Take it easy, Urvasi!
Stories that we find in mythology may guide us towards the light
BALAJI NARASIMHAN harata. Do they have any link DAY Bangalore and Ayus?
with life as we lead it today? Who is Ayus, you ask? Well,
M
any of my friends ask Before I answer this question, Ayus is the founder of the city of
me if I believe in the let me ask you another—what is Matura, a city that is today fa-
stories that feature in the link between SR Ramakrish- mous as the birth place of Lord
the Ramayana and the Mahab- na, the resident editor of MiD Krishna.
WHO WAS AYUS?
Ayus was actually the son Pu-
ruravas and the celestial nymph
Urvasi. Pururavas was smitten by
Urvasi and asked her to marry
him. Since Urvasi is immortal
and Pururavas was a mortal, she
came up with three conditions
that bound them together (was
this the world’s first pre-nuptial
contract? Who knows!) Even if
one of these conditions was bro-
ken, Urvasi would leave Puru-
ravas.
THE CONDITIONS WERE:
• Urvasi would only consume
ghee that was offered to the sac-
rificial fire (don’t ask me how she
stayed slim on a diet like that)
• Pururavas was to guard Ur-
vasi’s two rams, which she
claimed were like children to her
(why should a king stoop to
guarding rams? Hey Ram!)
• Except while making love,
Urvasi should never see Puru-
ravas naked (And you though
that ancient mythology was only
about pious stories?)
Of course, this went on fine for
IF MY LOVE SHOULD LEAVE ME: This painted by a while, but the devas of heaven
Raja Ravi Varma shows Urvasi leaving Pururavas because he wanted Urvasi back (it has been
broke the conditions that bound them together PIC/WIKIPEDIA reliably learnt that Indra feels
rather sad when the gang of
four—Urvasi, Menka, Rambha
and Tillottama—are missing. If
you think that dancing girls dur-
ing IPL matches are new, well In-
dra has had them all along—the
dancing girls, not the IPL). So,
they hatched a low plot to get Ur-
vasi back (and you thought that
only our politicians can stoop so
low?)
So, one fine night, after Puru-
ravas and Urvasi were lying in
bed after an intense bout of love-
making, some of the devas came
and stole the rams. Pururavas
would have followed and fought
manfully, but since he was
naked, he couldn’t rise to the oc-
casion (pun unintended). This
irked Urvasi, who hurled nasty
words at him (yes, wives used to
harangue husbands even in those
days) and so he chased the devas
in the nude.
CONTRACT REVOKED
The devas pretended to be
scared and left the rams and ran
away. When Pururavas picked
them up and approached Urvasi,
the wily devas set fire to a stack of
hay nearby—and this meant that
Urvasi saw Pururavas in the nude
while they were not making love.
And so she left him.
Pururavas however caught up
with her later and after discussing
their lives together—with a
strong focus on their amorous
pursuits, which would have left
Casanova feeling like a nice, in-
nocent school kid— Pururavas,
knowing that Urvasi would nev-
er come back, said to her, ‘Give
me my Ayus’.
Here, note the double pun—
ayus means life, and it is also the
name of their son. Pururavas
made this pun because he hails
from the Chandra Vamsam and
his ancestors include Budha
(Mercury, who rules intelligence
and more importantly, in this
context, humour).
Ok, so I have taken a long time
to tell you people that Budha is
associated with humour and dou-
ble entendres. And this is the link
between our resident editor, who
writes ‘Ayyo Rama’ every day,
and Ayus—humour.
So, now, let’s look at his chart.
Why did Ram have a career in
writing? It is because Sani the
lord of the 3rd house, which rules
written communications, aspects
Budha, the lord of the 10th
house of careers. And since Bud-
ha is responsible for humour,
Ram writes Ayyo Rama.
SERIOUSLY FUNNY
Now, you may want to ask
me—why didn’t Ram become a
pure comedy writer? Why did he
become an editor, who has to
also write a lot of serious stuff?
One reason could be because, in
his chart, Budha is aspected by
Sani.
Sani is an extremely serious
graha and is associated with stuff
like discipline, patience, persist-
ence, responsibility, and serious-
ness, among others—stuff that
editors need to possess (especial-
ly the patience part when they
are dealing with writers like me
who take three months to write
stories like this one).
So, now you know why Ram is
an editor and a person who
writes humorous stuff.
Now, there is only one thing to
address, the question I asked in
the beginning—and if you still
want to ask me the question,
then you probably need to read
this article again!