Talk:The Hindu Values of Sportsmanship:Avoid Bullying your Team Mates
By Vishal Agarwal and The Hindu Society of Minnesota
It is unjust and cruel to mock and bully others, be they your team mates or others. Be kind to others and be respectful to others. Bullying creates mutual grudges and long term enmities. In the short term, it ruins mutual cooperation and commitment resulting in loss of victories. The following story shows how the arrogance of the Pandava brother Bheema created lifelong enemies who even tried to kill him, although luckily, he was able to survive. But other bullies might not be that lucky.
Story: Duryodhana tries to Kill Bheema Due to Latter’s Bullying
Of all the brothers, Bheema was the strongest and he could also swim the fastest. Bheema used his strength to tease the Kauravas. Sometimes, he would catch them under his arms and pretend to drown them in the Ganga River, till they gasped for breath and begged him to free them. If they climbed a tree, Bheema would shake its trunk, causing the Princes to fall off like fruit! These haughty actions of his made Duryodhana and other Kauravas hate him. One day, all the Princes went to the banks of Ganga for a picnic. Duryodhana got the food of Bheema poisoned. During the night, when Bheema was lying unconscious, Duryodhana and his other Kaurava brothers tied Bheema with wild creepers and threw him into the river. To make sure that Bheema had died, they also planted metal spikes on the bed of the river where they threw Bheema. But as luck would have it, the strong water current dislodged the spikes and moved them away from where Bheema fell.
Now inside the water, some poisonous snakes bit Bheema. Just as ‘diamond cuts diamond,’ the snake poison countered the poison in the food. Bheema immediately revived, and somehow came to the river bank. Insight from this story: We make lifelong enemies by teasing and bullying our classmates.