00:00 How did you learn vegan? I am very curious to know this.
00:09 You see I was vegetarian since birth firstly. I was born in a vegetarian family and I was
00:23 into spiritual literature since an early age. And I really do not remember one day or one
00:33 episode that made me particularly conscious towards animals. But even in my earliest memories
00:42 I had this affection towards all living entities. So that was there. But I was not a vegan.
00:53 When I was in my 82nd year or something, there was a Hindi story I read and it was a good
01:07 story. It was the autobiography of a calf, a cow's calf.
01:20 So how it is born and what it has to go through and how it was denied milk and then how it
01:28 was castrated and then how it was exploited in the fields and ultimately how it was dispatched
01:36 to the slaughterhouse. So that made me quit milk at that time. However, the entire full
01:49 concept of veganism was not known to me at that time. So I left milk but continued taking
01:59 milk products for another decade almost, more than a decade, 15 years. Then it was probably
02:12 waiting to happen that I quit all this altogether. So I had my rabbits and there was one particular
02:28 female rabbit and she had an injury in one leg and it was incurable. So the doctors had
02:38 asked me to euthanize it. I had refused. So it required daily care. The dressing had to
02:47 be changed, the wound had to be cleaned up and these things and she could not run. So
02:51 all the others, rabbits would run around and be away and do their stuff and this one would
02:56 stay with me all the time. So and then one day she died and it was my mistake actually.
03:08 I did not know much about their anatomy. I probably allowed her to eat some stuff that
03:18 she shouldn't have taken. So I was in grief and two or four days after that I watched
03:26 this movie, The Ship of Theseus and in that there was this scene in which they were conducting
03:34 experiments on rabbits and one of those rabbits looked so much like Nandu, my rabbit and that
03:46 was the moment sitting in the cinema hall there at that time I decided to just do away
03:53 with everything that involves anything related to any animal. So and that was the moment
04:03 and after that it didn't really require any effort. That day and this date has been what
04:09 seven, eight years now. We'll have to look at the release date of that movie. I mean
04:16 that longer time. So it's been quite effortless since then. Once it was left, it was left.
04:26 Amazing. So thanks for sharing that touching story with us. I'm pretty sure a lot of people
04:34 will identify because surely when you're seeing a chicken or a dog or a rabbit pass
04:40 a road also and a car is coming in front of them, your mouth is in water. We don't feel
04:45 like, hey that is a dog, now what am I going to eat it for dinner?
04:49 I'll take the liberty of sharing another interesting story in brief because you just
04:53 talked of watching a goat or a chicken or something. I was driving down one particular
05:01 road and there were these butcher's shops by the side and it was a bit late in the night,
05:10 9 or 10 or something and one chicken just somehow managed to escape the butcher's knife,
05:17 it was about to be slaughtered and came running right in front of my car and I jammed the
05:25 brakes and the butcher of course came running from the behind and picked the animal up and
05:32 took it back and I drove on for around 500 meters and then I decided that well I can't
05:41 leave the animal like that. So I took a u-turn, came back and bought the chicken and brought
05:59 it to my place and stayed with us for many years and we have just so many memories and
06:08 photos and videos and anecdotes with it.
06:11 So yeah.
06:13 That is adorable. Acharya ji, it's been a true honour to hear about not just your perspective
06:26 but also practice in daily life. I think two leaders lead by example and you're certainly
06:32 doing that. So this will encourage a lot of people. Thank you so much and that's all the
06:40 time which we have but I'm sure sometime if you give permission I would love to speak
06:46 to you at length about this. It would be my pleasure, surely, certainly. Thank you so much. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.
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