In Sarala Mahabharata, Dhritarashtra did not ask his minister Sanjaya to tell him what was happening right then on the battlefields of Kurukshetra, neither did Sanjaya volunteer to tell him. He got the news of the war every day after the fight stopped. He would then share his feelings with Sanjaya and sometimes would ask …
WAR OR NO WAR? THE FINAL ANSWER ACCORDING TO TWO ODIA MAHABHARATAS
The Mahabharatasin question are Sarala’s Mahabharataof the fifteenth century and Mahabharataby the sixteenth century poet, Jagannatha Dasa, known and revered as the author of Odia Bhagabata, which is a sacred text. Incidentally, there are at least three retellings of the Mahabharata in Odia. The third is the Mahabharata which seems to have been written in …
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THE REVENGE OF THE DEAD: THE STORY OF THE SPECIAL DICE OF SAKUNI
From one point of view, it was not Sakuni who avenged the brutal murder of his father, uncles and relatives by his nephew, Duryodhana; it was indeed his father, King Gandharasena himself who did. He was the Causer Agent: Sakuni was merely “doing agent”, more an instrument than an agent. In fact, in a Sanskrit …
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GANDHARASENA’S GREED
A manuscript of Sarala Mahabharatahas a slightly different story of King Gandharasena but the difference is both quite interesting and significant. This story is about his greed and punishment. Pleased with Gandharasena, goddess Ganga had given him divine dice sticks and dice cubes and told him to return those to her on the completion of …
CONCERNING DURYODHANA’S KILLING OF HIS MATERNAL GRANDFATHER
Here my main purpose is not to retell a story from Sarala Mahabharata but only respond, by way of story-telling, to some important questions that friends have asked, who – in particular, Dr. Pradip Bhattacharya and Dr. Vineet Chaitanya, both eminent Mahabharata scholars - have been kind enough to read the post on why there …
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HOW THE PANDAVAS CAME TO LIVE IN INDRAPRASTHA
One day the Kauravas and the Pandavas were playing a game which, today, we would most likely call “kabaddi”. When there is jealousy, malice and hatred in the mind, a game like this could turn into a mini battlefield. This was precisely what happened that day. Misusing the rules of the game, Dussasana hit Yudhisthira …
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HOW BHIMA KNEW ABOUT "GOLAKAPUTRA"
Kunti and the Pandavas had just settled down at Indraprastha. Every morning Yudhisthira would pay respects to Kunti and then proceed to Hastinapura to pay respects to bada baapaa (father’s elder brother) Dhritarashtra and bada maa (father’s elder brother’s wife). His brothers would join him, although Bhima did not like it at all. He didn’t …
I AM SITTING, O SON OF GOLAKA
(aho golakaputra mu basuchi) said Bhima to Duryodhana as the latter invited him to take his seat in the Kuru court, saying, “take your seat, O son of Pavana (pabanaputra basa)”. The family elders, Bhishma and Bhurishrava, clapped and laughed loudly. ‘How on earth, did you get to know of this secret?”, they asked Bhima, …
KANSA MAMU, NO SAKUNI MAMU
The The maternal uncle or manu in Odia culture is someone who is very affectionate and caring towards his nephew (or niece) and mamu ghara (maternal uncle’s house) is a place where the nephew spends a happy time, where he eats dudha bhata (rice with milk), which stands for delicious food in the language. But …
RAI’S STORY
(This post is not about Sarala Mahabharata. It is about a ritual in Shri Jagannath Temple in Puri and the story associated with it. The ritual continues but the story is all but forgotten. The inspiration for this post has come from some observations of Ms. Sewa Bhattarai regarding some fading worships in Karnali and the …
