Characters/Persons from Mahabharata - Part 10

Characters/Persons from Mahabharata

The story of Gandhari
Characters/Persons from Mahabharata

Gandharī is a character in the Hindu epic, the Mahabharata. In the epic, she was the daughter of Subala, the king of Gandhara, a region spanning northwestern Pakistan and eastern Afghanistan, from which her name is derived. Gandhari's marriage was arranged to Dhritarashtra, the eldest prince of the Kuru kingdom.
Gandhari voluntarily blindfolded herself throughout her married life. Her husband Dhritarashtra was born blind, and on meeting him and realizing this, she decided to deny herself the pleasure of sight that her husband could never relish.
Gandhari bore a hundred sons, (collectively known as the Kauravas), and one daughter Dushala who married Jayadratha. The Kaurava, principally Duryodhana and Dushasana, were the villains of the Mahābhārata, and were all killed in their war against their cousins, the Pandava, at Kurukshetra.
Although Gandhari's sons were portrayed as villains, the Mahābhārata attributes high moral standards to Gandhari. She repeatedly exhorted her sons to follow dharma and make peace with the Pandavas. Gandhari was especially close to Kunti who respected her like an elder sister.
Gandhari made a single exception to her blindfolded state, when she removed her blindfold to see Duryodhana rendering his entire body except his loins invulnerable to any foe. This was however to prove fruitless as Bhima smashed Duryodhana's thighs in their decisive encounter on the eighteenth day of the Kurukshetra battle, a move both literally and figuratively below the belt.
Gandhari was also devout; in particular an ardent worshipper of Lord Shiva. Gandhari's sacrifice of her eyesight and her austere life was to grant her great spiritual power. Gandhari's anguish in the loss of her hundred sons resulted in her cursing Krishna in effect ensuring the destruction of the Yadavas. It is also said that through a small gap in the napkin in which her eyes were blindfolded, her gaze fell on Yudhisthira's toe. The toe was charred black due to her wrath and power. Gandhari ended her life with her husband and her sister-in-law Kunti in the Himalayas, where they died in a forest fire.

The story of Ghatotkacha
Characters/Persons from Mahabharata

Ghatotkacha (Sanskrit घटोत्कच), as per the Mahābhārata epic, was the son of Bhima and Hidimbi (Hidimbaa, classically). His maternal parentage made him half-Rakshasa, and gave him many magical powers that made him an important fighter in the Kurukshetra war, the climax of the epic. He got his name from his head, which was shaped like a pot (in Sanskrit, Ghatam means pot and "Utkach" means head.
Ghatotkacha, when he was young, lived with his mother Hidimbaa, when one day he had a fight with Abhimanyu, his cousin, without knowing that Abhimanyu was Arjuna's son.[2] The telugu movie Mayabazar is based upon this fight and Ghatotkacha's subsequent help to Abhimanyu in winning the hand of Balarama's daughter, Sasirekha.
Ghatotkacha is considered to be a loyal and humble figure. He made himself and his followers available to his father Bhima at any time; all Bhima had to do was to think of him and he would appear. Like his father, Ghatotkacha primarily fought with the mace.
His wife was Ahilawati and his son was Barbarika.
In the Mahābhārata, Ghatotkacha was summoned by Bhima to fight on the Pandava side in the Kurukshetra battle. Invoking his magical powers, he wrought great havoc in the Kaurava army. In particular after the death of Jayadratha, when the battle continued on past sunset, his powers were at their most effective (at night).
At this point in the battle, the Kaurava leader Duryodhana appealed to his best fighter, Karna, to kill Ghatotkacha as the whole Kaurava army was coming close to annihilation due to his ceaseless strikes from the air. Karna possessed a divine weapon, or shakti, granted by the god Indra. It could be used only once, and Karna had been saving it to use on his arch-enemy, the best Pandava fighter, Arjuna.
Loyal Karna, unable to refuse the request of Duryodhana whose cause he had pledged himself to serve, hurled the missile at Ghatotkacha, killing him. This is considered to be the turning point of the war. After his death, the Pandava counselor Krishna smiled, as he considered the war to have been won for the Pandavas now that Karna no longer had a divine weapon to use in fighting Arjuna.