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SANNYASA DAARMA
The time for sallekhaná death should be such as is pleasant, and not likely to add to the discomfort of the saint. The place should also be one where trouble and inconvenience and discomfort are not very likely to be encountered. The saint who performs sallekhanā places himself under the guidance of a well qualified and experienced achārya (leader of saints) who superintends the ceremony, and appoints other saints to take care of and attend upon him.
Sallekhanā is performed either at a time deliber. ately chosen, or, in case of accidents, when the probability of death is almost tantamount to a certainty. If there be doubt, and the saint is not willing to undertak, sallekhanā at once, he should adopt a qualified vow for a certain period of time, after which sullekhanā is to be terminated if death does not occur in the interval, but there is no other difference between the qualified and the regular form.
Even when deliberately undertaken sallekhana death is not suicide. It is not inspired by any of those sorrowful or gloomy passionate states of the mind that amount to an unhinging of the mental balance and imply a fit of temporary insanity characteristic of a suicide's mind. On the other hand, it is characterised by the utmost degree of mental clarity and urged by the pious ambition to control one's destiny, and, through it, ultimately, deathi itself. As said in the Householder's Dharma :: " Sallekhanú death must be distinguished from suicide. It is undertaken only when the body is no longer capable of serving its owner as
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