The importance of being 'Draupdi' !

I was discussing 'Kabhi Alvida Na Kehna' with my roomie the day i saw the movie. It was pretty animated a debate. He completely disliked the movie because the story was so unrealistic for him, while I was telling him about the Einstein's theory of relativity which says that 'Everything is relative'. Like in this context the movie may be accepted by western audience and not by Indian!! Well well well, I am not going to write here what I personally think about the theme of KANK because I don't want to sound defensive. What I do want to write is about where did our talk then moved to. While discussing marriages, we figured that our ethos and mores regarding marriage are biased towards males. Like after a marriage, a girl will leave her home. Indian Maharajas could have so many wives and so on. And then I said "How about Panchali? She had 5 husbands". And he said, "thats just a story and other wise also her character is pretty controversial". He just had to say that, because after that my poor roomie had to hear a long lecture from me on MahaBharata and significance of the character Draupdi (Am I using the correct spelling btw ;-) !!!

First things first, Mahabharat is a story we have all grown up with (incase the reader of this blog is not from Alaska). And we all know about each character and every event. But I got a chance to study all these event/charcters in more detail when I read and adapted version of Mahabharat called 'Maha Samar' by Narendar Kohli. And I was really moved by his point of view, rather his explanation of so many things that constitue this great epic. Out of so many interesting characters, the most powerfull female character is Panchaali. First a thought !!!

The five pandavas are in exile. One day they go to a competition and since Arjun is a best shooter around, he wins the prize which is king's drupad's daugher Daraupdi. They bring her home and say to their mother Kunti who is in the house 'See, what we have brought today'. Kunti says, 'Since I am on fast, what ever you have brought, divide among yourselves i.e. five brothers'. Now what if Kunti was not on a fast that day??????????

Jokes apart, there are three things which I beleive the character of Draupdi represents.

First, the most talked about event of mahabharat, the 'vastra-haran'. When Dushaasan is disrobing Draupdi, its not only he who is the culprit and not only Duryodhan. Its their father Dhritrashtra too, Duraupdi's husbands too who shamelessly sit idle, and what husbands, the men who are epitome of bravery. Pitamaha Bhishma too, Dronacharaya too, Vidhur and what not. And though I may sound melodramatic, even I was there disrobing Draupdi. Even you.
Some did it just for lust, basically duryodhan and co. And duryodhan refuses to die, even now in India every 2 minutes there is a rape. I don't know a single guy who has never 'Eve-teased' ! And am I not disrobing Draupdi when I am watching that porn movie?
And then some did it because they were bound by something else, some kind of promise, oath towards King, kingdom, clan or they were just following the rules of a dirty game. Any thing that does not allow a person to save a woman's pride can only be one thing: BULL SHIT!
And the only person who had to come to the rescue was the one who is free from all bond and shackled, Lord Krishna himself!
Well, another thing to notice here is that this all stopped when 'Gandhari' intervened. And she mind you was a female. So all the women groups out there, take a cue :p

Second thing is Draupdi's controversial marriage to 5 men. I think that Draupdi is the only wife in our history who had more than one living husbands. One thing which it represents is that its after all an equal world. What ever is applicable for HIM is true for HER too. And the most significant aspect of this is the maturity of the relation the five brothers and their wife had. They all loved her and she loved all of them. There was no envy or jealousy. Among the brothers, there is no desire to prove himself stronger or better in some way to impress her. She is not biased towards any one of them. They even divide the time-zones, like, one year she will be with the big brother, then next year the younger one and so on. And these time-zones are sacrosanct for all of them.
I am overwhelmed by this, because the relation of Draupdi with the five brothers speak that only Love and Respect matters, and not conventions. There is no type of relationship which is not possible. Have you seen the Amitabh Bachan's movie 'Black'? What do you call their relationship? The only thing they shared was LOVE.

The THIRD thing about Draupdi is the reason why she was born. So according to the story, Draupdi was born from 'Yagya-Agni' (Sacred-fire). Now this guy, Dronacharya had insulted Drupad, because once Drupad had also insulted him and basically he was one son of an Egotist ! Ok, so Drupad had asked God of Fire to give her Draupdi as her daugher and the only mission of Draupdi was to be the nemesis for the whole Aryan clan. Which ofcourse she finally did become!
But in that great war, all her enemies dies, but also her own relatives, her brother and even her five sons. In the end, she was still a loser. I see this as 'Justice being done'. Because hate begets hate and here we have Draupdi whose whole carnation was for destruction. Ved Vyas (the author of mahabharat) has shown no mercy or sympathy towards her in this regard, and thats one of the things that makes this book an epic of all times!!

THE END !!

alright, now I am supposed to do a spell check but I am not going to correct grammatical mistakes and revisit sentence structures this time. Its so tiring and boring a job ;-)

Shiver - One of my fav. songs.

What kind of blogger will copy and paste lyrics of popular songs on their blog ????
Well I DO. This is the song which made me put Coldplay in my favorite list. I can hear to this song non stop the whole day. Amazing lyrics !!




So I look in your direction
But you pay me no attention, do you?
I know you don't listen to me
'Cos you say you see straight through me, don't you?

And on and on
From the moment I wake, to the moment I sleep
I'll be there by your side; just you try and stop me
I'll be waiting in line, just to see if you care

Oh…
Did you want me to change?
Well I changed for you
And I want you to know that you'll always get your way
I wanted to say…

Don't you shiver
Shiver
Sing it loud and clear
I'll always be waiting for you

So you know how much I need you
But you never even see me, do you?
And is this my final chance of getting you

And on and on
From the moment I wake, to the moment I sleep
I'll be there by your side; just you try and stop me
I'll be waiting in line, just to see if you care

Oh…
Did you want me to change?
Well I changed for good
And I want you to know that you'll always get your way
I wanted to say…

Don't you shiver
Don't you shiver
Sing it loud and clear
I'll always be waiting for you

Yeah I'll always be waiting for you
Yeah I'll always be waiting for you
Yeah I'll always be waiting for you, for you
I will always be waiting…

And it's you I see but you don't see me
And it's you I hear so loud and so clear
I sing it loud and clear
And I'll always be waiting for you

So I look in your direction
But you pay me no attention
And you know how much I need you
But you never even see me