The Mahabharata epic features Karna as an epitome of the virtue of giving away even his most personal and prized possessions to whoever accosts him, that too without a wink. Scholars delivering discourses narrating such episodes extoll the senior-most among the Pandava brothers showering on him the title Daanashoora, a term that virtually pushes his prowess as an archer par excellence to the back-ground. Although the epic, with its large number of episodes of several centuries vintage, has its glory, anyone emulating the unflinching act of the great warrior who chose to be on the side of the Pandava rivals in war, is also described as a Daanashoora, in veiled ridicule. The 1965 war against the neighbouring country brings to our memory of people readily parting with their jewellery in response to the appeal by the then Prime Minister of India in the cause of raising war funds. Also, people of the land making a gift of their bhoomi to Vinoba Bhave is a classic example of rising above carnal desires by resorting to bhoodaan.

The prescription of giving away materials in various forms including alms, attire, money and even near and dear ones dates back to ancient times, with the rider of taking care not to let anyone know about the good done to needy. Another soft rider attached to gifting, as part of the land’s culture, is to avoid indiscretion in choosing the beneficiary.

Recognition of the pangs of pain of others that follows penury like one’s shadow cannot happen without good Samaritans in society sparing their energies in inducing young minds to imbibe the noble virtue. Old timers of Mysuru can recount names of its citizens during bygone days bailing out many families finding themselves in financial difficulties of the extreme kind. One is prompted to observe that the time-honoured culture is not-yet totally dead given the reports in dailies of some high-net-worth-individuals in society giving away substantial portions of their wealth for good public causes. Currently, names of founders of Infosys have figured in such reports, keeping august company with the founder of Microsoft in the act.

Various matters portrayed in money terms are nowadays calculated as percentage of GDP of the respective country. While the US reportedly is quoted to score 1.44 percent, in case of India, the figure 0.34 scores quite low. Philanthropy has a long way to go in the country.