Once upon a time, a young boy called Prabhakaran was learning the Sasthrams in Gurukulavasam Sampradayam. Despite being exceptionally gifted, the Guru used to be extremely tough with him, though to lesser gifted students he was patience personified. The Guru used to abuse and beat Prabhakaran. Though baffled, Prabhakaran bore all these sufferings and ignomy with dignity and became versatile in all Sasthrams. Even though the time for him to complete his education was over, the Guru did not let him go. One day the Guru beat him on the thigh so harshly that it started bleeding. Prabhakaran couldnt take it any longer and went away from his classes for the day. Hurt, he wanted to take reprisal on the Cruel Guru and managed to find a place in the loft above the Gurus bedroom with a big stone, with the avowed purpose of killing him in the night. In the night, he heard the Guru remorsefully tell his wife that he was being tough on Prabhakar, only because he was exceptionally talented, and he didnt want him to be complacent, which he feared would happen, if he were to praise him. Hearing this, Prabhakaran was overcome with grief, and falls on the feet of the Guru, but revealing to him that he had intended to kill him. Though the Guru pardoned him, Prabhakaran took the issue of his intention to murder his Guru to a court of learned people, and sought a suitable punishment. Since even thinking of harming a Guru is unthinkable, murder was unpardonable in their eyes. The punishment given to him was to cover himself with rice husk (Umi) and set fire to it, slowly burning himself to death. Prabhakaran accepted the punishment and set about to carry it out. While he was slowly being burned to death, he thought "My this janmam is ending now. Let me at least create something eulogizing the God, which will be my contribution to my Guru and to the World' Thus he started creating and reciting the poem 'Sree Krishna Vilasam'. The brilliant poem was never completed. When he reached the 12th Sargam, his body got completely burnt and the last verse was 'Pasya Priye Konkana....."
Much later, the legendary Poet Kalidasan tried to complete the Poem. He took off from where Prabhakara Kavi left off 'Pasya Priye Konkana' by adding the word 'Bhoomi bhagaan'. At that time there was a divine voice (asareeri) "Pattu noolinondu vazha naaru echu koottan purappadenda" (dont try to add plantain thread to silk thread). Kalidasan was a genius, and one can imagine how good Prabhakara Kavi was by this incident. A peeved Kalidasan stopped his attempt to complete Sree Krishna Vilasam, and to this day it stays unfinished. Kalidasan felt a bit of jealousy and inferiority complex at this, and vowed to create one like this and thus was born 'Kumara Sambhavam', Prabhakara Kavi started his Poem with 'Asthisrayarassa thara sumeru nama', while Kalidasan commenced Kumarasambhavam with ' Asthyutharasyam Dishi Devathathma Himalayo Nama Nagaadhi Raja:'
The long and short of it is that it doesnt pay to add Plantain thread to a Silk Thread. But we continue to do so in many areas and in many countries with disastrous results.
I was reminded of this story when I see the Brazilian Football team of today. As an avid fan of Brazilian football of the 1980s when they played with the Latin American flair and swagger, so aesthetically pleasing, with wonderful results to show, I am dismayed at their current status. All their top players play in the more straitjacketed European football, which gets reflected in the Brazillian national teams performance on the field. They have tried, with disastrous consequences, merging the drab European Style (Vazhanaaru) to their Natural Style (Silk Thread), and the result is there for all to see.
Ditto with Indian Hockey. With the advent of Astro Turf, we went for a series of European coaches to adopt the ugly physical European style, and in the end we are neither here or there.
The Cricket Team almost fell into the same path. Wright, Chappel, Kirsten and Fletcher tried to mould India to another Australia or England, with emphasis on system than natural talent. Fortunately for India, our Silk threads ( players like Sachin, Ganguly, Dravid, Laxman, Kohli, Kumble, Zaheer) were much superior and we didnt lose out like our hockey team. Now it has dawned on the powers that be that it doesnt pay to buy Vazhanaaru coaches by paying huge sums from abroad.
We do see this in many Organizations. A team of brilliant people (pattu nool) will be saddled with a few mediocre ones (Vazha naaru) bringing down creativity and productivity
Kalidasan was wise enough to stop on hearing the Asareeri, but our Vazhanaaru people chug on merrily,........ and there lies the tragedy.
We used to have a single days polling 30 years ago, and prior to the introduction of Electronic Voting Machines, and results announced the very next day. Why should we have the elections spread over 2 months, and counting done only 3-5 days after the last day of polling?
