Mahabharat vignettes

Created on Friday, September 19, 2008

Indians have endless fascination with mythology , and despite the current saas-bahu and reality show infestation, we are having some mythology show or other enjoying prime time on every channel worth its beam. Our mythology for that matter, is not devoid of sex sleaze and intrigue of soap operas that it competes against , and nothing epitomizes this more than mahabharat,a tale having no peers. Amazing plots, subplots,history, fiction, all woven into a surreal epic, which you can read , reread and yet neither fathom it fully, nor have enough of it. In this series of posts I will examine some of the interesting characters that the story offers. Of course derisively. Its more enjoyable that way(Imagine Akshay Kumar's 'wicked' grin in background). Umm.. on second thoughts i will also try to explain the stuff in what it 'actually' could have been. Logical interpretation, for those who prefer jargon. So, here we go with the first one.

Vyasa: They say history belongs to the victor. But i bet, a lot of it belongs to the chronicler too. Consider this. What was bharat vansh ? The clan of kauravs and pandavs , and the principle ruling family of present day india.Who were these Kaurav's and pandavs? Sons of Pandu and Dhritrashtra. And who exactly were these chaps ? Sons of their fathers ? Alas no. There father Vichitravirya died without being useful to their mothers. So, the dadi came to rescue.She called her illicit son(they are not Ekta Kapoor's prerogative) ,to make her two bahu's (and a daasi, in tow) pregnant. A very enviable job i must say. Coming back to the topic, so the children he begot , defined the 'true blue' royal blood in india.(There is a 'Pariskhit' twist to this tale , but it would be discussed later). So, the entire vansh, and its gaurav and parampara, is basically a 'jugad' arrangement thanks to this illicit son of a fisherwomen. And guess who he was. Vyasa. The writer of mahabharat.Just a little play with words,and the history of bharatvarsh becomes his own ! Since all this happens, early in the tale, he must have written the entire story that follows,with the sinful gratification of someone passing off his own children's frolicking as history. And perhaps housed all his fantasies into it too.