Q8 Answer the following questions.(do any four)
a)What did Ti_Jean,s father ask him to do when he went to town?
b) How did Ti--Jean fool his father?
c) How did Ekalavya learn archery?
Answers
c) In Mahabharata, the ancient Hindu epic, there is a character called Eklavya who wanted to learn archery from the famed guru Dronacharya. Eklavya, however, was from a lower caste and Dronacharya didn’t accept Eklavya as his student. Depressed, yet determined, Eklavya made a mud statue of Dronacharya and practised in front of it, day in and day out, meditating on his craft, taking inspiration from his guru, and eventually becoming a mighty archer.
Guru Dronacharya’s best pupil was ‘Arjuna’. Once, in a moonless night, Dronacharya and his students were hunting in the jungle when they saw a dog whose mouth was stitched together by seven arrows. Surprisingly, the dog was only muzzled, not hurt.
Arjuna was surprised and asked Dronacharya how this feat could be possible in a pitch dark environment. Dronacharya replied that this was achieved courtesy of a skill called shabd bhedi (shabd means word or sound; bhedi means a piercing) where the archer aims by listening to the sound and not by seeing the target. It was an advanced skill which Arjuna had not yet learnt. Dronacharya followed the source of the arrows and came to the place where Eklavya was practicing his craft.
A visibly impressed Dronacharya asked Eklavya, “Who’s your teacher?”. “You, Sir”, Eklavya replied, showed Dronacharya the statue and told him how he was ‘inspired’ and ‘taught’ by him. Dronacharya was impressed, confused and angered. In a match Arjuna vs. Eklavya, Eklavya was a superior archer. In a maneuver to retain Arjuna’s position as the best archer in the Kingdom, Dronacharya said:
“Where’s my teacher’s fee?”
“I’ll give my guru whatever he desires”, Eklavya replied.
“I want your right thumb”.
Eklavaya cut off his right thumb with a knife and presented it as the teaching fee (dakshina). Eklavya was crippled but even with this handicap he was still was considered one of the best archers of his time.