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Hinduism 
The Mahabharata as Theatre – 2

Experiencing the performances of "Shakti" and "Katha Amrita Saman" a number of issues come to mind beyond what Mallika Sarabhai and Shaoli Mitra have highlighted through the poem of Kartikeya Sarabhai and Iravati Karve's Yuganta respectively. Mallika's Draupadi is very much for a European audience, while Shaoli's, cradled in the rich soil of Kashiram Das' Bengali verse re-telling of the epic, automatically establishing rapport with the audience. Thereby, Shaoli's communication is, inevitably, more piercing, while Mallika's dazzles with its scintillating fusion of mime, dance, "abhinaya" and eloquence. Shaoli's rendition of the epic women spans several hours, where Mallika's Draupadi is a blazing flame that shoots up and dies down all too swiftly. Both differ strikingly from the genuine folk-tradition of the "Pandavani" in the fresh psychological insights they provide into the female characters, as against the concentration on vigorous, rousing telling-of-the-tale characterizing the latter.

"Katha Amrita Saman" starts its story with Satyavati, not Ganga, although therein lies the knottiest problem which is at the core of the epic. The infanticide practiced by Ganga on seven of her sons, her bringing up of Devavrata without his royal father, her very first appearance when she takes her seat on the right thigh of Pratipa and demands that he marry her—all these provide fertile ground for the enquiring mind. Add to this the fact that Shantanu was the youngest of Pratipa’s sons and come to the throne only because Devapi, the eldest, was disqualified on account of a skin disease, just as later Dhritrarashtra, the eldest, is passed over because of his blindness in favor of the younger Pandu. Strangely enough, Pratipa does not seem to have bothered to get his son a bride. Shantanu did not attend a single svayamvara and appears to have had a peculiar weakness for tribal women living on the shores of rivers, be it Ganga whom he meets beside the river Ganga, or Satyavati whom he sees beside the Yamuna.

In the veins of the Kauravas it is the blood of Vyasa which flows, and thereby their ancestry is traced back to a fisher-girl Satyavati and the sage Parashara. In the case of the Pandavas, however, there is not a trace of the royal blood of Kuru. Their fathers are unknown. All we are told is that they were brought up in the Himalayas where the tradition of polyandry existed, as Yudhishthira assures Durpada while insisting that all five brothers shall marry Draupadi. Through their mother they are related to the non-Aryan Yadavas and to the Nagas (Aryaka, who saves the poisoned Bhima, is Kunti's father's maternal grandfather). Their claim to the throne, therefore, is quite dubious. The fact of their being seized upon by Drupada to work out the old rivalry between Hastinapur and Panchala from the time of Samvarana and Nila is an issue that needs to be highlighted. For, it is because of this ancient animosity that Draupadi is used as a pawn by Drupada. The so-called svayamvara is really a ceremony of viryashulka, that is, to the strongest goes the prize. Draupadi has no option regarding choosing a husband. She will have to wed the person who succeeds in the test of skill. Very perceptively Karttikeya Sarabhai's poem makes this point: "the Svayamvara was mine", says Draupadi, "but the choice my father's”—the only amendment needed here being that it was no svayamvara at all. Moreover, Mallika Sarabhai could have added that the choice was not only Drupada's but even more so Kunti's and of her sons other than Arjuna who won the bride. Drupada's plan had been so to structure a test that none but Arjuna could win the bride. In this he succeeded, skillfully throwing dust in the eyes of the assembled royalty. Immediately after Arjuna hit the target, the epic records that Yudhishthira and the twins slipped out and went home. Arjuna and Bhima who bring Draupadi home later. By that time, Kunti has been told of what has happened. The entire drama that takes place at the expense of Arjuna and Draupadi, is something which has not been exploited by Shaoli Mitra or Mallika Sarabhai, let alone the mystery of Draupadi's birth and its implications for the development of her personality.

Why is it that Kunti deliberately says something which ensures that Draupadi will have to have five husbands possessing her just as she herself had four (Surya, Dharma, Vayu, Indra)? Kunti, at least, did not have to go through the daily trauma of having to satisfy equally five men. Although it is Pandu who chose her impregnators (Surya is the only one she chooses on her own), she merely had a one-time sexual relationship with four persons, never having to live with them. Is it the eternal tale of the mother-in-law inflicting on the daughter-in-law more misery than what she has had to undergo?

– Continued

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