Vasudhaiva Kutumbakam
Updated: Jun 2, 2023
The movie, 'Sita Ramam' might appear to audiences to be based on the much-hackneyed theme of eternal love enduring over a lifetime. However, to me, there was a deep humanitarian undercurrent to the romantic saga.
I loved the way the protagonist, Lieutenant Ram always manages to put others' needs above his own, even when his own life is at stake.
He risks giving a bunch of strangers the benefit of the doubt, though a wrong judgment meant sure shot death for himself and his fellow officers.
At another point, when the riots break out, he fends off 8-10 vultures single-handedly. Thus, he safeguards the honor of a young girl who is cowering in the shadows. In another scene, on hearing the piteous crying of a child, he goes back to a blazing inferno. He risks death by fire to save the child's life.
However, a fate far worse awaits him, when he and his fellow officer, actually his senior get taken as prisoners of war. In one final act of bravery, he sacrifices his life and his honor, so that his colleague can return home to his family.
This set me thinking... What was motivating this mortal human being to continuously adorn the colors of courage, in the face of death and dishonor?
It was not merely his military training, as we see the fellow army officer succumbing to the threat of harm befalling his family members.
Was it because he was an orphan, all alone in the world, with no cares about family like the others? Well, that too changed as soon his love interest appeared on the scene and he too became a family man.
I concluded that it was because of his high degree of compassion. Lieutenant Ram knew that all humans were united in the way they felt pain, endured suffering, experienced love and forged attachments. He understood that the grief of losing a loved one was the same in all human beings, irrespective of the language they spoke or the color of their skin. He lived by the adage ' Vasudhaiva Kutumbakam' which means that the whole world is his family, one family. He wanted no harm to befall any living, breathing entity.
Compassion was his guiding star and hence his courage never ever failed him. He put his family above himself and overcame all the challenges to become larger than life.
