Rise of Kali Quotes

“Krishna said with a smile. “Once you win, everything will be considered fair.”
― Anand Neelakantan, AJAYA - RISE OF KALI (Book 2)

“A good politician knows when to act noble and when to be ruthless. Politics is the art of using others to achieve your goals.”
― Anand Neelakantan, AJAYA - RISE OF KALI (Book 2)

“You dare laugh at the fall of Suyodhana and all the noble men like Bhishma, my father, Karna, and the others who fought for him? Read Jaya to know how Karna rejected the temptation to become Emperor and instead chose to stand by the man who had given him everything when he had nothing. Read how Karna was trapped by own nobility, how impossible promises were extracted from him; know how he was shot while extracting the wheel of his chariot that was stuck in the mud. Know that Arjuna did not keep his word, as any honourable warrior would have done, when he failed to kill Jayadratha before sunset, hiding behind the lame excuse that the sunset had been maya, an illusion created by an avatar. Sleep in your beds peacefully by all means, if your conscience still allows you to do so, you lucky devils.”
― Anand Neelakantan, AJAYA - RISE OF KALI (Book 2)

“Mandana Misra was a great scholar and authority on the Vedas and Mimasa. He led a householder’s life (grihastha), with his scholar-philosopher wife, Ubhaya Bharati, in the town of Mahishi, in what is present-day northern Bihar. Husband and wife would have great debates on the veracity of the Vedas, the Upanishads, the Gita and other philosophical works. Scholars from all over Bharatavarsha came to debate and understand the Shastras with them. It is said that even the parrots in Mandana’s home debated the divinity, or its lack, in the Vedas and Upanishads. Mandana was a staunch believer in rituals. One day, while he was performing Pitru Karma (rituals for deceased ancestors), Adi Shankaracharya arrived at his home and demanded a debate on Advaita. Mandana was angry at the rude intrusion and asked the Acharya whether he was not aware, as a Brahmin, that it was inauspicious to come to another Brahmin’s home uninvited when Pitru Karma was being done? In reply, Adi Shankara asked Mandana whether he was sure of the value of such rituals. This enraged Mandana and the other Brahmins present. Thus began one of the most celebrated debates in Hindu thought. It raged for weeks between the two great scholars. As the only other person of equal intellect to Shankara and Mandana was Mandana’s wife, Ubhaya Bharati, she was appointed the adjudicator. Among other things, Shankara convinced Mandana that the rituals for the dead had little value to the dead. Mandana became Adi Shankara’s disciple (and later the first Shankaracharya of the Sringeri Math in Karnataka). When the priest related this story to me, I was shocked. He was not giving me the answer I had expected. Annoyed, I asked him what he meant by the story if Adi Shankara himself said such rituals were of no use to the dead. The priest replied, “Son, the story has not ended.” And he continued... A few years later, Adi Shankara was compiling the rituals for the dead, to standardize them for people across Bharatavarsha. Mandana, upset with his Guru’s action, asked Adi Shankara why he was involved with such a useless thing. After all, the Guru had convinced him of the uselessness of such rituals (Lord Krishna also mentions the inferiority of Vedic sacrifice to other paths, in the Gita. Pitru karma has no vedic base either). Why then was the Jagad Guru taking such a retrograde step? Adi Shankaracharya smiled at his disciple and answered, “The rituals are not for the dead but for the loved ones left behind.”
― Anand Neelakantan, AJAYA - RISE OF KALI (Book 2)

“The sadhu smiled at me and said, “Son, if those who passionately argue for one side or another, care to pause in their arguments, they will hear Barbarika laughing and mocking them.”
― Anand Neelakantan, AJAYA - RISE OF KALI (Book 2)

“The saint and the atheist, seekers both, bowed to each other and went their separate ways.”
― Anand Neelakantan, AJAYA - RISE OF KALI (Book 2)

“Krishna, from desire, life is born. From attachment, love. From passion, beauty. From compassion, humanity. Desire is the very foundation of nature.”
― Anand Neelakantan, AJAYA - RISE OF KALI (Book 2)

“There are different kinds of work. Work for the sake of result is not worship. Work unaffected by result is true worship.”
― Anand Neelakantan, AJAYA - RISE OF KALI (Book 2)

“But everyone and every faith has a place in the great mosaic of our culture. Nothing is absolutely right or wrong. We may perhaps need the head of Barbarika to see the bigger picture.”
― Anand Neelakantan, AJAYA - RISE OF KALI (Book 2)

“Stories, I believe, should be about questions, never about answers. Every answer should give birth to a hundred questions. That is the mark of a confident civilisation and that is how we, the sons and daughters of Bharatavarsha, have always celebrated our stories – with debate, argument and counterargument. Certainly not by accepting without dissent. Perhaps Barbarika is laughing at all of us. Let us celebrate that laughter.”
― Anand Neelakantan, AJAYA - RISE OF KALI (Book 2)

“Jagat satyam, Brahma mithya.”
― Anand Neelakantan, Rise of Kali: Duryodhana's Mahabharata

“The country belonged to him, Devavrata Gangadatta Bhishma. Dhritarashtra”
― Anand Neelakantan, AJAYA - RISE OF KALI (Book 2)

“No ambition was purely selfless or selfish, acknowledging it honestly to oneself made life much simpler. To”
― Anand Neelakantan, AJAYA - RISE OF KALI (Book 2)

“Bhishma to Yudhishtra (Anusashana Parva): But it is not always easy for mere mortals to arrive at dharma-vinischaya (definition of dharma). Only kala (time or Yama, the God of Time or Yamam), knows what is dharma and adharma.”
― Anand Neelakantan, AJAYA - RISE OF KALI (Book 2)

“The greatness of Vedavyasa’s work is in the questions it evokes every time we read it, rather than in the answers given by preachers who reduce it to a simplistic tale of good versus evil.”
― Anand Neelakantan, AJAYA - RISE OF KALI (Book 2)

“Adi Shankaracharya smiled at his disciple and answered, “The rituals are not for the dead but for the loved ones left behind.”
― Anand Neelakantan, AJAYA - RISE OF KALI (Book 2)

“Is dharma a war fought without ethics and then glorified?”
― Anand Neelakantan, AJAYA - RISE OF KALI (Book 2)

“How naive you still are, Arjuna my friend,” Krishna said with a smile. “Once you win, everything will be considered fair.”
― Anand Neelakantan, AJAYA - RISE OF KALI (Book 2)

“Tchaw! The Pandavas did not even fight for their wife; do you think they will fight for a few cows?” Suyodhana said dismissively. “Nephew, to such people, a wife’s honour can be pawned but a cow’s life cannot be compromised. The easiest way to conquer Bharatavarsha is to march a few cows before the invading army.”
― Anand Neelakantan, AJAYA - RISE OF KALI (Book 2)

“Krishna answers that what he sees is maya, the illusion of life, at once fascinating and confusing. No one can decide what is dharma and what is adharma, who is the victor and who is the vanquished. Mortals are but tiny specks in the vast universe, blips in the great ocean of time. Disgusted,”
― Anand Neelakantan, AJAYA - RISE OF KALI (Book 2)

“Perfection is stillness, perfection is death. A wheel that does not move is useless. I am the axle of the wheel of dharma. Knowledge is the pin. What is at the top today will be at the bottom tomorrow. The dharmachakra moves with time, forward and cyclically.”
― Anand Neelakantan, AJAYA - RISE OF KALI (Book 2)

“Brother, by desiring an object, attachment is born. From attachment, wrath is born. From wrath comes want of discrimination. From want of discrimination arises ruination of intelligence. From loss of intelligence springs loss of understanding, and then man is ruined.”
― Anand Neelakantan, AJAYA - RISE OF KALI (Book 2)

“If an idea was to survive, it had to adapt with the times – bend but not break, show it was changing, yet never really change.”
― Anand Neelakantan, AJAYA - RISE OF KALI (Book 2)

“Death is real and devastating and no intellectual circus can take away the pain of the people who are left behind.”
― Anand Neelakantan, AJAYA - RISE OF KALI (Book 2)

“Stories, I believe, should be about questions, never about answers. Every answer should give birth to a hundred questions. That is the mark of a confident civilisation and that is how we, the sons and daughters of Bharatavarsha, have always celebrated our stories – with debate, argument and counterargument. Certainly not by accepting without dissent.”
― Anand Neelakantan, AJAYA - RISE OF KALI (Book 2)