Many students face dilemmas in their lives about what to do in the future and how to achieve their goals and targets. The lack of guidance makes the situation tougher to handle and may lead to them going astray. So, yesterday, an interactive session on “Leadership and Strategic Lessons from Panchatantra” was conducted by Student Organization SPADE in the form of its infamous “SPADE ki Pathshala” by inviting Mr. Bikash Agrawal who is a Lead Finance in Eternia (a venture of Hindalco, Aditya Birla Group).
As the title of the session suggests, the meeting was about how to face the difficult situations of life through the learnings of Panchatantra, the children’s book. He started with the history of Panchatantra, a book that was written three centuries before the birth of Christ (BC). It is the most widely translated storybook in India and is known around the world. It has been translated into more than 50 languages and consists of nearly 200 versions. This book holds numerous stories with each story giving an individual life lesson allowing you to remove all the negativities in life.
Panchatantra is composed of two words:
Pancha– five
Tantra– strategies (niti)
Thus, Panchatantra is also called Nitishastra which establishes itself as the first self-help book.
The five strategies of Panchatantra and applying them to the perspective of students:
- Mitrabhed- loss of friends i.e. not letting go of something you possess.
- Mitra samprapti- winning of friends i.e. motivation, communication and good performance.
- Kakolukiyam- war and peace i.e. how to get a good job or start a new business.
- Labdhapranasam- losing something you have gained i.e. even if you are well prepared, you fail in the exam caused by distraction.
- Aparikshit krakam- the result of hastily taken decisions i.e. impatience leading to the use of short-cuts.
Overall learning from Panchatantra:
- It will enable you to keep things simple and straightforward making them easier to apply in real life.
- It allows you to stay calm in adverse situations and think about a proper solution.
- Keeping your eyes and ears open to eliminate all the negative energy around you and spread positivity.
- It helps you to know the importance of context enabling faster learning.
- It explains what leadership is. It is putting others before yourself, saving others before saving yourself and is the way you exhibit what you want in life which only the person with good leadership skills can do.
Five qualities of being successful in life
Mr. Bikas Sir started this topic with a famous Sanskrit shloka:
“Kaak chesta, Bako dhyanam, Swan nindra tathaiwa cha, Alphari, Grihatyagi, Vidyarthi panch lakshanam”
Meaning: your efforts must be similar to a crow, your focus on work must be like a crane’s, take a nap like a dog keeping the alert mode in your brain on, eat less and properly, and stay away from the luxuries of life!
This explains the five qualities a student must possess to succeed in life which are:
- Persistence
- Focus
- Commitment
- Alertness
- Passion
He then gave us the lessons from other famous stories of Panchatantra and also the method to apply them in our life to overcome obstacles. Some of them being far-sighted and the ability to make correct decisions on the spot without believing in luck, giving priority to oneself and importance to one’s individual views, making decisions calmly without being hasty avoiding hurry and a lot can be achieved with pre-emptive action.
With this, he signed off thanking SPADE for giving him this opportunity of interacting with students and guiding them to lead the enlightened and accurate path of life with ease.
