Was Draupadi really disrobed in the Dice Hall? - Page 6

Originally posted by: shani88

Parts in bold - This is EXACTLY the reason why I asked (in the dice game-vastraharan thread) if Krishna considered Yudhishthira to be as guilty as the chandal chaukdi in the dice game/vastraharan fiasco.

Yes, the Kauravas physically and verbally abuse her, and humiliate her, and all of them rightly die in Kurukshetra.

But Yudi staked her, the Pandavas (being her wonderful husbands) remained mute spectators to her humiliation, and yet ALL the Pandavas survive the war, and Yudi becomes HP king at the end of it.

What does it all really mean?

Originally posted by: .Vrish.

I think the only reason Krishna spared the Pandavas was that he couldn't have punished them w/o Draupadi being punished w/ them. Like had he killed them, Draupadi would have been widowed. She had enough boons insurance covering against that eventuality.

Originally posted by: sw123

oint "why Krishna did not intervene?".the reason is that the lord Krishna came to earth to establish dharma,to establish dharma all the people who does not follow dharma/support adharma should be eradicated. to accomplish that task a big war(kurukshetra) is necessary,if he intervened and killed Duryodhana,Dussasana,Karna,Shakuni etc then eliminating all the other adharmies will be a tough task bcoz lord should go to each and every adharmi and kill them which is very difficult.If all of them gather together in a war then it will be easy to accomplish the task.

Originally posted by: smrth

Yes, I did understand your point actually. You were stating the relative severity of both insults, and taking into account the repercussions that Draupadi's insult had later in the text to conclude that it must have been considered as a transgression of the highest order. And you are right, it is hard to understand all the hullabaloo surrounding the incident if there was no attempt to disrobe Draupadi. But if you consider those times, you get the impression that no other man other than the husband was allowed to touch a married woman. So in this case, not only is she dragged by the hair (which is why Draupadi takes the oath of never tying her hair, and washing it in Dusshasan's blood), she is also urged by Karna to leave the Pandavas and take another man for her husband after which Duryodhan attempts to lewdly entice her by showing her his left thigh (which was meant for the wife). So taking the morals of that period into consideration I'm sure the above insults (ant that too hurled at a royal, the queen of Indraprastha, the daughter in law of the Kurus) were viewed to be as grave as an attempted disrobing would be viewed today. So the point I'm trying to make is, import of disrobing as a crime today can be = import of the above mentioned insults in that era.

Assuming that the disrobing never took place, Draupadi referring to Karna as having played a role in her insult is still not fallacious. As in if one were to rule out Karna instigating the disrobing, her argument about Karna insulting her still stands as Karna humiliated her in other ways too.

So if we take the vastraharan out of the picture, the entire dice game incident still makes sense. (Ideally ruling out such a crucial incident would have given rise to inconsistencies within the text later). But to the contrary it makes more sense, because if you go through the text you'll notice that immediately after Draupadi is disrobed, there are just one or two lines about the court being stunned at the miracle. But immediately afterwards Vidura launches into his speech of how important it is to answer the question that Draupadi has raised, something which she does before the attempted stripping. Vidur speaks as if nothing has happened between Draupadi raising her question of whether she was a slave and the moment he begins his speech. Even later everybody just goes on debating whether Draupadi is a slave or not rather than express some shock at the stripping and astonishment at the miracle, which does appear a bit odd. It's as if the entire incident was added later. And I don't see why anybody would not mention the disrobing out of sheer disgust later when they do mention the fact that she was menstruating and in a single cloth without any compunctions.

Thanks for raising your points though. 😊

Edited by ashwi_d - 11 years ago

Originally posted by: ashwi_d

Fine points...May be so...

Except these;😊

1) The severe oath was taken immediately after the disrobing attempt and before other insults by Dury and Karna that you have cited. Except Karna's prompt. Now If Dushy's drag was only blame left to account (that oath), then gory details are not sufficiently justified. However grim menstruation may be taken, it lacks matching affront in absence of 'public disrobing attempt'. Let us remember, Bhima is not a blind savage, prone to punish the offender so terribly at touching his wife.(For Dury's insult, he took another oath.)

2) In this light, and considering severe condemnation of others involved, the ruling out of this lynchpin incidence is in fact creating glaring inconsistencies in the story line; the punishments the punishers. Not only Bhim, Arjun, Krishna too. The offenders exculpated as much and punishers vindictive that much. Their characterisation is simply not confirming this.

3) If present text is suspected a 'later interpolation' because of lack of mention later on, why this 'lack' itself may not be taken as later redaction? There is a noticeable trend to glorify and tone down sone villainy (elapsed) even in the text.

4) But more logically, perhaps the act was not contested overtly afterwards because it was actually rendered futile at its very attempt. So technically it was indeed not done! She was 'not disrobed' successfully, Courtesy Intervention!😲

5) Now the questioned passage from Vana Parva;

First let us reconstruct her trial. When Dushy is forcing her to the court, she sure was not so alarmed as to call for Madhav. After all she was being taken to a place where her elders and husbands were present. 'She is angry, full of spirit and launches her counter immediately...All in vain. Her oppressors crosses limits and at Karna's instigation an unimaginable horror stares her in face. All her defences- including husbands- fall useless...then she invokes Govind...'

Coming back to Vana PARVA passage. If we take following meanings from the said dialogue as per the refutes, (I am not, have tried more fitting interpretation)- 'instead of 'thanking' she is complaining' ...'even you did not come to help'. Then. Rescue from WHAT? When did she call Divine? On what emergency? Or what 'protection' that she ever got and deserved thither?? Is not this very insinuation confirming the 'existence'?!

Edited by smrth - 11 years ago

Originally posted by: mnx12

If it's said he didn't intervene, Dharma provided her sarees. What was that Dharma? Her Pativrata dharma protected her. The saree became endless. Dushy got tired pulling her saree. It wasn't Dharma, whose ansh was Yudi. If it was really the Dharmaraj, he would have put some sense in his ansh- Yudi & stopped him from going ahead in dice game