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ghotalaz

@ghotalaz

Dazzler

Posted: 14 years ago

#11

I'll write down a brief update for the episode of Jul 23, 2011. Shani Dev talks about the power of women. The story is of the Princess Narmada. Her swayamvar is going on. (My God Imagine is seriously obsessed with Swayamvars LOL!) When one Prince says he's a warrior, she says then he should become her bodyguard not husband. When one Brahmin says he has wisdom, then she says he should be his teacher not husband. She rejects all of the men saying nobody has the qualities to become her husband. The men who came there for the Swayamvar feel insulted & insult her father saying it's actually she who doesn't have the qualities of becoming a good wife. The King(her father, sorry forgot his name) cries in front of the statue of Shani & says he got insulted due to his daughter & wished he had no child. Narmada hears this & begs for forgiveness & says she'll marry any guy he chooses for her. The king angrily tells her to marry the first man she meets on the way outsideNarmada leaves & sees a man (Kameshwar) sitting under a tree covered with a shawl. She goes up to him & touches his feet & says he has accepted him as her husband. She takes off his shawl & sees the man who is suffering from leprosy. She gets shocked, the villagers tell her to stay away from him as he is suffering due to his sins he did in the past. She tells him that she has accepted him as her husband & asks them where his house is. Laxmi, Parvati & Saraswati are watching all this from above & are praising Narmada's strong determination.

The King arrives at Kameshwar's house & asks Narmada how she will live with a man like that. She says now her life belongs to her husband only. The king leaves. She serves her husband with full devotion. One day she tells Kameshwar to fill up her maang, Kameshwar throws the puja thaali on the floor & says he loves someone else (Chandrakala) & wants to marry her. Narmada cries & begs him not to leave her & says she has no objections of him marrying Chandrakala. Kameshwar thinks he'll let her stay as he & his wife would get a maid in the form of Narmada. Shani now gets angry & says Kameshwar has been suffering due to his sins & now still he hasn't reformed in his thinking ways yet. Narmada promises to take Kameshwar to meet Chandrakala. She goes to bring a cart, Shani appears in front of her & introduces him as Kameshwar's friends & tells her that he wasted all his money on Chandrakala & ignored his friends/family & today he's still going to meet the same girl. Narmada says it's her duty to serve her husband. Narmada & Kameshwar arrive at Chandrakala's place. She rejects him saying he has no money left & now she has no love for him. Narmada takes him away from there but he once again runs back calling out Chandrakala's name. Shani dev says now Kameshwar will get punished badly. On the way Kameshwar bumps into Sage Maandavi (I hope I got the name right). The sage curses Kameshwar that he will die the next day. Narmada swears in front of the Tulsi plant that if she has served her husband with full devotion then the sun will not rise the next day. Shani dev gets shocked. Laxmi, Parvati & Saraswati go to Mahadev & tell him to keep Narmada's promise. Mahadev takes the skin of tiger on which he sits, & throws it in the air & it covers the sun. Darkness is casted on the earth. The gods go to Mahadev & tell him that if the sun doesn't rise then the life on earth will get destroyed. Shani dev too arrives & tells Mahadev that if the sun doesn't rise then life won't prevail on the earth. Mahadev says that Shani Dev is the God of Justice so he should do justice to her. Shani dev arrives in front of Narmada & tells her to free Surya Dev from her promise. Narmada refuses then Shani Dev makes the curse of Sage Maandavi invalid & cures Kameshwar's leprosy & his evil thoughts. Narmada takes her promise back & frees the Surya Dev. Kameshwar gets cured & begs forgiveness falling at Narmada's feet.

Shani says the river Narmada was named after her & says a woman who is a true devotee of her husband has a lot of power.

Janakiraghunath thanks for opening this thread & thanks to Lola for reopening it & Vrish thanks for providing the link.

I'll post my comments & questions regarding the episode later ...

Edited by vik rocks - 14 years ago

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Vrish

@Vr15h

Stunner

+ 6

Posted: 14 years ago

#12

Vik

Looks like that king should have had Rakhie Sawant and Ratan Rajput as his daughters - then they'd have had to marry whoever they selected. Incidentally, that's the original purpose of swayamvars - to give princesses the choice of which of their father's allies they were willing to marry. Usually it was just kings, so it was strange that they had Brahmans and others in this one.

And Princess Narmada royally screwed up her life by selecting such a hubby. In a lot of the mythos, such devoted wives sometimes ended up as rivers. If only it were that easy - most of our mahaan TV bahus would be great rivers, and we'd be building hydel dams all over the place 🤣

Okay, enough of my irreverent humor - so Shani punishes Kamaleshwar for past scenes? But was Princess Narmada too guilty of such sins for which, instead of a swayamvar wedding, she had to marry a leper? Did Shani spell it out?

Let's see how next week's episode goes

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ghotalaz

@ghotalaz

Dazzler

Posted: 14 years ago

#13

Vrish, Narmada wasn't punished, at least nothing like that was shown. Shani had mentioned that Narmada will write her own destiny & prove she has the qualities of a good wife. All he talked about was Pativrata Stri ki Shakti.

Kameshwar couldn't get punished bcoz of Narmada's pativrata feelings. Shani with his powers cleaned up his mind instead & reformed him. I was actually wondering, today in saas bahu serials, if the female leads do the same thing then what would be calling them, obviously not pativrata, something else which starts with the letter D😈 Btw Vrish today these Mahaan bahus of TV are still capable of building up rivers with their bucket full of tears😆 Ok I'm done with my jokes! Coming to the main point...

If a wife supports her husband in his evil activities, then what are the consequences? Does the wife become a pativrata stri 😕or does she too become evil in the eyes of God as she's supporting her husband's evil deeds?😕 In JSK, Krishna had mentioned this thing to Balram that if a husband is evil then by destiny his wife too is considered as an equal partner in that evil deed as someone who supports the wrong person is also equally at fault too, & wife is considered to be the half soul/body of husband. It was something like that he said referring to Kansa's wife Keshni. Here in Shani Dev it's just the opposite, Kameshwar got saved due to his wife. How come his wife didn't land up in the fault position for supporting her husband's evil acts? 😕Or was it bcoz Keshni had not supported Kansa & tried to reform him so she wasn't considered a pativrata stri so Kansa couldn't get saved from the Lord & got killed?😕 I'm serous about this question. That's the only reason why I wrote a brief update to form a background for my question😆

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Janaki

@RamKiSeeta

Achiever

+ 6

Posted: 14 years ago

#14

^^ I don't think it is the duty of a wife to support her husband no matter what he does. Characters like Mandodari and Gandhari became known as patrivrata strees because they condemned their husbands' evil actions, refused to support them, and tried to reform them though they failed.

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ghotalaz

@ghotalaz

Dazzler

Posted: 14 years ago

#15

Janakiraghunath, thanks for the reply. Even I don't think it's necessary to support husband if he's doing something wrong. What actually disappointed me in the episode was when Narmada said she had no problems with Kameshwar marrying Chandrakala, then the goddesses above - Laxmi, Parvati & Saraswati said that by giving out such a statement Narmada has achieved the status of being a true pativrata stri. Even Shani Dev mentioned it & I just couldn't agree with it. Does that mean...that if Narmada had refused to support her husband's decision of marrying someone else then wouldn't she be considered as a patrivrata stri😕 I really didn't get what were they actually trying to show with that episode...is the moral of the story that no matter whatever bad things your husband does, support him & even if he treats you badly, you should tolerate it to become a pativrata stri & that will be your strength

Edited by vik rocks - 14 years ago

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Vrish

@Vr15h

Stunner

+ 6

Posted: 14 years ago

#16

Actually, Gandhari is not anything even close to a pativrata stri. After she cursed Krishna, he pointed out to her how she was the cause of all that destruction by not restraining Duryodhan. So Gandhari really falls under the villainous category - like the literal blindfold that she had, she also turned a proverbial blindfold to the faults of Duryodhan.

Anyway, I agree w/ Vik - Narmada agreeing to allow her husband to marry someone else was ridiculous, but in the context of the times when polygamy was allowed, maybe she was proving it in that she didn't have to destroy her own marriage in the process. In any case, the term pativrata stri is very restricted, and in mythology, only about 7 women had that status - Sita, Savitri, Anusuya, Srimathi, Sulochana and 2 others. A lot of very illustrious women far more virtuous than either Narmada or Gandhara fell outside this definition - Kaushalya, Urmila, all of Krishna's wives, and a whole lot more.

W/ our normal mythos, we normally do not hold women of those times to modern standards, so I'd not fault them for acting the way they did. But in this serial, there is a mix of ancient and modern characters that Shani goes after - in one episode, he was dressed in a modern high court judge's robes, while in last week's episode, by contrast, he was involved in a dispute probably in the Treta Yuga. So it's unclear what messages the show is trying to send. If it's trying to say that women of today should live like Sita or Narmada, it's beyond ridiculous, b'cos none of the men walking the earth today is anything close to Rama, so why should any woman behave like Sita towards her hubby? Sure, respect him and all that, but worship him? And this from a woman who just days ago insulted much worthier men who came to win her? 😕

Also, what they showed about Shani altering the thoughts & desires of Kamleshwara reminded me of a movie I saw as a kid on a fictional character called Doc Savage, who @ the end of the movie, 'cures' the villain by surgically getting rid of all his evil thoughts 🤔 If this were even possible, wouldn't the gods have done what they could to ensure that nobody in the world has evil thoughts? But the gods grant free will to people, and reward/punish them according to their decisions. If gods were to alter what we feel, want and all that, none of us would be living our own lives - we'd just let them live it for us.

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MagadhSundari

@MagadhSundari

Sparkler

+ 4

Posted: 14 years ago

#17

^^ Was gonna say the same thing re: Gandhari. The ultimate proof of her being at least somewhat shaky on dharm and not very different from her husband was her attempt to make Duryodhan invulnerable. If she knew right from wrong and genuinely wanted right to triumph, she wouldn't have done that. She is just like the fictional Keshni, who in the early days of the JSK forum we used to refer as "thaali ki baigan" for slipping and sliding between supporting and opposing her unrighteous husband. But the example of Mandodari is valid IMO even though she didn't make it onto the 'list'. Sages who aren't among the sapta-rishis are rishis nonetheless. The term pativrata as I understand it describes a woman who is loyal to her husband and does all in her power to support his well-being (moral and spiritual included) - not to support him unquestioningly. Mandodari fits the bill, as did Kayadhu. Simply accepting her husband's desire to remarry is not enough to qualify Narmada. Sita accompanied Shri Ram for his vanvaas even though he initially told her it wasn't a good idea; in other words she opposed his point of view - so agreeing with your husband all the time, every time, obviously isn't part of the criteria. I don't watch this show anyway, but from the snippets you guys gave it doesn't sound like I'm missing much...

P.S. Subhash Sagar is listed as a producer... but didn't he pass away a couple years ago?

Edited by lola610 - 14 years ago

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Janaki

@RamKiSeeta

Achiever

+ 6

Posted: 14 years ago

#18

@Vrish and Lola,

I guess you guys are right...Gandhari may have been a good woman at some point, but she made some mistakes that would unqualify her from the pativrata list (which is not limited to just the women that come in the sloka). Not only in Duryodhan's case, I personally never felt her tying the cloth around her eyes was very supportive of her. As Dhritarastra's wife, it was Gandhari's duty to help him rule the Kingdom and she made herself just as blind as him, thereby making herself unable to fulfill her duty. She could have run the state in his name very well, since Dhritarastra's blindess often impeded him from doing his job well.

Also, I feel that couples worshipping each other is not wrong...but it should be mutual. A wife should not be only one serving and worshipping her husband, since our scriptures describe a wife as a husband's pride and honor. He too should worship her, and when worship and respect is mutual in a relationship, both sides are happy.

Ram always worshipped Sita, and Sita always worshipped Ram. People often think Sita constantly served Ram without ever expecting anything in return, but hardly anyone recognizes the respect Ram heaped on Sita. It is not fair for men today to expect their wives to be like Sita if they themselves are not like Ram, and vice versa for the wives. They cannot expect their husbands to be like Ram if they themselves are not like Sita.

A wife and husband should both support each other only when the other is doing good deeds, or else it is their duty to correct them and put them on the right path. If anyone listens to the stotras recited during the saptapadi of a marriage, this is exactly what comes there. It never says a wife must blindly support her husband at all times. It tells the wife and husband to correct each other when the other is going the wrong way, and many soap operas and even mytho shows today interpret a wife's duty totally wrong and send out the message that a wife must be servantile to her husband, even when he is abusive. That is totally wrong and our scriptures or puranas never ever supported such thought. A wife and husband are equal, and both are each other's God/Goddess.

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ghotalaz

@ghotalaz

Dazzler

Posted: 14 years ago

#19

Even I wonder if thoughts could be altered & evil thoughts could be taken out from one's mind then why only Kameshwar, why not Raavan? why not Kans? why not any others from the Asur jaatis? What was the need to kill anyone of them, just replace their evil thoughts with divine thoughts...problem solved. I know this question was answered in JSK, where Krishna was asked why doesn't he change the thoughts of Kansa on which he replied that he's giving out hints for Kansa to reform himself but if he doesn't realize it then he'll get punished at the end & Krishna wasn't in the favor of changing Kansa's thoughts. Krishna had the opinion that doing so would be going against the law of universe...This particular episode of Shani Dev has seriously confused me😕 Was it challenging the law of universe?

The husband-wife relationship should be mutual. It's definitely not only Sita was giving out respect to Ram, even Ram had tremendous respect & love for Sita. There's no couple like Sita-Ram on this earth today bcoz there's only one Ram & only one Sita... from Ramayana

Rest... Awesome opinions by all of you guyz!!!👏 Completely agree...👍🏼

Edited by vik rocks - 14 years ago

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Vrish

@Vr15h

Stunner

+ 6

Posted: 14 years ago

#20

Okay, today's episode was a story of a hubby-worshipping wife Achala, who duly does all her hubby's vraths and everything. Her hubby breaks her fast, and then tells her that he has to leave town on some business, and didn't really want to leave her, but didn't have much of a choice. He gets into his cart and leaves.

In Devalok, Kamadeva is observing her, and thinks that she exceeds the apsaras in beautiful. She's beautiful enough to gift to Indra. 🤢 (Kamadeva, love doesn't mean loyalty, in your opinion? How'd you like Deva Indra hitting on Rati, like he did Ahalya?) Shanidev is offended @ her remarks, and disgusted that Kamadeva is equating a pativrata woman w/ apsaras. In his chamber, Kama goes and decides to take revenge on Indra for a past insult, where Indra rebuked him for trying to have somaras - something that only devas were allowed, not gandharvas.

Kama tells Rati of his plans to gift Indra such a woman and win the right to have somaras. Rati is shocked and Shani decides to give him some chances. Kamadev tries to tempt the woman by shooting some flowery arrows from his flowery bow 😆 First he sends one that creates a rose path in front of Achala, but she thinks that it would have looked more beautiful had her hubby been there to share it. Next, Kama shoots an arrow that creates a futon w/ a flowery arch on top of it. Achala is tempted to sit there, but can't imagine doing that in the absense of her hubby. Shani then decides to shoot Achala herself, but Shani destroys the weapon that Kama fires @ her.

Shani then appears b4 Kama and rebukes him for trying to get a devoted wife to stray just so that he can drink somaras. He tells him that he's abusing his power, and going along the path of adharm. Kama tells him that he's doing Achala a favor by taking her to heaven, but Shani tells him that for a woman, heaven is @ the feet of her hubby. Kama tells her that he'll get her to voluntarily come w/ him to swarga. Shani silently tells him that he can never lead Achala astray.

Back on earth, Achala is w/ her MIL, when someone who's selling jewelry has arrived. It's Kamadev, obviously dressed up as that. Kama tells her that he's brought some great jewelry, and MIL asks Achala to take a look. Kama gives them some samples of the jewelry, and takes out a great necklace, trying to tempt Achala. MIL persuades Achala to take it, and asks Kama how much it costs. He tells her not to worry, and asks Achala to try it on. He has embedded his magic in it, and knows that she'll willingly come w/ him. Shani above warns Kama not to cheat, and try & lead a woman astray.

Achala tries it on, but Shani burns the string on the back. Kama is shocked. Kama tells her not to worry, and tells them that he has another like it. He invites them to come w/ her. MIL declines, but asks Achala to go instead. Achala asks Kamadev to go ahead, and that she'd follow. Kama this time makes sure it can't be damaged, and Achala arrives. Kama invites her to wear it, but she tells him that she'll only do it after the pujas. Kama agrees, and after she leaves, says to himself that she'll fall for him.

On the way back, Achala sees Shani, who is in the garb of a minstrel, and is singing something that reminds her of her wedding vows. Achala is horrified to hear it, and recalls her wedding vows, and everything she's done for her hubby. She is shocked and goes back to Kama, and tells her that she can only wear it after her hubby returns, and returns it to him.

Kama then takes his original deva form, and Achala is angry to see him. Kamadev tells her that he gave her all that, and invites her to come to heaven w/ him. Achala angrily tells him that her hubby's company is what's heaven for him. Kama casts a spell on her and traps her. She challenges him to take her, and appeals to Shani to save her. Shani blesses her and destroys Kama's hold on her, shocking him. Ultimately, Shani destroys Kama's tent as well, and Achala gives him a bhashan 😆 She warns him never to try cheating another devoted woman.

Kama doesn't give up, and decides to use some more enticement arrows @ her. He fires it, but Shani arrives on his hawk and destroys it right in front of him. Kama is shocked and realizes that Shani was behind all that. Shani tells him that he'll now be punished for trying to entice women to do something against their norms. He cursed him that he'd be a leper and have a BO of fish, and that every creature would be disgusted by him. He sends Kama's arrow back to him to strike him, and Kama's form changes, and he's afflicted w/ rashes. Shani then curses him to live on earth.

Kama decides to approach the Ashwin twins, but the Ashwin twin is repelled by his BO and drives him away, telling him there's no cure for it 😆 Kama leaves and goes to the devas court, but Indra tells him that there is no place there for cheats like him. He approaches Brahma, who too declines to help, as does Vishnu. Then he approaches Shiva(!) (Maybe Shiva could have incinerated him again and saved him from that curse 😈) Mahadev tells him that it's not possible given his attempt to cheat a woman and insult her. Mahadev continues w/ his bhashan. Parvati however intervenes and tells him that if Kamadev was not liberated, the order of nature would be upset. Mahadev agrees, but points out that this is Shani's curse, but if he approached Achala and apologized to her, his curse would be lifted.

Kama runs to Achala who's w/ her hubby, falls @ her feet and begs her forgiveness. Achala can't recognize him, so he introduces himself and begs Achala to forgive him, which she does on the grounds that he recognizes his faults. Achala asks Shani to forgive him, and Kamadev is restored to his original self.

Comments: I was surprised that Kama was the one who chose to do all this, given that as the god of love, integrity of marriages would be high on his mind. Also, women do die b4 their hubbies, as well as after, and when they do, they get to swarga on their own. So was Shani and Achala saying that they'd be immortal and only go to swarga together w/ her hubby. Maybe the difference was that in this case, Achala going to heaven didn't equal death.

I also had no idea that Kamadev was a Gandharva and not a Deva, or that beings other than Devas were forbidden from having Somras. The Gandharvas should have gone for making some great drinks of their very own. 😈😆

Edited by _Vrish_ - 14 years ago

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