Arjun rushed to his own shovel, but it was too late. The spring had found its path through Vikram’s canal. Arjun’s field, which he had refused to work on without a guarantee, remained dry.
Halfway through his work, a neighbor came running. “Arjun! A herd of wild goats has broken through the fence on the north side. Your young saplings are being destroyed!”
When the next dry season came, Arjun did not calculate or wait. He simply picked up his shovel and dug. He did not know if a spring would appear or if rain would fall. He only knew that digging was his dharma —his right action. bhagavad gita quotes on karma
Vikram wiped his brow and said, “I know two things: the village needs water, and I know how to dig. The result is not in my hands. But the act of digging? That is in my hands.”
That evening, a dejected Arjun sat with Vikram under the banyan tree. “You were lucky,” Arjun said bitterly. “You found a spring.” Arjun rushed to his own shovel, but it was too late
Vikram smiled gently. “Brother, I did not dig for the spring. I dug because it was the right action to take. The Gita teaches us: ‘Karmanye vadhikaraste, ma phaleshu kadachana’ — You have a right to your action, but never to its fruits.”
Vikram, however, simply picked up his shovel and walked to the riverbank. His neighbor asked, “Why are you digging? You don’t know if the rains will come. You don’t know if the canal will work. You might fail.” Halfway through his work, a neighbor came running
On the tenth day, a strange thing happened. As Vikram dug, he struck a layer of porous rock. Water—not from rain, but from an underground spring—began to seep into the canal. Slowly at first, then in a steady, cool stream. By the twelfth day, the spring water reached Vikram’s field and began flowing toward the village well.