world which considers commentary as 'making stories', Harsha Bhogle was always going to be a misfit, for he chose to 'narrate a story' as (he thought) his profession demanded!
In a world where commentators like Sidhu and Rameez Raja can't keep silent, Harsha Bhogle was always going to be a misfit for he believed in the Richie Beneaud style of commentary where pauses were more important.

Unfortunately, Harsha Bhogle now finds himself like a Rahul Dravid amidst Carlos Brathwites.
I am reminded of a conversation Harsha and Geoffrey Boycott once had in the commentary box which went something like this-
GB: ''Sachin Tendulkar has in his long career never been on the honour's board at Lords.''
To which Harsha replied in his own cheeky manner with a brilliant - ''Whose loss is it?''

To the stories and reports regarding termination of Harsha Bhogle's contract from IPL commentary I have just one thing to say-
''Whose loss is it?''

Well, till the time international cricket resumes, all that we are left with for now is to listen to Navjot Singh Sidhu thumping our ear drums with- ''Ball aise jagah lagi Jahan pe haddi nahi hoti!'' (While referring to a batsman getting hit on his groin!)
Or we could just go on and 'Mute the TV set' as Harsha Bhogle had hismelf remarked a couple of years back that viewers should be given a choice to watch sports without commentary.
That time has really come with Harsha not being a part of BCCI'S contracted commentators.
For some spectators who view the IPL games in the same manner that they watched 'Comedy Nights with Kapil', it won't be a loss.
For a some crazy cricket fans like me, the loss is beyond words.
But Harsha still has a long way to go.
He now needs to declare himself as a free lancer and all the other broadcasting companies- even top ones like Sky Sports and Channel 9 will come running, after all Harsha is India's only voice of cricket.
And hopefully, he should continue to write, for cricket needs him as much as he needs cricket.

To give a glimpse of what Harsha means to me-
At 10, I wanted to be a cricketer.
At 20, I wanted to be Harsha Bhogle.

Ending it with a quote by Harsha himself, ''Most entertainment is an escape from reality; sport is an escape into reality. May it long be that way!''




A 'CRICKET' fan,
Devashish Palkar

Thursday 7 April 2016

''The Midnight Cries!''

''The Midnight Cries!''

It was 1 AM and the busy hospital of the day was now a silent place.
A loud cry alerted everyone in the medical ward.
It was of a mother whose 20 year old daughter had been admitted to the hospital just that morning and found to have cardiomegaly and symptoms of congestive heart failure.
A panicked mother immediately reported to the nursing station that something was wrong with her daughter who was convulsing on her bed.
Even before the medical officer and intern reached the place and started the CPR, she had breathed her last. They however continued the CPR but ECG refused to take any curves..
The mother cried out loudly and  now almost everyone in the ward was awake .
Her daughter lay there silent, unmoved, lifeless..

At the same time, a 100 metres away, in the labour room, another woman cried loudly at the height of her labour pain. In that instance, the woman became a mother.

In both instances, a mother cried.
In the first, the daughter gave no response.
In the second, the baby daughter wriggled, cried out loudly and came to life...

In the first, a cry was followed by more cries.
In the second, a cry was followed by laughter..

- Devashish Palkar

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