That late spring afternoon, Draupadi stood near a high window in her guest room, combing her long silken hair, from which emanated the fragrance of musk. Outside, in the middle of a luscious lawn, a fountain jetted out spurts of water.
Now happy and relaxed, she had almost forgotten that she was away from her own palace in Indraprastha. Suddenly, she was jolted out of her musings by a knock at the door. She turned around to see a female attendant walking in.
‘King Duryodhana’s charioteer, Prathikami, wishes to see you, O Queen,’ she said.
Quickly arranging her hair in a bun at the back of her neck, Draupadi asked the servant to let him in.
Prathikami bowed to her respectfully, and then said, ‘I carry a message for you, O Queen.’
‘First, tell me how did the game go this morning?’ she asked.
‘Not too well for King Yudhishthira,’ he replied with a sorrowful expression on his face. ‘He has lost everything to my master – his jewels, his elephants and horses, Indraprastha his brothers and himself.’
‘Incredible! Are you out of your mind?’
‘This is the truth O Queen. I saw and heard it all,’ Prathikami responded. ‘King Yudhishthira played recklessly.’
‘I don’t believe this at all,’ Draupadi muttered, but her face had turned pallid. ‘What is your master’s message for me?’
‘He has summoned you to the assembly hall, since King Yudhishthira wagered you too – and lost.’
‘Oh God!’ Draupadi cried out, covering her face with both hands. She felt as if the earth had given way under her feet. She slumped into a chair and then asked, ‘Tell me, did my husband lose himself before wagering me?’
‘Yes, you were his last bet,’ he said. ‘I imagine he had lost all control over himself.’
‘But how could he stake me after he had lost himself to Duryodhana?’
‘I am nobody to understand all this. I am just a charioteer who has been ordered to fetch you,’ said Prathikami.
‘Then tell your master that since my husband was not a free man when he staked me, I am not willing to go.’
But after the messenger left the room, Draupadi broke down in tears and began to cry like a child. She felt as if the world had ended for her. Who could she turn to when her own husband had used her in a bet?
When Prathikami reported to Duryodhana how Draupadi had refused to come, saying that wagering her was illegal, Duryodhana flew into a rage. ‘That arrogant woman – I will bring her down to her knees,’ he shouted.
Although everybody else sat mute and confused, Vidura stood up for Draupadi.‘O Elders,’ he said. ‘Draupadi has raised an important legal issue, which deserves careful deliberation. The crux of the matter is that Yudhishthira was not a free man when he wagered her. So she has not been lost in this game. I also feel that the Kauravas have betrayed their glorious heritage.’
‘This is not the time and place, O Vidura, to preach to us,’ said Duryodhana. ‘You seem to brandish your wisdom like a sword all the time.’
Then he turned to his brother Duhsasana and said, ‘I know you will not return empty-handed. Go and fetch that woman here at once. If she resists this time, drag her here by the hair. A slave must obey her master’s orders.’
Excited over this assignment, Duhsasana said arrogantly, ‘That woman needs to be broken into obedience.’ And he strutted out as if he were being sent to vanquish some insurgent ruler.
There was no knocking at the door this time. Duhsasana flung open the front door and strode inside.
‘O Draupadi, will you come with me voluntarily or would you like to be dragged by your hair all the way to the assembly hall?’
Draupadi felt like a hunted fawn. She was devastated. Tearfully, she now begged to be spared.
‘O Duhsasana, aren’t you my brother-in-law? Take pity on a helpless woman like me. I appeal to your sense of chivalry.’
But he just glowered at her. ‘I am not here to listen to your pleading. Come with me straightaway and beg for mercy from my brother in the open assembly. Now, will you come or…’
When Draupadi still tried to hold herself back, he pounced upon her like a wild beast, seized her by the hair and began to drag her all the way to the assembly hall, as if she were a sack of rice. All the attendants standing around were shocked at this man behaving like a rakshasa.
‘Here is the empress of Indraprastha,’ said Duhsasana tauntingly as he pushed her before the gathering.
Though humiliated, Draupadi mustered up enough courage to address all the elders, with embers of anger smouldering in her eyes.
‘O you custodians of dharma, why have you gone mute? Think of your mothers who suckled you, your daughters and sisters who look up to you for protection, and then decide if what these monsters are doing to me is justifiable. Or is it that all of Bharatavarsha has fallen under a curse and is now doomed to disaster? A nation that does not honour its women is destined to extinction. I can imagine how my husband must have been cheated at the game of dice, otherwise he could not have lost all the rounds. Have you all blindfolded your eyes? It seems that King Dhritarashtra is not the only blind man in Hastinapur because all of you have also blinded yourselves to honour, chivalry and truth.’
So anguished and heart-rending was her outburst that Bheema jumped up and asked Sahadeva to bring him a taper so that he could set the entire palace ablaze. But Arjuna held him back, saying that they were now bound by their brother’s pledge.
Suddenly, everyone was taken by surprise when Vikarna, one of Duryodhana’s brothers, stood up and started speaking. ‘I must share the blame for the humiliation that my family has inflicted upon this lady. Why have we abandoned the Kshatriya dharma to protect and respect our women? I may be a mere youngster, but I do understand that Yudhishthira was not a free man when he wagered his wife. Also, he was only one of her five husbands. Shouldn’t he have sought his brothers’ consent before wagering her? And what right had Sakuni to propose her as a stake? It is always up to the player himself to choose his bet. The whole operation, therefore, smacks of some grievous wrongdoing.’
As Vikarna finished speaking, he was greeted with applause by some for his forthrightness.
But Radheya rose and shouted him down, saying that he had betrayed his own family.
‘I am surprised to see a mere youngster opening his mouth too wide in the presence of his elders. Since he has talked too much, let me now ask you all if anyone forced Yudhishthira into the game of dice. Also, wasn’t it his own choosing to move from one stake to another? He could have surely stopped in the middle of the game to end it. But he played on, as if he were possessed by some spirit.’
Some people in the audience now nodded their approval of what Radheya had just said.
Impervious to Vidura and Vikarna’s pleadings, Duryodhana decided to avenge himself for Draupadi’s taunt in the Indraprastha palace.
So he asked Duhsasana to strip Draupadi in the open assembly. As Duhsasana stepped forward to seize her saree, she cried hysterically: ‘O Krishna, where are you?’
‘O Duhsasana,’ roared Bheema, ‘I will wait for the day when I’d suck the blood from your chest after tearing it apart. Take it as my vow, O rakshasa. There will be no rest for me till I plunge my sword into your heart and see you gasping for your last breath.’
But Duhsasana brushed aside this threat and started to disrobe Draupadi.
Then a miracle took place, stunning the entire assembly.
As Duhsasana pulled at Draupadi’s saree, it was immediately replaced by another length of the same cloth, as if some invisible divine hand were supplying inexhaustible lengths of the same saree. This continued so long that Duhsasana was utterly exhausted and he slumped on the floor.
Everyone in the gathering was shocked and speechless. Expressions of relief now appeared on the faces of Vidura, Bheeshma, Drona and Kripacharya. As for the Pandavas, they raised their hands to the sky as a gesture of thanksgiving.
‘There is, indeed, justice up in Heaven,’ said Yudhishthira to himself.
During the entire happening, everyone had remained mystified over Dhritarashtra’s silence. There were, of course, moments when he seemed to strain his blind eyes as if to see what was going on around him. It was obvious that he was in a state of great mental turmoil. Suddenly, he raised his right hand as if to attract everybody’s attention. Then he spoke: ‘I have heard it all, though I could not see anything. But in my mind’s eye, horrible imaginings have been tormenting me all this time. Now I feel that I can see light at the end of a long, dark tunnel. It is now time for me to speak. Let me first ask my child, Draupadi, to forgive my erring sons, Duryodhana and Duhsasana. Grave sins they have committed, for which I should hold myself responsible as well. But life is too short to let hostilities linger on. Nobody would be happier than myself to see Hastinapur and Indraprastha come together in love and friendship. Before I finally close my eyes, I wish to see peace reigning all over Bharatavarsha.
‘And now, I wish to make an important announcement. I hereby proclaim that all of Pandavas’ losses be restored to them immediately – their wealth, their elephants and horses – and their freedom. I would also like my child Yudhishthira to return to Indraprastha and rule over his kingdom in full glory.’
As he finished speaking, the entire gathering broke into spontaneous applause. Was it another miracle, someone said from the audience. As for the Pandavas, who now rose from slavery to freedom, it was a strange turn of events. But would Duryodhana still mend his ways, Yudhishthira wondered.
Yudhishthira touched King Dhritarashtra’s feet and then led Draupadi and his brothers out of the assembly hall.
But just as they stepped out of the hall, Draupadi, still aflame with intense wrath, turned to Bheema. ‘Since you were the only one who dared speak out for me, let me also say that I have taken a pledge. I vow that till you bring me a palmful of Duhsasana’s blood to apply to my hair, I will let it hang loose – undone.’
‘I assure you, O Draupadi,’ responded Bheema, ‘that I won’t let you down. Just pray for that moment…’
As for Duryodhana, he immediately began consultations with Sakuni, Duhsasana and Radheya. They took the king’s proclamations as a lapse in his sanity. They felt greatly frustrated to see that in one stroke, he had made them surrender all that they had acquired through manipulation and cunning. But Sakuni did not feel entirely defeated. He cited sage Brihaspati, who believed that no means should be considered evil in achieving one’s goal, for foul was fair in every battle to be won in life.
He then advised Duryodhana to seek his father’s approval for another game of dice, which would be only a ‘friendly’ sport, with no stakes. He believed that being a compulsive dice player and a true Kshatriya, Yudhishthira would again fall for the game.
So hardly had the Pandavas arrived in Indraprastha when a messenger brought Yudhishthira an invitation from Duryodhana for another round of dice – with no stakes this time. Gullible that he was, Yudhishthira took it as an invitation to a genuine friendly game. In spite of stiff opposition from Draupadi and his brothers, he agreed to return to Hastinapur.
Before they sat down to play, Duryodhana said to Yudhishthira, ‘Dear cousin, as you already know, there will be no stakes this time. We will play for just fun.’ He paused. ‘However, let us come to an understanding between us that whoever loses, he would go into exile for thirteen years, with the last year to be lived incognito. If the loser is discovered during the thirteenth year, he would have to undergo another cycle for the entire period. Well, there should be nothing to worry because I could be a loser this time – in which case, I would cheerfully go into exile.’
Without understanding his cousin’s evil intention, Yudhishthira nodded his consent and the game began.
Sakuni again held the dice in his right hand and muttered some incomprehensible words. Although he had already manipulated the dice, he wanted the Pandavas to carry the impression that everything depended upon how the dice turned.
Then, looking all around, he let the dice roll out on the chauser cloth. The dice tilted to one side, then another, before coming to rest at a six.
‘We have won!’ shouted Sakuni gleefully. Duryodhana jumped up to embrace his uncle, saying ‘You have done it again.’ In one stroke, Duryodhana had not only grabbed Indraprastha but had also reduced the Pandavas to the state of refugees. Since his ever-vigilant spies, he knew, would certainly be able to locate them during the thirteenth year, they would be bound to another full cycle of exile.