Poll
Gandhari's act of blindfolding her own eyes symbolizes.....
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When after the match at dice the tresses of Draupadi were seized, I uttered certain words in rage. Those words are still in my remembrance, I would, for all years to come, have been regarded to have swerved from the duties of a Kshatriya if I had left that vow unaccomplished. It was for this, O queen, that I did that act. It behoveth thee not, O Gandhari, to impute any fault to me. Without having restrained thy sons in former days, doth it behove thee to impute any fault to our innocent selves?
"The holy one said, Arise, arise, O Gandhari, do not set thy heart on grief! Through thy fault, this vast carnage has taken place! Thy son Duryodhana was wicked-souled, envious, and exceedingly arrogant. Applauding his wicked acts, thou regardest them to be good. Exceedingly cruel, he was the embodiment of hostilities, and disobedient to the injunctions of the old. Why dost thou wish to ascribe thy own faults to me? Dead or lost, the person that grieves for what has already occurred, obtaineth more grief. By indulging in grief, one increases it two-fold. A woman of the regenerate class bears children for the practice of austerities; the cow brings forth offspring for bearing burdens; the mare brings forth her young for acquiring speed of motion; the Shudra woman bears a child for adding to the number of servitors; the Vaishya woman for adding to the number of keepers of cattle. A princess, however, like thee, brings forth sons for being slaughtered!"
Originally posted by: varaaliI think, it was Gandhari's way of protesting against her father for meekly accepting Bhishma's proposal to wed her to the blind Dritarashtra.
Probably she did not have any issues with his blindness, but the fact that her sons could never be kings of a kingdom must have made feel let down. It is possible that she could have felt that had she been given in marriage to the crown prince of another smaller kingdom, she wold have stood a very good chance of becoming a queen and a queen mother thereafter.
Originally posted by: .Vrish.In the Savitri-Satyavan's story, if one recalls, Satyavan's father was blind, but I don't recall his mother blindfolding herself out of respect to him. I know she probably didn't come anywhere near Savitri in terms of loyalty to husband, but had that been a standard, she'd have definitely followed it.
No, I think that the colloquial image of Gandhari's blindfold symbolizing her turning a blind eye to the misdeeds of her sons was symbolic enough.
Originally posted by: JanakiRaghunathI also feel it was unmindfulness. No where in the scriptures does is say that if a husband is blind, the wife should make herself blind too. 😕 In fact, the scriptures say that a wife should lead her husband on the path of good and guide him when he is in trouble. Dhritarastra clearly could not rule the Kingdom well being blind, so Gandhari would have been a more faithful wife had she helped him rule the kingdom through her sight. So many things could have been prevented had she kept her sight.
Faithfulness could have been a factor in Gandhari blinding herself, but I also think it was a form of revenge against Bhishma and her father. She might not have wanted to marry a blind Dhritarastra who was then not King, so by blinding herself, she refused to see the husband she was forced to spend the rest of her life with.
Originally posted by: Cool-n-FreshCase 1 : Husband is on the wrong path.Wife follows him whatever be the situation.Case 2 : Husband is on the wrong path wife corrects him and directs him into the right path.Who is to be termed as 'Faithful' from the above 2 cases?
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