The Puffin Mahabharata

by Namita Gokhale

  ‘I love you, Arjuna,’ she burst out at last. ‘I want to spend all my life with you.’

  Arjuna was alarmed. His goal in visiting Indra’s palace was to get his father’s magical weapons. His mind was set only upon the war the Pandavas had resolved to fight, to avenge Draupadi’s humiliation and win back their kingdom from the Kauravas. He had neither the time nor the desire to fall in love. He was already married to Draupadi and to Subhadra, Lord Krishna’s sister. He had two sons, Srutakarman and Abhimanyu. There was no place in his life for Urvashi and her simpering looks.

  ‘I pledge you my love, Arjuna,’ Urvashi said soulfully, ‘and seek yours in return.’

  ‘But you are much older than me,’ Arjuna stuttered tactlessly. ‘You are like my mother Kunti!’

  Urvashi was well and truly offended. Her vanity was hurt and she suddenly became very vicious indeed. ‘I am an immortal, a celestial being,’ she retorted. ‘Apsaras have no age, for we grow no older with the passage of time. Those things happen only to you mortals!’

  ‘I am sorry, Urvashi, but I cannot love you,’ Arjuna said apologetically.

  The lovely apsara’s fine eyes flashed with fire. ‘I shall avenge this insult,’ she shrieked. ‘I curse you! Although you rejected my love, you will not be able to reject this curse! You are so proud, O Arjuna, of being a brave and manly warrior, but you will become a eunuch and spend your days surrounded by women, dancing for their amusement.’

  Arjuna was devastated by Urvashi’s curse. He rushed to his father for advice.

  ‘No one has ever been able to resist Urvashi’s beauty,’ Indra exclaimed. ‘A curse cannot be withdrawn, but I can certainly persuade her to reduce it to just one year. Perhaps, in future, in the thirteenth year of your exile, Urvashi’s curse might help you find a suitable disguise to hide from the Kauravas.’

  Arjuna was somewhat relieved by the answer. Indra requested Urvashi to forgive his son and reconsider the curse. She agreed, and although she was still angered by the handsome mortal’s refusal, she assured to limit the curse to a year.

  Arjuna spent the rest of his time in Amaravati learning the arts of dance and music from the gandharva king Chitrasena. Chitrasena’s lessons were to be infinitely useful when, in the thirteenth year of his exile, Arjuna had to live out Urvashi’s curse.

  The Pandavas’ Wanderings

  Every day in heaven is a year on earth. The six earthly years Arjuna spent in Indra’s palace passed in just so many days. Indra taught Arjuna the precise use of his divine astras, and then, when it was time for him to leave, sadly bade him farewell.

  Meanwhile, the other brothers were missing Arjuna dreadfully. He was the most cheerful and charming of the Pandavas, and life was very dull without him. Bhima would constantly quarrel with Yudhishthira, criticizing him for being too tolerant and patient, while Draupadi would weep at the fate that had overtaken them all.

  The great sage Brihadaswa came to visit the Pandavas in the forest. Yudhishthira, who was full of grief and self-reproach, burst into tears before the holy man. ‘Have you ever seen or heard of anyone more unfortunate than me?’ he sobbed.

  Brihadaswa consoled Yudhishthira by telling him the story of Nala, the Nishadha king who too had lost his kingdom in a game of dice. Nala had suffered great misery and hardship, as had his wife Damyanti, until he learnt the secret art of winning at dice. This art was known as the Akshahridiya. ‘I shall teach you this secret art, Yudhishthira,’ the sage promised. He took him away for three days, and taught the son of Dharma how to speak to the dice so that they would always obey his command.

  Yudhishthira was reassured by Brihadaswa’s stories and instruction. If Nala, the king of Nishadha, could reverse his fortunes, why, the Pandavas would be able to do so as well. And now that he had learnt the secrets of the Akshahridiya, Sakuni and Duryodhana would no longer be able to trick him at the dice-board.

  The Pandavas decided to go on a long pilgrimage. They went to Mount Kailash, in the high Himalayas, crossing a hundred steep hills before they reached there. The forests were full of flowers and birdsong. It was the first time in the long period of their exile that Draupadi was happy. She would smile with wonder at all the exotic and beautiful blossoms that she saw, and Bhima would rush and pluck whichever flowers she desired.

  One morning Draupadi was walking through the sloping woods when the east wind wafted a lovely blossom into her hands. It was a white lotus with a thousand petals. It had an intoxicating fragrance, and a hundred butterflies fluttered in homage around it.

  ‘Oh, how I wish I had another of these flowers,’ Draupadi sighed.

  Bhima, who always did whatever he could to make Draupadi happy, set off in search of the thousand-petalled lotus. As he rushed across the forest paths he encountered the monkey god Hanuman, who like Bhima, was the son of Vayu, lord of the wind. Hanuman blessed Bhima, and told him that, when the war with the Kauravas began, he would be there to aid the Pandavas.

  Bhima continued to walk north, following the heady perfume of the thousand-petalled lotus. Guided by his sense of smell, he arrived at a beautiful meadow, at the centre of which was a still and shimmering lake, abloom with hundreds of white lotus flowers. This was the garden of Kubera, the god of wealth, but Bhima did not know this.

  As Bhima began plucking the flowers from the lake for Draupadi, Kubera’s guards tried to stop him. Bhima dealt with them in his usual forcible way. The frightened guards went to complain to their master Kubera about the terrifying trespasser.

  ‘That sounds like Bhima,’ laughed Kubera, and went forth to greet his Pandava friend. He wanted to hold a feast in Bhima’s honour, but for once the huge warrior declined a good meal.

  ‘I must hurry back to Draupadi,’ he exclaimed, ‘or these stolen flowers will wilt and my search will have been in vain.’

  So the days passed, sometimes cheerfully, sometimes clouded with sadness, and then the months, and gradually the years. When the Pandavas reached the hermitage of Badari, they enjoyed the clear air of the mountain retreat.

  One evening, they saw an unearthly light radiating from the mountain slope. Indra’s chariot was rushing towards them, carrying Arjuna in it. As Matali brought his vehicle to a halt, Arjuna rushed out to greet his long-lost family. They did not sleep for many nights, as Arjuna regaled them with tales of his adventures and stories of the wonders of Amaravati and Indraloka.

  The period of exile was drawing to a close. The Pandavas, especially Draupadi, were sad at leaving the beautiful mountains, which had offered them so much solace and comfort. Their thoughts returned to their cousins, the Kauravas.

  ‘It is time to remember our oaths of vengeance,’ Bhima declared. ‘Even my dear Yudhishthira must shed his patience after our period of exile is over.’

  The Battle With The Gandharvas

  In the twelfth year of their exile, the Pandavas left the high mountains and returned to Kamyaka forest, near the still waters of the Dwaitavana lake. Their movements came to the notice of the Kaurava brothers, and Duryodhana began burning with the old intense fever of jealousy. He was driven mad by his desire to actually see the Pandavas in exile and witness their discomfort. Goaded by Sakuni and Karna, who hated the Pandavas almost as much as he did, Duryodhana set off for the Dwaitavana lake.

  The Kuru warriors set up their tents in the forest. They laughed and drank and feasted. Duryodhana wanted to set up a pleasure house by the lake where he could spend time with his favourite wives and slave-women. His scouts and spies were, meanwhile, instructed to swim to all corners of the lake to discover the whereabouts of the Pandavas.

  The Kuru soldiers strutted to the water front. Suddenly they were stopped in their tracks by two smiling gandharvas.

  ‘Move aside,’ said the Kuru soldiers, in their rough voices. ‘Duryodhana, the foremost of the Kauravas, has come to the Dwaitavana lake with his queens. Go away, there is no place for you here!’

  ‘The Dwaitavana lake is closed by the orders of the gandharva king,’ the gandharv
as said, gently but firmly.

  ‘Duryodhana is the mightiest of the Kauravas!’ the Kuru soldiers barked.

  The gandharvas were unruffled. ‘The gandharva king is a celestial,’ they replied in their musical voices. ‘He does not have to give way to a mere mortal.’

  The soldiers tried to push the unarmed gandharvas aside, and even drew arms against them, but try as they would, they could not budge them or get past their glowing bodies.

  When Duryodhana came to know of this encounter, he gathered his troops and marched towards the Dwaitavana lake. Soon his soldiers were drawn into furious combat with the gandharvas. The gandharvas are normally peace-loving, but they are immortals and it was impossible for the mortal Kauravas to defeat them in battle. The artistic gandharvas understood the art of creating illusions and would confuse their opponents effortlessly. They would throw flowers that would turn into balls of fire and spread sheets of blinding light above the panicking Kaurava army. Each gandharva would multiply into ten mirror-images of himself. Frightened and bewildered, the Kaurava soldiers ran away, but Karna continued to fight undaunted. Duryodhana’s elephant ran trumpeting in fear towards the lake. Finally, Karna, too, had to leap from his chariot and run away. And all this while soft gandharva music played in the heavens, as though mocking the Kauravas’ defeat.

  Duryodhana, Dusasana, Sakuni and their wives were all captured by the smiling gandharvas. Duryodhana found himself flung into an iron net which was hung from the sky and left suspended there.

  His despairing soldiers and courtiers now belatedly found the Pandava camp and rushed there for help. They fell at Yudhishthira’s feet and begged him to come to their rescue. ‘Duryodhana is captured by the gandharvas!’ they exclaimed. ‘His wives are held captive by them! You must help us!’

  Bhima was delighted by their desperation. ‘Duryodhana deserves to be punished,’ he gloated. ‘Whatever makes you think that we will come to his aid?’

  Yudhishthira reproached his brother. ‘It is our duty to defend our cousins,’ he said quietly. ‘They may be our enemies but they are still our blood brothers. We may fight amongst ourselves, but when they are attacked by a third party, we must help them.’

  Bhima could not believe his ears. He went red with anger and began flexing and unflexing his muscles in frustration. But Yudhishthira was stern. ‘We are five against a hundred,’ he said. ‘But against a common enemy, we are a hundred and five. Take Arjuna, Nakula and Sahadeva with you, and rescue Duryodhana.’

  Bhima remained unconvinced, and so Yudhishthira, the son of the lord of righteousness, tried another line of argument. ‘We are destined to fight and destroy the Kauravas,’ he explained. ‘But for the moment, our duty lies in rescuing them. You must follow my command and go to their aid.’

  The Pandavas obeyed Yudhishthira and fell into furious battle with the gandharvas. The brothers were mortals, but they were all sons of gods and immortals. Bhima got busy with his mace, while Arjuna rained a blanket of arrows from his magical bow, the Gandiva. The gandharvas began to tire under the assault.

  Suddenly, a peal of musical laughter echoed through the sky. A rainbow appeared and behind it stood Chitrasena, the king of the gandharvas. Arjuna was surprised and delighted to see his friend, who had instructed him in the arts of dance and music. ‘Whatever are you doing here, Chitrasena?’ he asked.

  ‘Your father, Lord Indra, sent me,’ said Chitrasena. ‘He came to know of Duryodhana’s plans to humiliate you and we thought we would turn the tables upon him. Your dear cousin is at your mercy now! You can do what you please with him.’

  ‘You must let Duryodhana go,’ Arjuna replied. ‘That is what Yudhishthira desires.’

  ‘Then Yudhishthira must come himself to free him,’ said Chitrasena. And so the humiliated Duryodhana was released by the gandharvas and handed over to the oldest of the Pandava brothers.

  ‘You may go, Duryodhana,’ Yudhishthira said courteously. ‘You are free to return to Hastinapura again. Your wives, your brothers, your troops, all may return with you.’

  Duryodhana’s humiliation was complete. This was even worse than being captured by the gandharvas. Too petty to thank his cousin for his magnanimity, he proudly turned his face away and left without a word, choked by an anger and helplessness he could not contain.

  Plotting Revenge

  Duryodhana dispatched his army back to Hastinapura. He stayed on in the forest camp, hurt and humiliated by his defeat at the hands of the gandharva king and Yudhishthira’s generosity in releasing him. ‘I was forgiven by my enemy,’ he lamented, ‘and released along with the women. I shall kill myself, I shall starve to death here in this forest. Dusasana must become king in my place.’

  Dusasana, Karna and Sakuni had stayed on in the forest to console the despondent Duryodhana. ‘The bond between us is as strong as that between those Pandavas,’ Dusasana exclaimed. ‘I would never accept the crown of Hastinapura in your stead!’

  ‘I have been defeated and pitied! I can’t bear to think about it,’ the eldest Kaurava moaned.

  ‘I love you as much as your brothers do,’ Karna reassured him. ‘If you should decide to die, why, I will die with you! And look at it like this—the Pandavas didn’t really defeat the gandharvas! Arjuna is a friend of Chitrasena, the gandharva king, and they staged the whole thing between them.’

  Sakuni had been watching his nephew with an amused smile. ‘What a big baby you are!’ he said. ‘For all your grand words, you are acting like a spoilt brat. Grief and suffering strengthen character, but perhaps you have been too pampered all along.’

  ‘Look at the Pandavas,’ Karna pointed out tactlessly. ‘They didn’t cry or complain when they were sent into exile.’ This statement upset Duryodhana all the more.

  Sakuni knew how to handle Duryodhana. ‘I have the perfect solution,’ he said, a sneer playing on his lips. ‘All you have to do to redeem yourself is to restore the kingdom to the noble Pandavas. Everyone will praise your generosity, and the whole episode will be forgotten.’

  This wasn’t what Duryodhana wanted to hear. ‘I shall spend the night in the forest, meditating on what I must do,’ he declared. He spread out a mat of kusa grass, closed his eyes in prayer and beseeched the fates to show him what to do next.

  A prayer must be pure and come from the heart, only then is it heard and answered. Duryodhana’s mind and heart were shrivelled and warped by hatred and envy. Kaalla, the demon of wrong advice and misdirection, who feeds on false pride and mistrust, came and perched himself on Duryodhana’s left shoulder. ‘You shall rule the earth,’ lying Kaalla whispered into his ear. ‘Why should you think of giving up the world when it is yours to rule? Karna, Dusasana, Bhishma, Drona and Ashwathama are all there to fight for you, and to die for you if necessary. Do not bow before the Pandavas! Defeat them in battle and be the king of all you survey!’

  His words heartened Duryodhana immeasurably. Kaalla had set the eldest of the Kauravas on a course of action that would destroy not only him, but his entire clan.

  So Duryodhana returned to Hastinapura, planning revenge against the Pandavas, who had never deliberately done him any harm. Encouraged by Karna, his faithful friend, Duryodhana set out to perform the Rajasuya yagna. All the neighbouring kings were either made to submit to him and pay tribute, or were defeated in battle by the valiant Karna.

  The coronation ceremony for the Rajasuya was planned on a grand scale, for Duryodhana was determined to outdo the one the Pandavas had performed at Indraprastha. A special messenger was sent to the forest to invite the exiled Pandavas to the yagna ceremony.

  ‘I would be happy to come,’ Yudhishthira said gently, ‘but I cannot enter the city of Hastinapura until our time of exile is over.’

  ‘And then, we shall enter your city and perform a yagna where your king and all those who support him shall be slaughtered like sacrificial goats,’ Bhima added, unable to contain his rage.

  The Exploits of Jayadratha

  The twelfth year of exile drag
ged on and on and on. Yudhishthira was pensive as he contemplated the enormous suffering he had inflicted on his wife and brothers. After all the recent battles, Dwaitavana was no longer the peaceful retreat it had once been, and the Pandavas decided to return to the Kamyaka forest and stay there for a while.

  In the meanwhile, Dushala, the youngest of the Kauravas and the only daughter, had been married to Jayadratha, the king of Sindhu. One day, when the Pandavas had gone out hunting, Jayadratha passed by their forest home on his way to the kingdom of Salva. There, in a clearing by the forest, he saw Draupadi standing by the doorway of their hut, one arm draped around the branch of a tree. Although he did not know who she was, he was struck by her beauty, which lit up the dark forest like a streak of lightning.

  ‘Who are you?’ he asked, completely infatuated by this apparition.

  ‘I am Draupadi, the wife of the Pandavas,’ she replied.

  Jayadratha introduced himself. ‘My husbands are in the forest, out hunting,’ Draupadi said courteously. ‘Pray be seated until they return.’

  But foolish Jayadratha, smitten with love, proposed to the horrified Draupadi that she run away with him. ‘I shall keep you in the comfort you deserve,’ he said. ‘You are a queen, not meant to live in the forest in this misery.’ Ignoring her protests, he seized her and carried her away forcibly in his chariot. As they sped away, the deer scurried this way and that and the birds let out warning cries.

  ‘Something is wrong,’ said Yudhishthira. ‘Let us hurry back to Draupadi.’

  When the Pandavas realized what had happened, they set off in pursuit of Jayadratha, who was naturally no match for them. Very soon, they had overtaken and overpowered him. The terrified Jayadratha leapt off his chariot and hid cowering in the forest. Nakula and Sahadeva rescued Draupadi, while Bhima taunted Jayadratha to come out and fight with him.