Reading The Mahabharata in the 21st Century

By Kurchi Dasgupta
(An Indian artist and writer based in Kathmandu)

When I was asked to write on a favourite text, I looked back on my reading of the last ten
years and I realized the one that has stayed with me is perhaps quite expectedly The
Mahabharata. It is a text which, once read in its entirety, is quite impossible to outgrow for
the rest of ones life. However, to write about the original, which I read in Kisari Mohan
Gangulis English prose translation of 1880s, would be irrelevant to some. So I choose
Gurcharan Dass The Difficulty of Being Good as a point of departure.
It was reassuring to note that Dass journey into the epic was driven by a newly-acquired
longing to trace his cultural roots and an inquiry into the nature of human moral values that
were specifically spurred by the global financial crisis of 2008 and the Satyam Computers
scandal of 2009. Das himself comes from a hardcore corporate background, having been the
CEO of multiple national and multinational companies, including Procter and Gamble
Worldwide. Perhaps the reason why I chose his text over other scholarly or literary forays, is
the fact that he comes from the world of business and it is undoubtedly global capitalism
that weaves together our reality today.
It is therefore not surprising that Das begins his commentary on the epic with Duryodhana
and his character trait, envy. Duryodhanas envy drives a civilization to smithereens. Its
treatment in the first chapter allows Das to introduce the unforgivable game of dice and the
accompanying public disrobing of Draupadi possibly the epics most exciting, titillating
points of popular interest. It also allows him to present Yudhishthira, the righteous king, at
his weakest. Duryodhana is not ashamed of his envy because it is part of a larger and
consistent egoistic philosophical outlook, says Das, while Yudhishthira, in particular, will
offer a competing view of the world, based on dharma, which he explains as a universal
duty of righteousness, applicable to all and founded on non-violence, truth and concern for
others. Das, however, is all in favour of a healthy dose of envy, which he calls healthy
competitiveness that makes a business thrive. He uses the Ambani saga as an example. Only
when that envy descends into self-destruction, does it become a problem (?!). And then
comes the piece de resistance, the sub-heading: If greed is the sin of capitalism, envy is the
vice of socialism because envy is felt more strongly by near equals than those widely
separated in fortune,. This glosses over the fact that it was actually Duryodhanas greed
that translated into envy, and the two are irrevocably entwined in human nature. The
globalized reader, however, finds comfort in Dass thus favouring of capitalism over
socialism, especially when The Mahabharata proves to be an unsettling read where no one

person is judged inherently good or bad and where dharma, as Das notes, is present more
by its absence.
Interestingly, another very interesting commentary called The Book of Yudhisthir1 by the
renowned Bengali scholar and comparatist, Buddhadev Bose, begins with the Vana Parva
instead. Incidentally, I call these texts commentaries because loosely holding true to the
bhasya format, they help us unpack and weave together the meaning of the epic. A
successful philosophical commentary helps its target audience to read philosophically the
text being commented upon, and mediates between the text and a given readership.2 This
brings us to the question of the target readership of the two books as well. The Difficulty of
Being Good is by the authors own admission a wider audience, obviously to an India that
feels more comfortable with Krishan over Krishna and Dharam over Dharma and to a
country turning middle class and necessarily English-speaking. Boses subtle analysis is, on
the other hand, was first written in the vernacular and serialized in the middle-brow literary
magazine called Des in eighteen installments in 1972. At that point in history, the magazine
defined literary taste in West Bengal and its readership, which held pretensions to erudition,
was mostly restricted to the cultural hub of Bengali-speaking Calcutta and its suburbs. The
two books can therefore offer subtle insights into a erudite but regional versus a low-brow
but widely popular reading of the same text.
That Bose starts with the Vana Parva, in fact its last fateful day when the yaksa prasna
episode takes place must also be a reflection of this. The twelve year-long exile is equivalent
to what I would call a gap year for the Pandavas, a period of intense experiential learning.
The lessons learned culminate in a test, that of the questions put forth by the Yaksa, who
was actually his own father Dharma in disguise: what is the news? The world full of
ignorance is like a pan. The sun is the fire, the days and nights are fuel. The months and
seasons constitute the wooden ladle. Time is the cook that is cooking all creatures in that
pan; this is the news, answered Yudhisthira and brought back to life his four brothers.
Wisdom set the tone of Boses reading; consumerist envy and desire for Dass.
And so Dass second chapter must inevitably be on Draupadi, the ultimate object of desire
to Kaurava eyes for she was desired and protected by their superior rivals, the Pandavas.
Speaking of Draupadi, I find it difficult not to revisit another commentary on the epic, one
from the anthropological perspective of Iravati Karve. And be disillusioned somewhat when
she answers What was Draupadis biggest mistake? with that Draupadi had questioned
Yudhishthiras right to stake her in the game of dice -- and that Draupadi was standing
there arguing about legal technicalities like a lady pundit when what was happening to her
was so hideous that she should only have cried out for decency and pity in the name of the

Translated from the Bangla text Mahabharater Katha by Buddhadev Bose (pub. 1974) into English by Sujit
Mukherjee, pub. By Sangam Books (India) Pvt. Ltd, Hyderabad, 1986; distributed by Orient Longman Limited
2
Sanskrit Philosophical Commentary by Jonardon Ganeri, 2010

kshatriya code.3 Gurcharan Dass chapter called Draupadis Courage thankfully offers an
alternative perspective. Control over the woman was a unit of the political vocabulary of
the language of the Kshatriya ethosand what is significant in the epic narrative is that
Draupadi, the Kshatriya woman deprived of her prior rank and status, absorbs onto her
body the symbols of political fraudulence perpetrated on the PandavasDraupadi is
constantly spoken of as ekavastra, as a reminder of her ritual defilement (through which)
the sociopolitical identity of the Pandavas enter a liminal stage,4 put together in a nutshell
is Draupadi predicament. Das tackles this gracefully with his position that while Draupadis
disrobing is consistent with the moral paradigm of patriarchy, her polyandry was initiated
by the epic to challenge the same paradigm. He also reminds us that the epic blithely
challenges Manusmriti on the arbitration of dharma and instead leaves it to, not God, but to
human reason and goodness and an individual cultivation of an ethical self.
For three years starting 2008, I was immersed in simply reading The Mahabharata in its
entirety, an engagement that spawned three full-fledged solo exhibitions of paintings that
were almost immediately showcased in Kathmandus Siddhartha Gallery and Londons
Nehru Centre. 2008 was also the year that Nepal was declared a republic by the newly
elected Constituent Assembly. Having witnessed the countrys tortured transition from
autocratic monarchy to democratic republic, and experiencing the daily disillusionments
that such transitions inevitably bring in its wake, I was in need of clutching onto a text that
would bring reassurance as well as some much needed explanations of human failings. Dass
often loquacious arguments remind me of how the epic helped regenerate my confidence in
human reason. As Das perceptively points out, Draupadi was the voice of the caste-specific
action based sva-dharma in The Mahabharata, Yudhisthira consistently prevailed as the
voice of the contemplation and conscience-based sadharana dharma. With her example Das
takes the Indian administrative service to task, , I believe that Draupadis example is an
inspiration to free citizens in all democracies. The statement does not spring from a
misguided romanticism but an awareness that her legal question was a terrifying social and
moral challenge to the society of her time, when everyone believed that a wife was a
husbands property, and not an independent free agent, and that it should embolden
citizens to question the dharma of public officials, especially when they confront the
pervasive governance failures around them, for the question can easily be translated as a
call for accountability in public life. To this Das has entwined the immorality of silence, for
let us not forget that the entire Kaurava court stood and watched, as the Pandavas were
made to lose unfairly; and soon afterwards, witness dumbly the terrible humiliation of a
young bride of their own clan. Interestingly, though Draupadi is omnipresent in Boses
reading, she never claims a chapter of her own.

Yuganta The End of an Epoch by Iravati Karve, 1968

Imaging Vengeance: Amba and Draupadi in the Mahabharata by Janaki Sreedharan in Reflections and
Variation on The Mahabharata, Sahitya Akademi, 2009
4

Though Arjuna has been the perennial favourite as the action hero of The Mahabharata,
whose acts of violence have been given moral justification by God himself i.e. Krishna in the
poem Gita in Bhishma Parva, it is the quieter, thoughtful Yudhishthira who has emerged as
the ideal for humankind in the past century. This perhaps corresponds to our increasing
realization that The Mahabharata is less a war epic or a romantic tale and is more of an
itihahasa (historical compendium) with a strongly novelistic narrative treatment. While
Arjunas actions were straight, not experiential though with a touch of conscience (Amiya
Dev, 2009), Yudhishthira emerges from the fog of indecision, apparent acts of weakness and
a lack of physical aggression and valour slowly but steadily over the course of the nearly
hundred thousand slokas -- and shines radiant in his adherence to an universal, humane
ethical system that somehow manages to uphold individual experience and action through
the lens of innate, human goodness. The very last two parvas, The Mahaprasthanika or
The Great Departure and The Swargarohinika or Ascenion are devoted to the glory of
Yudhishthira, the unlikely but true representative of the everyday individual who daily rises
to greatness through small, unsung humane acts. As Bose points out, at this peak of
Yudhisthiras great departure, where he confronts Indras divinity with his own humanity,
where he refuses to be persuaded by Indra and is ready to forsake entry into heaven for the
sake of a dog if we recall at this point many other past events, then shall we realize that
this noble and human poem is but an account of Yudhisthiras life. 5
Gurcharan Das dedicates the last of his character-interrogations to Yudhishthira. Damn the
kshatra way! Damn the power of the mighty chest! Damn the unforgiving stubbornness that
brought us to this disasterBecause of our greed and our confusion, wehave been brought
to this condition for the sake of a trifling kingdom. Now that we see our kinsmen lying dead
upon the ground, no one can rejoice at being king, he quotes directly from The
Mahabharata to make Yudhishthiras case. He calls the chapter Yudhishthiras Remorse and
goes on to contradict the common, masculinist perception that Yudhishthiras remorse was
actually self-absorption or self-pity with a moral sentiment like remorse is valuable for it
offers a psychological basis for the moral life, and further adds that empathy for
Yudhishthiras remorse at the end of The Kurukshetra War was invaluable in my dharma
journey. It opened up a new understanding of dharma and taught me how to cultivate the
moral life. That this comes from a representative of global business, what if a retired one, is
oddly reassuring. Das clearly refers to his own corporate career, and takes on the
mechanism of global capitalism with, Yudhishthira does reflect. Unlike most of us, he makes
a deliberate choice between following his own interest unthinkingly his kshatriya-dharma
or doing something more difficult, which might even involve some inconvenience, but
which is the right thing to do from the larger perspective of a universal sadharana-dharma
of his consciencethe theme of the Mahabharata is not war but peace.

The Book of Yudhisthir, translated from the Bangla text Mahabharater Katha by Buddhadev Bose (pub. 1974)
into English by Sujit Mukherjee, pub. By Sangam Books (India) Pvt. Ltd, Hyderabad, 1986; distributed by Orient
Longman Limited

The one regret I feel over Dass commentary is its refusal to enter into dialogue with The
Mahabharatas multilayered narrative structure, for it is this structure that allows a
multiplicity of voices and perspectives to build up a polyphonic world. As Amiya Dev deftly
points out in his levels of Narration in The Mahabharata, The enormity of Mahbhrata is
also reflected in its multiple levels of narration ... there is a variety here that is rare.
Narration by a professional bard, narration by the authors disciple, narration by an instant
witness, and narration by the learnedare all here. Accordingly, the event narrated is twice
removed, once removed, nearly instantaneous, and very far. In other words, we have a
variety of pasts and the story of their negotiation. Narration is the means by which a past is
brought to the present, wherever that present is, whether aunakas, Janamejayas,
Dhritarshtras or Yudhishthiras. And of course the eventual present is ours. The inner
presents are graded no doubt, but they co-exist with the outer or eventual, that is, our
present. It is only in the present that khyna (<khy) is gathered, for to tell, to relate, to
narrate is to build a bridge to the present. Narration is bridge building.6
By now it must be obvious why I was impelled to enter the world of the epic in 2008 - by the
two Gulf Wars, 9/11, Godhra, 26/11, the global financial crash and recession and also, the
gradual revelation that the recent Maoist revolution had less to do with right and more to
do with power. In 2010 I had written in the catalogue for my exhibition The Mahabharata:
An Impression that it is not just a tale of how a race, if not humanity, is wiped off the face of
the Earth it is also a tale of how stupefying chaos may at times progress into unity and
peace. We are in the middle of yet another such dark moment and I return to it hoping for
answers and direction as innocents suffer and die in Gaza.

Levels of Narration in The Mahabharata by Amiya Dev, Epic and Other Higher Narratives: Essays in
Intercultural Studies, pub. By Pearson Education India, 2012