Mahabharata An Epic Tale Of Ancient India

Mahabharata is a journey that would enlighten the prominence of life and righteousness of humans.

The epic tale of Mahabharata begins with Devavrata, the son of King Shantanu and river goddess Ganga and a disciple of Parshuram, swearing an oath of celibacy to ensure the marriage of his father and Satyavati, an adopted daughter of tribal fisherman chieftan. Due to this, King Shantanu blessed Devavrata with a boon of icchya-mrityu and was named Bhisma. After their son, Vichitravirya’s birth King Shantanu died and Satyavati became Rajmata. Vichitravirya was an alcoholic and completely dependent on Bhisma, therefore Satyavati ordered Bhisma to win the three princesses of Salva kingdom, Amba, Ambika and Ambalika and bring them to Hastinapur to be married to Vichitravirya. However, Amba had already chosen her groom so Vichitravirya was married to Ambika and Ambalika. On getting turned down by her beloved prince, Amba came to Hastinapur to seek justice by marrying Bhisma as he has won her. But, due to his oath of celibacy Bhisma refused and an enraged Amba decided to commit suicide when Lord Shiva grants her the boon of rebirth with her past memories and become the cause of Bhisma’s death.

Soon after the marriage of the other two sisters, their husband died and there was no successor of Hastinapur’s throne. So, Satyavati decided to call her son Vyasa and the queens gave birth to Dhritarashtra and Pandu. Also a maid gave birth to Vidur at the same time. Therefore, the three kids were brought up together in Hastinapur. Later, Dhritarashtra was married to Gandhari, the princess of Gandhar, without her brother, Shakuni’s will. And Pandu was married to Kunti, the princess of Kuntibhoj, and Madri, the princess of Madra. Kunti was blessed a boon, by Maharishi Durvasa, that she may call any god and bear his child. To test the boon she called upon the Sun God and was granted a sun named Karna. Since, she was unmarried at that time so she decided to afloat Karna on the river Ganga to avoid embarrassment. Despite of Dhritarashtra being the eldest son, Pandu was made the King of Hastinapur which enraged Shakuni who then decided to destroy the Kuru Vansha in order to avenge his sister.

Later, Kunti invoked three different deities to bear three child named Yudhistir, Bheem and Arjun whereas Madri had two sons Nakul and Sahedev. Gandhari, as blessed by Lord Shiva, gave birth to 100 sons and one daughter. Karna was always humiliated for being a Soot Putra and therefore Duryodhan, the eldest son of gandhari, made him the King of Ang. Out of gratefulness to Duryodhan, Karna pledged to be Duryodhan’s friend forever. The 105 princes of Hastinapur grew up together and were sent to Drona for their education. The 105 princes were always divided into 100 Kauravas and 5 Pandavas. Later, Arjun won Draupadi’s swyambar, the princess of Panchal whose sister was Shikhandini, who was Amba in her previous life. Due some misunderstanding, Draupadi had to marry the five Pandavas which made her a subject of humiliation to the Kauravas.

Draupadi’s humiliation in the court of Hastinapur was the cause of the Battle of Kurukshetra which claimed thousands of lives including Bhisma, Drona, Karna and all the 100 Kauravas. Pandavas won the battle with the help of Lord Krishna and Yudhistir was made the King of Hastinapur.