It is said that when a person becomes overly involved in loving affairs, he forgets himself as well as others, and he forgets how to act and how to speak. It is said that once when a man's son was blind since birth, the father, out of staunch affection for the child, named him Padmalocana, or "lotus-eyed." This is the situation arising from blind love. Bharata Mahārāja gradually fell into this condition due to his material love for the deer. It is said in the smṛti-śāstra:
- yasmin deśe mṛgaḥ kṛṣṇas
- tasmin dharmānn ivodhata
"That tract of land wherein the footprints of a black deer can be seen is to be understood as a suitable place to execute religious rituals."