All of us have some special friends in our life. The criteria which makes a particular friend special than other friends can be different for person to person.
On the day of friendship day I would like to help you to recall about a very famous friendship story.
Krishna and Sudama were childhood friends. Who is Krishna? He is nothing but Lord Sri Krishna, who is an incarnation of Lord Vishnu. Both stayed and studied in the gurukul (school) of Sandeepani rishi (saint). Balram, Krishna’s elder brother also studied there. Krishna was a prince and Sudama from an ordinary family. The guru-kul is like one big family and the students have to do many little chores apart from their studies.
One day, the guru-patni (teacher’s wife) asked Krishna, Sudama and Balram to get firewood from the forest. As they were leaving, she called Sudama back and said,“Here, take this bundle, I have packed some groundnuts for all of you to eat if you get hungry.”
Walking around in the forest, picking dry twigs and chopping firewood from fallen dead trees, the three boys were tired. They decided to rest a while. As Sudama was weaker than them, his friends, did not let him exert too much and so he was less tired than the other two. Balram and Krishna soon fell asleep, Krishna with his head on his friend Sudama’s lap. After a while, Sudama became impatient to eat the groundnuts given by the guru-patni; he could not wait for the others to wake up. He started eating them.
The sound of the munching penetrated Krishna’s sleep and he asked, “What is the sound I hear?” Sudama replied, “It is only my teeth chattering due to the cold.” He did not want Krishna to know that he had not shared the groundnuts. Of course, Lord Krishna knew the truth.
Krishna and Sudama went back to their respective places after the completion of education at guru-kul. Later in life, Sudama became very poor. It is said that his act of not sharing the groundnuts had brought this fate upon him, by the law of karma. (Does anyone know what “karma” is? It means every action has an equal and opposite reaction! If you do not share with others, others do not share with you!)
Sudama’s wife suggested to him, “Why don’t you seek help from your childhood friend Krishna, who is now the king of Dwaraka?” Sudama said to her, “How can I go to see him empty handed?” Whereupon, she packed some dahi-pohe, a frugal preparation of rice and curd, for Krishna and gave it to her husband. Sudama proceeded on his journey on foot.
On reaching the city of Dwaraka, he asked his way to the gate of the King’s palace. He requested the guards to send a message to the king that his friend, Sudama, from the guru-kul of Sandeepani rishi, had come to meet him. On hearing this, Krishna came all the way to the gate to welcome Sudama, whom he was so fond of. He took him to his royal chambers and enquired about how he had been and how his family was. Sudama was so dazzled by the opulence of the palace, that he felt shy to offer the dahi-pohe, which his wife had sent for Krishna. Krishna noticed that Sudama was holding something in his hand and hiding it behind his back. He asked, “What have you got there in your hand?” Sudama said, “Oh, nothing, nothing.” Krishna said, “Your wife must have something for me.” He reached out and grabbed the bundle from Sudama’s hand and eagerly opened it. “Oh! Dahipohe!
My favorite!” he exclaimed and ate the dish with relish. Krishna rejoiced at the taste of love in that simple meal which could not be matched by the delicacies made in the royal kitchen. Sudama was so overwhelmed by his love that he forgot to ask Krishna for help.
When Sudama returned to his village, he wondered how to tell his wife that he had not even asked Krishna for help. He could not locate his hut. Some children dressed in finery came running to him, calling out, “Father, Father!” They pulled him towards a mansion, where his hut had once been. He could not believe his eyes. At the gate, dressed in fine clothes, stood his wife, and the children who had pulled him were his own children. Seeing him wonder-stuck, she explained, “All this is because of your friend Krishna. While you were in Dwaraka, he transformed our destiny, from rags to riches.”
The basis of true friendship is love, which accepts the friend as he is and forgives all his misdeeds.
