'कर्मण्येवाधिकारस्ते मा फलेषु कदाचन'

Whenever I used to hear the shloka  'कर्मण्येवाधिकारस्ते मा फलेषु कदाचन' in my childhood, I used to think - Won't be it useless if we keep on acting without keeping a target, without thinking of a reward? But later when I really came to know the real meaning of this shloka, I was deeply mesmerised by the it.

What a beautiful statement! We really should give up the desire to get something in return when we act. But sometimes people confuse this statement with 'having no goals and target in out life'.

I give you two scenarios. In one, student is preparing for his final exam wholeheartedly. He has set a target to achieve distinction. In second scenario, there is an employee who always praise his supervisor/immediate boss so that he/she will be lenient while appraising this employee's performance. Above mentioned Bhagvadgita Shloka is in reference with second scenario.

Most of us are attached with the 'Karmfal'. We always want something in return when we act or perform our duty. Saints have said - Perform duty for the duty's sake and not for the reward. Be kind with the people and help them not because they will reciprocate the same in return but be kind and be helpful for sake of being kind and helpful.

In today's world, most of us have become 'reward oriented'. We perform because we will get some reward. Behaviourism school of Psychology also talks about 'reward and punishment' principles. People act beacuse they are about to get something or they don't do a specific thing to avoid punishment. This is how we learn things. Right from our childhood we have been told that if you do good you will accumulate 'Punya' and if we act bad we will accumulate 'Paap'. This 'reward and fear induction technique' moulds our behaviour since our childhood. Just reflect back and try to reacall - Haven't your parents, teachers, peers, other family members told you that if you behave good, people will praise you, they will appreciate you? They have right? This is beacuse they wanted us to behave good. But they didn't tell us that do good for good's sake. Why? I couldn't solve this puzzle yet.

Well so now when we have grown up, let's think little high... Let's start doing good for sake of good and not out of the desire to get reward. Let's understand, doing good - itself it is a reward and we should feel happy about it.

No doubt our actions are going to yield some fruits. But this shloka's only point is that don't get attached to the 'Karmfal' (fruits of the action).

'कर्मण्येवाधिकारस्ते मा फलेषु कदाचन'
Isn't it really beautiful?

- Dipti S. A. Shinde