A major controversy has broken out over a video excerpt of one of the lectures of Vikas Divyakirti, the managing director of the UPSC tutoring centre based in Delhi named Drishti IAS, wherein he is seen maligning Hinduism by mocking Hindu deities Lord Ram and Sita. In the video, the UPSC instructor Vikas Divyakirti was heard saying that in Ramayana after the battle, Lord Ram told Sita that he did not fight the war with Ravana for Sita because Sita was like the ghee licked by a dog and not ‘eligible’ for him.
This inappropriate statement about Lord Ram and Sita triggered several reactions, with netizens demanding a ban on his coaching institution.
Following the outrage on social media, the UPSC professor, Vikas Divyakirti gave an interview to The Lallantop in which he said whatever he claimed in the video is supported by evidence.
Interestingly, while in the video that went viral Divyakirti said that the statement he referred to was mentioned in Srimad Valmiki Ramayan in the interview with the Lallantop, the UPSC professor said had quoted from a book by Purushottam Agarwal.
“He has been a member of the UPSC which means we can quote him in our studies. I have not read Ramayana or Mahabharata in Sanskrit. I came across this in this book which cites Valmiki Ramayan itself,” Dr Divyakriti said.
“I do not speak without evidence. I have spent less time on Twitter and more time on my studies. That’s where I am more comfortable,” Dr Divyakriti said in the interview citing the page numbers where the information can be found.
Following Divyakirti’s response, numerous academics and authors took to social media to explain why the UPSC professor’s statements were unsubstantiated.
Ami Ganatra, the author of Ramayana Unravelled, a book that retold the story of Shri Rama, recently posted a video on YouTube illustrating how the UPSC professor’s initial remark on the Hindu epic Ramayana and subsequent clarification were both incorrect. She emphasised how obtusely cherry-picking a line from the scripture, without having a thorough knowledge of the text, leads to convoluted and twisted interpretations, as was the case with Dr Divyakriti.
For easier understanding, Ami Ganatra broke down Divyakirti’s remark into two parts. She said that firstly, the Drishti IAS managing director, Vikas Divyakirti had remarked, apparently referring to some text, that when Ram defeated Ravana, Sita was elated over thinking that his husband has done everything for her. However, Ram stated that he did not fight the war against Ravana for her but for his family and lineage.
The author admits that this specific phrase does appear in Srimad Valmiki Ramayan, but selectively quoting only one line without providing context is almost like misquoting our itihās, according to the author.
The author noted how excerpts of the Srimad Valmiki Ramayan, such as the one on Kishkindha Kand or Sunder Kand that appears before verse 115, that Divyakirti referred to when he made the aforementioned remark, reflect Lord Ram’s anguish and yearning for his wife Sita after she was abducted by Ravana. Divyakirti, she contended, conveniently ignored this and cherry-picked that one particular line leading to muddled conclusions.
The author asserted that it is critical to understand the context of the statement and also whether Lord Ram said it literally or whether there was a deeper meaning to the analogies.
Author Ami Ganatra then went on to speak about the viral clip wherein the UPSC teacher audaciously compared Hindu Goddess Sita with “ghee contaminated by a dog.”
It may be recalled the Divyakirti had claimed, in a clear falsification of Hindu mythology, that Lord Ram told his wife, goddess Sita, “that just as food licked by a dog becomes unfit for consumption, you are no longer acceptable to be my wife.”
At this point, the author first pointed out how Divyakirti cleverly lied following the social media backlash. She called our attention to how, in the first clip that went viral, Divyakirti brazenly declared that this exact exchange is mentioned in the Srimad Valmiki Ramayan; however, after the social media backlash, he modified his stance and stated that this reference was found in the Ramopakhyana (the story of Lord Ram as it appears in the Mahabharata).
The author stated that she is convinced that the Srimad Valmiki Ramayan is the genuine scripture written by Sage Valmiki and that she solely believes what is written in this holy book and not in the various versions available in the market.
Castigating Divyakirti for cherry-picking one sentence from the scripture and rattling it out of context thus creating a completely erroneous perception, the author read out numerous passages from the Srimad Valmiki Ramayan that indicate how restless and worried Ram was while Sita was in Ravana’s captivity. She goes on to say that when Ram won the fight and returned to Sita, he was afraid that the people would dispute or raise their fingers at Sita’s sacredness, so he used such lines to provoke Sita, who in response gave ‘Agni pariksha’ to prove her sanctity.
The author continued by referring to versus 118 of the Yudh Kand in the Srimad Valmiki Ramayan, where after the ‘Agni pariksha,’ when the Agni god appears and testifies for Goddess Sita, Lord Ram says that he never had an iota of doubt about Goddess Sita’s sanctity, but asking her to go through the test was necessary so that no one else ever has the courage to raise fingers at her.
By narrating this entire episode, the author simply sought to prove that it is completely improper to isolate and quote only one or two sentences without knowing the total context. This, she maintained, amounted to distorting the entire scripture, which Divyakirti unfortunately did.
A Sanskrit scholar, author, and editor Nityanand Misra, like author Ami Ganatra, took to YouTube to post a video in which he criticised the UPSC professor for distorting the Sanskrit epic and maligning Hinduism. Misra chastised Divyakirti for misrepresenting the Hindu holy scripture by cherry-picking an ancient Sanskrit metaphor, which he claimed was referenced in several places in the Mahabharata, without understanding the essence of it.
The scholar employs the English metaphor ‘don’t cast pearls before swine’ to describe how the meaning of the entire pharse will be lost if we literally translate this into Hindi or any other language. Similarly, he claims that when a Sanskrit metaphor was translated literally without context, its essence was gone, and it sounded blatantly perverted.
He stated how the Mahabharata contains numerous examples of the metaphoric phrase “a dog licked Havishya” to indicate a wicked person touching/abducting/ravishing another’s wife. This metaphor has even been employed by a female character, Dhātreyikā, Misra said, adding that to consider or propagate this a very bad thing attributed to Rāma by a poet without understanding the essence of this ancient metaphor in Sanskrit is a big blunder by Vikas Divyakirti.
It may be recalled that after the social media backlash, Divyakirti appeared on The Lallantop and claimed that he never speaks without evidence and that he had quoted from a book by Purushottam Agarwal.
However, in the video clip that went viral, the UPSC coach is heard narrating one episode from Srimad Valmiki Ramayana to his students. He claimed, in a clear falsification of Hindu mythology, that Lord Ram told his wife, goddess Sita, “that just as food licked by a dog becomes unfit for consumption, you are no longer acceptable to be my wife.” Vikas chuckles as he makes the ludicrous statement. A few pupils can also be heard laughing in the background after hearing his remarks.
Retweet If You Want . #BanDrishtiIAS pic.twitter.com/1yeLcZ9cHK
— Dr. Prachi Sadhvi (@Sadhvi_prachi) November 11, 2022
After the video went viral, netizens dug out video excerpts of Vikas Divyakirti’s other lectures and said that the Drishti IAS coach, over time, has been subtly brainwashing and instilling Hinduphobia in the minds of his students under the guise of helping them prepare for the UPSC Civil Services Exam.
Drishti IAS managing director calls Lord Ram ‘casteist’
In another video, Vikas Divyakirti was misrepresenting Ramayana and insulting the Hindu god Ram by labelling him a casteist. The fallacious assertion made by Vikas Divyakirti is mentioned in the controversial Uttara Khand, which experts believe was not an original component of the Srimad Valmiki Ramayan but a later insertion, the validity of which has never been confirmed.
In one of his sessions, the Drishti IAS managing director spoke extensively against the Modi government and how the latter and the industrialist Gautam Adani are hands in glove with each other.
In the same video, the teacher sings plaudits for the Aam Aadmi Party, describing it as a party that is always working for the betterment of ordinary people.
In fact, the Aam Aadmi Party used the abovementioned snippet of the Hinduphobic professor’s lecture in its campaign last year.
