The Uncrowned Son

“Devavrata!”

His tired eyes opened slowly. Normally, he would have just pretended to be asleep or unconscious. But he knew this voice. The only voice that called him by that name anymore. He wondered if he had imagined the voice in his desperation to talk to her. He wanted to think so. As much as he wanted to talk to her, he wished she were not here now.

“Devavrata!”

No. It was not his imagination. She was heading this way. His heart cried out loud. He could handle the pain that was flowing all through his body, but not this. She should not see him in this condition. She may not take it. Ah! Delusions. Mere delusions. He had no idea what was in store.

He tilted his neck painfully in the direction of the voice. A cloud of mist was taking shape as she floated on it towards him. Here was the mother of all rivers, the mother who washed all life forms of their sins. And, his mother too.

“What are you doing here, Devavrata?” she asked quite indignantly.

“Mathey!” he addressed her as he had always done.

“Is this what has become of the mighty warrior, the undefeated bulwark that was supposed to protect Hastinapur?”

He lowered his eyes in shame. Of course. Indifferent as always. There had been times when he had wondered if she was really the one who had given birth to him. But then, she had also wanted to drown him the minute he left her womb. What mother would do that, Karmic calculations be damned? But she had done that. Not once. Not twice. Seven times. He was to have been the eighth.

He wondered if it would have been better to have just gone then? Out of this miserable world back to where he belonged. He was after all, Prabhas, the light of shining dawn. One of the eight Vasus, the elemental gods. Driven by a moment’s greed he had stolen Vashishta’s cow and had been cursed to be born on Earth. The Vasus had entrusted Ganga with the task of giving them birth and quickly ending their mortal lives so they could avoid the misery of mortal living and go back to their world.

But Prabhas had not been so fortunate. His father had stopped Ganga from what he saw as paedocide. And Ganga had taken her eighth child with her. Prabhas had become Devavrata. His mother had taken him to the Preceptors of the Devas and Asuras who taught him the science of politics. In a rare exception, Parasurama had taught a Kshatriya the martial arts. A childhood unparalleled, thought Devavrata.

“But all of that for what?” Ganga interrupted his thoughts. “So you could just throw away what was rightfully yours?”

“Mathey?” Devavrata did not understand her anger. He knew that she had never been the loving mother. She was always the stolid, stoic guardian who wanted him to learn everything that was required for kingship. Hastinapur needed a successor. Pratipa had tweaked the tradition established by the revered Bharata. Instead of choosing the one most worthy as the next ruler, Pratipa had declared that his son Shantanu was the most worthy one. The best way to restore the old tradition without discrediting Shantanu would have been to make his son truly the most worthy one. And Ganga had seen to that. When Devavrata had finished his education, she handed him over to Shantanu informing him that there was none more qualified than Devavrata to become king. He had equal panache for governance and warfare. Hastinapur will remember him as the greatest ruler it had, she told Shantanu.

 Devavrata now remembered that she had not shed a single tear when she parted that day. Despite her cold demeanor, she had been the only family he had had and now she was gone. All through his life, in moments of sadness and anguish, he would go by the riverside and let her waters calm him. He still considered it a soothing experience.

“I wanted this city to realize its true greatness under your rule. I did not want my tardiness in drowning you to lead to your suffering. I ensured that you got the best of education. With your pedigree, you could have had such an exalted life.”

“But did he not?” he asked himself. Did the world not know him to be the finest warrior?  Did the Gods not bless him? Did they not give him the epithet of Bheeshma, the one of terrible vows? Did he not protect the throne of Hastinapur as was his sworn duty? Even when it seemed that the kingdom had no king, did the wolves not stay at bay, because his bow was still strung? Did he not take care of generations of the Kuru household?

“Yes. All that and much more. But you’ve also brought that household to the bloodiest war this country has known. You have led the house to be divided against itself and are responsible for this gory fratricide.”

“Mathey! But I tried everything I could to prevent this!”

“Oh! Don’t give me that. May be your paean writers can gulp that down. Not me. I know the numerous ways in which you have failed this kingdom and its people, Devavrata. When you gave up your inheritance to the throne, not only did you make your father happy, but you also threw away all the efforts I had made, as your mother, to educate you. Of what use was all that training when you were nothing but a caretaker?”

“Did I not have a duty to my father? Do the scriptures not say that? Did my guru Parashurama not do exactly that?”

“Parashurama is a Brahmin. His primary duty is to his household, unlike yours. Your duty was to protect the kingdom and its people, in which you have obviously failed. Just look around you. Does this place look like a kingdom well governed?”

“But I took a vow to serve anyone who sits on the throne after my father. I have merely been true to my word, Mathey!”

“Wasn’t it also part of the vow to ensure the right person sat on the throne?”

“Yes. And I have seen to it that the eldest and most eligible member of the Kuru clan has always occupied the throne. And I have been faithful to that throne.”

“No, you haven’t. If bloodline is the only thing that is important, you know that you’re the last surviving member of the Kuru bloodline. Pandu and Dhritarashtra carry Satyavati’s bloodline through Vyasa, not Kuru’s. But that is irrelevant. Your illustrious ancestor, Bharata, declared that bloodline was of no importance. He did not crown any of his nine sons as he believed that they were not eligible to rule. He considered it a crime against his people if he foisted on them a ruler merely based on lineage. But you, Devavrata, have failed him too. What if your father’s sons died without an heir? Even despite your pompous promise to not ascend the throne, Hastinapur was not devoid of brave, wise men who could have become rulers. Your duty as a caretaker to the throne would have been to advise anyone who was king, not to ensure that a particular family continued to rule.”

“But I made a promise to that fisherman, Satyavati’s father that her family would rule. How could I not keep my word?”

“Did you not make a promise to the people of Hastinapur that you would protect their interests? What is a promise to one man worth, if you reneged on a promise made to the entire rajya? You may have done the right thing by stopping the blind Dhritarashtra from becoming king. But what of Pandu? Did you not know that he was weak of heart and would never survive long enough? Why did you reject the wise Vidura? Because he was born to a maid? Well, Devavrata, Bharata would hang his head in shame if he was there. He crowned a commoner as his successor for the simple reason that the boy was brave and righteous. And did you think that the kingdom would praise you as the true successor to the noble Bharata? Ah! What vanity, Devavrata!”

At this, Devavrata said nothing. He knew what she said was right. He had been too loyal to the family and forgotten about the welfare of the state. He hung his head in shame.

 

But Ganga had no intention to stop. “What happened to your sense of duty when the kingdom was divided into two between brothers? Where were you when a ruler was gambling away his kingdom and people as if they were all his?  Should you not have intervened and said that as a ruler, Yudhishtra was the protector of his people and not the owner? Ignore the fact that Draupadi was the kula vadhu. Consider her to be an ordinary citizen. Where was your duty to Hastinapur when she was harassed in the open court? And what if she was gambled away by her husband? Were you not obliged as the protector to the throne to prevent its reputation from being tainted? And here. This war. Would Duryodhana have had the heart to fight it if you had decided that the best interests of the rajya lay in Yudhishtira becoming the ruler? And what did you do? Make another pompous oath. That you will kill ten thousand soldiers a day but will not kill the Pandavas. What kind of loyalty is that? No, Devavrata. Look around you. This war won’t last long. I don’t have to tell you how it is going to end. You know it by now. You have been disloyal to everyone. You have been disloyal to Dhritarashtra by not stopping his son from this war. You have been disloyal to Duryodhana in revealing to the Pandavas the means to defeat you.  And most of all, you have been disloyal to the people of this great rajya. How many of them have fallen on this battlefield? Hear, Devavrata. Hear. Hear the voices that cry out in pain as vultures and hyenas strip the living flesh from their dying bodies. Hear the earth grumble like a hungry stomach as it digests the sins of those that have fallen. And even before this stops, Devavrata, you will hear the wails of the womensfolk from the city. It will no longer be Hastinapur, Devavrata. The city of elephants is dead. It is merely the city of the widows and the orphaned. The happiness you brought your father and the blessings he gave you may very well take you back home to the Vasus. But remember, Devavrata. You will not be forgiven. Do not think that your deeds will bring you respect and glory. If you wish to use the remainder of your miserable life to atone for your sins, I suggest you start now.”

Saying thus, she seemingly disappeared in the shadows of the night. Devavrata could not close his eyes. He could hear the cries of fallen soldiers, at least ten thousand fallen at his own hands. He had indeed failed them. He thought he saw the moon and the stars hide themselves behind the clouds. They did not want to taint themselves by seeing him. The soil was considering continuing its support to him. To him, it seemed that even the arrows that passed through his body were trying hard to extricate themselves from him. And for the first time in his long life, Devavrata, Bheeshma of the terrible vows, cried.