Karunanidhi’s love for Hindu stories has no limits.
His penchant for misquoting them also has no limits and no parallels.
Currently he has developed a love for Mahabali.
The first time we heard MK relate Mahabali’s story was after A.Raja was arrested.
He compared Raja with Mahabali and said that Raja was punished for doing good!!
One of the readers pointed out at that time that MK perhaps was listening to Velukkudi Krishnan’s discourse as the story of Mahabali was the theme of his discourses around that time.
Could be, because looking at the subsequent talks on Mahabali by MK, it seems highly probable that MK came to know of Mahabali only through Velukkudi’s discourse.
I say this with some conviction because
MK missed the ready platter of Aryan bashing and Brahmin bashing available in Mahabali’s defeat. Velukkudi Swamy could not have harped on the Brahmin identity of Vamana.
He could have only elaborated on the Godhood of Vamana, the virtues of Mahabali and the Devas’ desire to put Mahabali under control.
So there is no way MK had known Vamana as a Brahmin boy.
Had he known that, he would have blamed Brahmanism and Arayanism as the causes for Mahabali’s defeat. He missed the chance.
What he is now left with is ‘self respect’ plank.
Already he has been bruised enough on the count of self respect in the seat- sharing drama with the Congress party. Coupled with this is Velukkudi’s captivating speech on Mahabali.
So it seems that MK could not think beyond Mahabali and self respect!
The result was his speech in Trichy last week where he took a dig at Keralites for celebrating Onam festival. How could they allow Mahabali to lose – because the issue involved is self respect!!!!
If Tamils were there, they would not have let Mahabali fall!!!!
Such was the self respect of the Tamils.
What Karunanidhi did not know was that Mahabali was a king in a part of Tamilnadu.
Or else how could we have a place named after him as Mahabalipuram and a series of Vishnu shrines established there – 6 of which have got submerged over thousands of years.
Even if we were to assume that Mahabali was in Kerala, was not Kerala part of Tamil speaking people of Sangam times?
Where was the self respect of those people of Sangam age?
His talk also shows that he has not read the full story of his favorite Kannagi.
In Silappadhikaram, there comes a mention of Banasura, the son of
His kingdom was in Tamilnadu only.
His daughter was in love with none other than
This grandson called Anirudh was imprisoned by Banasura.
From this dance of
MK does not know that, it seems.
He does not know that all the 11 dance forms mentioned in Silappadhikaram and danced by Madhavi were introduced by Hindu Gods – of which 2 were by Mahavishnu.
All these dance forms are the fore runners of today’s rural dances which his daughter Kanimozi promotes through Chennai sangamam.
MK’s attachment to Mahabali did not stop at Trichy.
He spoke about Mahabali again in yesterday’s election meeting at
This time he has graduated from self respect to self pity!
He compared himself with Mahabali and said that the inimical forces were trying to stop him from doing his good deeds to the poor.
In his February speech he put himself along with Raja and made a comparison with Mahabali.
This time he singled himself out and compared himself with Mahabali.
But he could not emphasis the details of the story, for,
when he started telling that Devas wanted to defeat Mahabali,
he made sure that he did not mean the Thevar community!
He thinks that people do not know
the difference between Thevar community and the Devas of Puranas.
MK can not afford to irritate Thevar community,
but he can say anything against devas.
It looked comical to hear him ‘cook up’ the Mahabali story and plead for his survival in this election.
Karunanidhi is cutting a sorry figure
when he starts speaking about Hindu stories
without knowing the interpretations behind them.
That he does not understand Tamil poems as well is
another fact that he exposed in his Semmozi theme song.
Most Hindu stories have many layers of interpretations and
the top most interpretation will have some cosmic or
geological relevance or
some relevance in Nature.
The story of Mahabali has a big geological secret behind it.
The story of Mahabali is best explained in Vamana purana.
Mahabali’s grand father was Prahlada of Narasimha avatar fame.
There is no reason to assume that Mahabali is of bad character.
But he was called an Asura due to his location in the globe.
The Asuras lived in the Southern hemisphere and the Devas lived in the northern hemisphere.
The dominance of Mahabali, the asura tells of a time when the Southern hemisphere was brimming with life. With movement of Time, the location of life shifts places.
This happens when the Northern hemisphere starts becoming habitable and the southern hemisphere goes under water.
This is made out in the story of Mahabali.
The pregnancy of Vamana by Aditi comes with a description of earth tremors.
Vamana purana says that when Lord Narayana was borne by Aditi as a fetus, it was very heavy.
The earth shook violently because of the unbearable weight of the fetus.
Wherever she went, that particular portion of earth tilted down because of the enormous weight.
It is also told in this Purana that even as Vamana was growing as a fetus,
the Asuras and their land started losing their life and radiance.
This depicts a condition of geological change on the face of the earth
when the lands in the Southern hemisphere were becoming uninhabitable and losing life.
Wherever Vamana went –even in fetus form – the land lowered.
The lowered land got easily inundated with sea water.
After Vamana was born and went to meet
When Vamana placed his foot on
he was sent to Patala which is the lowermost layer of the earth’s crust and the covering over the mantle.
This depicts the final culmination of loss of land into deep sea.
By doing this Vamana did not admonish Mahabali.
He only showed that that life in the South is over largely and
it must shift to North where Indra, the lord of Devas would rule.
Then will come a time when Indra will relinquish his post – it means that life will shift to the South.
Vamana tells Mahabali to remain in Patala until the end of the kalpa.
He also says that in the next Manvantra, Mahabali will become the next Indra.
This shows the cyclical change in the location of Life.
At present we see more land parts in the Northern hemisphere and most life concentrated on the North.
Vast stretches of the South are under water now.
In the next Manvantra, the North will become uninhabitable
and land forms will appear in the south and life will thrive there.
At that time Mahabali would become the Indra.
In puranas Virochana is the counterpart of Indra.
Mahabali is the descendant of Virochana.
Perhaps the next Manvanthra will have puranas tell about a counter part of Mahabali connected to Indra.
Time calculations.
To make a calculation of when such a reversal of location will happen, there are 71 chathur yugas in a Manvanthra and we are in the 28th chathur yuga in the 7th Manvanthra.
Each manvantra with sandhi has 30,67,20,000 years.
In the present Manvanthra we have finished approximately 12,05,20,000 years
until the beginning of the present Kali maha yuga.
In a striking coincidence the Himalayas formed at around 8 crore years ago,
well after 4 crores of years when the present Manvantra started.
Before that the land where we are standing now in
and was moving towards
In another 18 crore years, this northern location of life forms will decline and
the southern seas will see fresh lands coming up.
That was when the next Manvantra will begin with Mahabali as its chief.
This is the import of the story of Mahabali.
At another level of time calculation of smaller yuga cycles of 28,800 years of one round of axial precession,
the Vamana avatara happened pretty recently after the Ice age came to an end around 15,000 years ago.
The southern lands where Pandyans ruled,
where Meenakshi was born
where the first series of Shiva’s divine plays happened (Koodal kaandam in Thiruvilaiyaadal puraanam) etc, the south was brimming with life.
There was less life in the North which was covered with ice for most part.
Vast stretches of land in the Indian ocean starting from
the present day Mahabalipuram and Pumpukar were submerged at times
between 11,500 to 9000 years ago (More details in my Tamil blog ‘Tamizan dravidanaa?’).
The story of Mahabali and Vamana had happened then.
The present day Mahabalipuram was far extended into the sea and a temple for Narayana had been there. Each time the city was lost into the sea,
a new
Legend is that there were 7 temples one beyond the other.
At present there is only one
This is similar to Dwaraka submergence which also saw 6 submergences in the last 10,000 years.
In the immediate past Mahabali had lived in our shores.
His life shows the loss of land sinking to the Patala under the sea.
We are currently in the middle of the period between 2 Ice ages.
When the next mini Ice age sets in the north,
sea levels will fall and more lands will reappear in the South.
Life will start thriving there.
So goes the cycle.
This probability is supported by science!!
How can we expect one like Karunanidhi to understand
such intricate secrets hidden in Hindu texts and
the many layered meanings of Hindu texts
with his shallow knowledge?
Pity him!
