Q for Queens in Mahabharata - Mahabharata Mashup

Namaste, 

For me, there’s no kingdom without a queen. Women had played varied roles over the years. Mahabharata has many queens, some known, some powerful, and some left unnamed. 

Here, I’ll mention three queens from three generations who set the stage for future events. Of course, queens like Satyavati (Bhishma’s stepmother), Rukmini (Krishna’s wife), Sudeshna (King Virata’s wife), Damayanti (King Nala’s wife), etc., also had important roles. Even Kunti (though she was technically not a queen for most of her life) contributed to the events. 

River Goddess Ganga 

As you read in the post about Ashta Vasus, Ganga was destined to give birth to the Vasus. For this, she had to marry King Shantanu (son of Pratipa) of the Kuru dynasty. 

Even before the Vasus were cursed, King Mahabhisa of the Ikshvaku race was cursed by Brahma for staring at Ganga doing an important ritual. The king was to be born as a human, and Ganga would help break the curse. Later, the Vasus requested her to give birth to them when they had to be born as humans. 

One day, when King Pratipa was doing tapasya at the banks of the Ganga, she went to sit on his right leg and asked him to marry her. The king said the right side was meant for daughters and daughter-in-law, so he would welcome her as his son’s wife and made a promise. Years later, his son Shantanu went to the river bank, saw Ganga standing there, and fell in love with her. She agreed to marry him only if he promised never to question her actions. He agreed. However, unable to see her drown their children, Shantanu questioned her. She revealed the truth and left with the eighth child (Bhishma). Once the child was trained and old enough, she handed him over to Shantanu as the heir to the throne. 

The kingdom of Hastinapura flourished with abundance and prosperity when Ganga was the queen and lived in the palace with Shantanu. And why not? She was the source of life, after all! 

Queen Gandhari 

Gandhari was the princess of Gandhara (present-day Afghanistan), the daughter of King Subala. Gandhari worshipped Shiva and got a boon that she would give birth to a hundred sons. When Bhishma got to know of this, he approached King Subala with a proposal to get Gandhari married to Dhritarastra. However, the king didn’t agree, as Dhrtarastra was blind. Bhishma won him over with persistence. When Gandhari heard of this, she showed her acceptance by wrapping a silk cloth over her eyes. She said she didn’t wish to see his lack of sight and would continue to keep the blindfold until her last breath.  

Gandhari was shown as a regular flawed human in Mahabharata. Be it her jealousy when Kunti delivered a child or her desire to protect her son Dhuryodhana despite knowing his flaws. In Udyoga Parva, Gandhari was also asked to come to the Sabha to convince Dhuryodhana to make peace with the Pandavas. Her words were quite ruthless compared to Dhritarastra, who loved his sons a little too much (and was already jealous of the Pandavas). She straight out told Dhuryodhana that he was wicked and would remember their warnings when he faced death in the form of Bhima. She added that she could see it was too late to change his mind. 

While Gandhari’s role as a queen is not explored, she does come into the limelight with her curse on Krishna. The Curse of Gandhari by Aditi Banerjee presents the epic from her POV. (I haven’t read the book, but know Aditi is a dharmic person)

Empress Drapuadi 

Draupadi is the princess of Panchala, the daughter of King Draupada, and the wife of the five Pandava brothers. Draupadi was born from the yagna fire and is known as Yagnaseni. She wasn’t born as a child but as a teenager, along with her brother Dhrstadyumna, who came out of the yagna fire wearing armor and holding a sword. 

Draupadi was the queen of Indraprastha and became an empress when Yudhistira completed the Rajasuya. However, she had to spend the next thirteen years of her life in exile when Yudhistira lost the game of dice to Shakuni. After the war, Draupadi became the queen of Hastinapura and ruled the kingdom for 36 years. 

In Aranyaka Parva, Draupadi and Satyabhama had a conversation in the forest. Krishna and Satyabhama went to visit the Pandavas to offer support. Draupadi spoke about her role as a wife, daughter-in-law, and queen. We learn she was right in the middle of things and had complete control over the administration and finances. 

To quote Draupadi, “It was I who listened to complaints and laid down rules to be observed. I knew the entire palace system, from the maidservants and other palace workers to the palace cowherds and shepherds. I was the one, not the Pandavas, who knew the details of income and expenditure; I alone knew their total revenue. My husbands went about their various pursuits, and I managed their treasury, as inexhaustible as Varuna’s ocean.”

Draupadi was capable, confident, and assertive. Unlike the modern retellings, she wasn’t presented as an arrogant woman but an assertive one who spoke her mind when the need arose. She wasn’t proud of her beauty either. Her beauty was only a part of her but didn’t represent her entire personality. In a way, some feminist retellings have done more disservice to Draupadi than elevate her. 

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The AI images are made on Bing.