The phrase "ʼನಾ ಮಾಡಿದ ಕರ್ಮ ಬಲವಂತವಾದೊಡೆ ನೀ ಮಾಡುವುದೇನಿದೆ ಶ್ರೀಹರಿ!" translates to "What do you have to do, O Lord, when I am bound by my own deeds!" The story goes back a long time. A Brahmin woman named Gautami lived with her young son. One day, while playing in front of their hut in the forest, a snake bites him, and the boy dies in agony. The mother, witnessing her son’s death, is devastated. In her grief, she is tormented, overwhelmed with sorrow, and cries out loudly, beating her chest. A hunter named Arjun, who is present there, observes the scene of the boy being bitten by the snake, the child's death, and the mother's intense mourning. Unable to bear the plight of the grieving mother, he is filled with rage toward the snake that killed the boy. Immediately, he grabs the snake, hidden in the bushes. Standing before the heartbroken Gautami, he says, "Mother, I have brought the snake that killed your son. What shall I do with it? If you give your consent, I will cut it into pieces right now or burn it. I am waiting for your approval. Tell me, Mother." The compassionate mother replies, "No, please do not harm it. Do nothing to this snake. Leaving it alone is better. Will killing this snake bring my son back to life? Will his soul return? No... The life that was lost is gone! What will happen by killing this snake without reason? Why should you become a sinner by killing it for no reason? Leave the snake alone." The hunter, Arjun, insists, "Mother! You are naturally compassionate, and that’s why you are saying this. The snake has done wrong. It deserves punishment. It must be killed. All you need to do is agree. I will kill it," he says. Despite Arjun’s repeated insistence on killing the snake, the mother refuses to agree. She gets no supportive response to Arjun's insistence. Meanwhile, the snake, which had been listening to the conversation, started to speak in a human voice. The snake said, "O Arjun, I have done nothing wrong in causing the death of this mother's child. I bit him out of the impulse of death. What enmity did I have towards the child? Why would I want to kill him? You are falsely accusing me of a crime. That’s wrong! I am merely a tool of death. If you wish to punish someone, punish death instead. I am just an instrument in the death of this child. The actions are not mine." "Punishing the instigator of the crime is more just than punishing the agent itself. Don’t direct your anger towards me for no reason," it continued. Until then, Death had been invisible, but upon hearing the snake's words, it suddenly appears in a corporeal form. "Hey snake! Why are you pointing fingers at me? Why are you blaming me? I have done nothing wrong. I am merely a servant of Time," says Death. "As stated, I act accordingly. I am not just alone; the entire universe follows the will of Time. We all move according to the command of Time. There is no fault of ours in this. The entire universe is subject to the control of time. We are all mere puppets in the hands of Time. Time is the true puppeteer." At that moment, the Personification of Time appears before them. It says, "What is going on? Why do you all accuse me? In this, I have no fault. The snake is not to blame for the child’s death, nor is Death guilty; neither am I to blame. We are all innocent standing in the place of sinners. None of this is in our hands nor our actions," it states. Continuing, it explains, "Everything that happens is due to the karma of living beings. Every being in this world experiences the results of its own deeds. In this world, every being is born according to its karma and dies according to its karma. Every being experiences happiness and sorrow in this world in accordance with its karma. We allow the karma to unfold as it should. Nothing happens without a reason. Even the gods maintain neutrality in this matter. They cannot interfere in the matter of our karmic fruits."