Brains that heal

Thirukkural with the Times explores real-world lessons from the classic Tamil text ‘Thirukkural’. Written by Tamil poet and philosopher Thiruvalluvar, the Kural consists of 1,330 short couplets of seven words each. This text is divided into three books with teachings on virtue, wealth, and love and is considered one of the great works ever on ethics and morality. The Kural has influenced scholars and leaders across social, political, and philosophical spheres.Motivational speaker, author and diversity champion Bharathi Bhaskar explores the masterpiece.There are some couplets in the Thirukkural that don’t merely advise but unsettle the silence within us. They arrive like a question that refuses to leave. Kural 315 is one such mirror.“Arivinaan Aguvadundo PiridhinnoiThannoipol Potrakk Kadai”“What worth is a man’s intelligence, if he does not guard another’s pain as his own?”At first glance, the couplet appears simple. Compassion has been praised in every civilization. But Valluvar is doing something far deeper here. He is defining intelligence itself.A person may possess scholarship polished by universities, wisdom sharpened by experience, brilliance celebrated by society. What is the use of all these if another being’s suffering does not move him into action?The beauty lies in the word ‘Piridhin’.Not merely another human being.Another life.Another existence.And Valluvar does not praise tears or helpless lament. To treat another’s pain as one’s own is a responsibility.That is why this couplet kept returning to my mind when I read about Arunachalam Muruganantham being nominated for the 2026 Nobel Peace Prize.There are lives that seem to rise straight out of a Kural. Muruganantham’s life is one such.Born into poverty in rural Tamil Nadu, losing his father early, dropping out of school at 14, working as a welder to support his family — nothing in his beginnings suggested global recognition. Yet history often begins in unnoticed corners.A few months into his marriage, he discovered that his wife was using filthy rags and scraps of paper during menstruation because sanitary pads were too expensive. Behind closed doors, millions of women were enduring infection, shame, and indignity, as though suffering itself was part of womanhood.Most people would have looked away in embarrassment. Muruganantham could not.He began experimenting with cotton and other materials to design affordable pads. His wife and sisters initially helped him, but repeated failures exhausted them. Soon women in the village started avoiding him. Men mocked him.Then he uncovered another painful truth. The sanitary pads manufactured by multinational companies cost less than eleven cents yet sold at nearly 40 times the amount.With no volunteers willing to test his experiments, Muruganantham turned himself into the subject. He strapped a bladder filled with animal blood to his body and walked for hours testing absorption levels of the pads. The village ridiculed him.Yet somewhere amidst that disgrace was the quiet greatness of a man who had decided that another’s pain was his own.Years of relentless effort finally led him to create low-cost sanitary pad-making machines. He travelled across India training women to operate these machines and produce affordable pads with dignity and self-reliance. Today, his machines are used across 22 Indian states and in more than 100 countries. When approached by many companies to make this a commercial venture, Muruganantham refused as he knew the price of the pads would escalate.‘Padman’, as Arunachalam Muruganantham is affectionately called, winning the Nobel Prize would indeed be a moment of pride for the nation. One cannot help but whisper a silent prayer that the Nobel Committee sees the quiet magnitude of his work. Yet, for a man who has already brought silent smiles to millions of women, perhaps the prize has already been won.