The Real Hero.

How do you define greatness of a person? Who do we think is worth enough to be called a Hero? Is it that he – as a leader - survived toughest time of the history ? If that’s the case, what is the definition of ‘toughest time’? Is it that he lead the nation to the dizzying height of the success? Then, in that case, what is the definition of the ‘success’?. Or is it that he – as a leader - astutely lead an already established empire and succeeded in maintaining the hegemony? Of course, the definition tough times or success will vary drastically according to the time and situation. More ever, the society that person belongs to also play important role in shaping the nature of greatness of a person. Apart from being brave, intelligent and inspiring, that person not only needs to be on the winning side in order for the world to understand his greatness, but also the nation that he commanded and voiced needs to understand the consequence of his deeds for it be immortalized. There are number of examples where the extremely gifted people failed to grab the attention and ended up surrendering meekly to the unresponsive, pathetic and regressive society.

Thus it is quite hard to pinpoint exact reason behind greatness of a particular personality as time, situation and society plays great role in shaping a personality. Having said that, there are some common traits in great people – whether he is a political leaders, military general, ideologues or philosopher - who change the course of the history and future of the lackadaisical society drastically. That person is a rebel at the core because the ability to question the contemporary practices is a necessary first step towards revolutionizing the society. But Revolution doesn’t mean complete destruction of reigning social structure and forceful imposition of ‘new’ ideas because such a charade always fails. The genius of a great person becomes evident at the way he seamlessly institutionalizes his revolutionary ideas with contemporary social structure. The process of social change is usually very slow. And a leader understands this shortcoming of the society and yet manages to inject the vigor and confidence in the society. It is not that he is undefeated in all the contests. But he understands the nature of the defeat better than other looser. He learns from his mistakes and make sure that he doesn’t repeat the same mistake. At the end of the day – by hook or crook - he emerges victorious because of tremendous confidence and unflinching conviction in the cause.

To certain extent, heroes of the one society can be villains for the other. But then there are some deeds that transcendence the political and cultural boundaries. Such examples are quite rare. These people make cause more important than their persona. The rallying cry is the necessity to take action rather than personal whim. The result is counted on the basis of its effect on the cause rather than personal success. And, that’s precisely make them stand out among the other leading minds of the history. These great people attain higher degree of success even after their death. Because during their life time they rear such high quality of talent and imbibe the next generation with quintessential philosophy, that the next generation not only further the cause but take the success to the next level. Their legacy continue to live for hundreds of years and when ever society finds itself confused and under siege, these great people act like a bacon of hope the lost generations.

Such heroes are quite rare. And, in the last thousand years of Indian history, only Shivaji fits all the criteria described above.