From the Publisher
The story of Paundraka Vaasudeva is a somewhat
bizarre episode from the Bhagawat Purana. Yet the
discerning will find it relevant to our own times
when image building has developed into a skilled
profession.
Believing that
the common name, Vaasudeva, was a forceful
take-off point to achieve the attributes of
Krishna, his sycophants helped Paundraka to build
up his new public image so insistently that poor
Paundraka Vaasudeva started believing in it
himself. He mi-took the shadow for the substance
and fell into disgrace and disaster.
There is a moral
in this for all of us who live in an age of
doubles and stand-ins. If the end of Paundraka was
only pathetic, it was because his encounter was
with the benign and omniscient Krishna. Those who
are not so fortunate may meet with an end which
could be grim and tragic.
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