Originally posted by: metacrisis
It was really horrible how nobody really listened to her. I mean, Parashuram did go fighting Bhishma, but nobody really got her to calm down and explore an actually productive solution.
Even as Shikhandi, nobody really paid him/her much attention until when they needed them to do a very morally questionable job which was the result of some very poor counselling from their previous life.
Śālva was the only character who didn't listen to Ambā, right?
Several characters tried to get Ambā to calm down. They suggested options for her to live a comfortable life, which she rejected. At one point, she was given a choice between marriage to Śālva and vengeance against Bhīṣma, and she refused to decide for herself. After that, she didn't desist from vengeance, even after Gaṅgā cursed her.
Ambā is chaperoned by old brāhmaṇas and followed by a nurse when Bhīṣma sends her to Śālva. In the passage that I quoted above, when Ambā says that she can't return to Hāstinapura, we can infer that her entourage is ready to return. Bhīṣma has an obligation to maintain Ambā, and maybe marry her to Vicitravīrya (although he refuses to do so at Udyogaparvan 178.9-11), or Ambā could plead with Bhīṣma to challenge Śālva to battle and force him to marry her, but Ambā says no. Maybe she even parts ways with her chaperones, because Ambā spends the night at an āśrama, surrounded by tāpasas.
Udyogaparvan 173.10: Ambā tells the tāpasas everything (sarvam) just as it had happened to her (yathā vṛttam ātmani), at length (vistareṇa) and without leaving out anything (nikhilena). That's a lot of listening to her!
Udyogaparvan 173.18: When Ambā wants to perform penance, the tāpasa Śaikhāvatya reassures her with examples (dṛṣṭānta), precedents (āgama), and reasons (hetu), pacifies her, and discusses with the other tāpasas whether to take her to her father or Bhīṣma or Śālva. They tell her, "Go to your father, he'll decide what to do next, and you'll live there comfortably; no other option is as correct as your father. A woman's options are her husband in smooth times or her father in rough times. If you live in the woods alone, royals will proposition you, so don't think like this!"
Ambā replies that she can't go back to the Kāśi city, where she'll be disrespected by her family. She insists on penance to prevent similar misfortune in her next lifetime.
Udyogaparvan 174.17-18: Ambā's maternal grandfather Hotravāhana Sṛñjaya listens to the story from the tāpasas, and stands up, trembling. He seats Ambā on his lap, reassures her, and asks her to tell him her misfortune completely (kārtsnyena) from the beginning (āditaḥ). She tells him just as it had happened (yathā vṛttam), at length (vistareṇa). Hotravāhana supports Ambā's decision not to go to her father, and he trembles as he tells her, "I'll cut out your pain, follow me, Rāma Jāmadagnya will kill Bhīṣma for you and put you on even ground again."
Then Akṛtavraṇa arrives. Hotravāhana tells him Ambā's story, and Ambā confirms it, adding, "I am not eager to return to my city, for fear of disrespect, and for shame, great hermit whose wealth is penance! Whatever Lord Rāma advises, most honest brāhmaṇa! that is my work above all work, so I think, Lord!"
Udyogaparvan 176.1-4: Akṛtavraṇa says, "You have two grievances, fair one (Bhadre)! For which one will you have revenge, powerless one (Abale)? My calf (Vatse)! Tell me that. If you want the lord of Saubha assigned to your will, fair one (Bhadre), the great-natured Rāma will assign him, desiring your welfare. Or, if you wish to see that river's son Bhīṣma defeated in battle by the wise Rāma, the descendant of Bhṛgu will do that too, after hearing Sṛñjaya's word and yours too, clean-smiling one (Śucismite)!"
So far, every one of these male strangers is being totally sympathetic to Ambā and respectful of her feelings. None of these pious men is treating her like property or a disgrace. They care about her as a person, not an unmarriageable problem. However, when Ambā admits that Bhīṣma wasn't aware of her love for Śālva when he abducted her, and asks Akṛtavraṇa to decide what is the right approach with either Bhīṣma or Śālva, the story takes a turn for the worse. Akṛtavraṇa says that Śālva would bow to Rāma's command and marry her, if Bhīṣma hadn't taken her to the elephant-synonym (Hāstinapura); after being won and taken by Bhīṣma, she is suspect for Śālva. Ambā agrees, saying that she wants to get Bhīṣma killed in battle, but Bhīṣma or Śālva or whomever Akṛtavraṇa blames for causing her pain, that one should be punished.
Udyogaparvan 176.32, 177.6-7: Rāma offers to order Bhīṣma to do the right thing. Rāma offers to assign Śālva to marry Ambā. Rāma does not want to fight, and offers to order Bhīṣma to apologize to Ambā. She declines; she only wants Bhīṣma killed. Akṛtavraṇa exhorts Rāma, and Rāma challenges Bhīṣma to take back Ambā or die.
The text describes Ambā as painfully lusty for Śālva (Anaṅga-śara-pīḍitā; Udyogaparvan 172.8). She had a chance to force him to marry her, after which she could have hoped to convince him to reciprocate her love. Śālva's unwillingness to accept a wife who had belonged to another man was only one idea of dharma. Other fictional examples and the available writings on dharma tell us that society didn't value a man's consent above other interests. When a woman asked a kṣatriya to make her his, he was honour-bound to do it. If an unfaithful wife came back home, her husband was duty-bound to maintain her. And if a husband didn't copulate with his wife when she bathed after her monthly period, that was considered tantamount to genocide.
If Ambā didn't want to force Śālva, and since Bhīṣma refused to marry her to Vicitravīrya, Ambā could have chosen any other kṣatriya who might value an alliance with Kāśi. Or, even if no one was willing to marry Ambā (as Rāma implies at Udyogaparvan 178.6 and Bhīṣma compares an infatuated woman to a snake at Udyogaparvan 178.21), both Bhīṣma and her father had an obligation to maintain her.
Śālva and Bhīṣma and Ambā were just not interested in "an actually productive solution."
Kyunki Saas Bhi Kabhi Bahu Thi 2
