Karna, a hero/anti-hero or a glorified villain??? : Part-1

Preface

In the current times, Karna is regarded as a tragic hero, anti-hero and in some cases, even a hero. He is considered to be an invincible warrior and it is believed that only because of tricks played by various people and the rules of society, he didn’t get a chance to fight other mighty warriors. In my task of reading Mahabharat, a sub-task is to focus on Karna’s deeds and this article is an attempt in that direction.

Karna in आदिपर्व & सभापर्व:

• To fulfill Drona‘s wish, Kauravas launched an armed assault on Panchal. In a duel between Drupad and Karna, the latter was severely wounded and fled the battlefield. It should be noted that soon Duryodhan was also defeated and he too, fled the battlefield.
• Karna was an active participant in the ‘Lakshagriha‘ conspiracy. He was aware that Kunti was also going to accompany Pandavas. Note that Karna was unaware that Kunti was his biological mother.
• Arjun won the competition in Draupadi‘s ‘swayamavar'(स्वयंवर), in disguise of a ‘Brahman'(ब्राह्मण). When Drupad announced the marriage, some of the kings lost their temper because a ‘Kshatriya'(क्षत्रिय) beauty was going to be married to a ‘Brahman’. They took up arms to kill Bhimsen and Arjun(the other Pandavas slipped away to avoid detection). Karna was one of such kings who assaulted Arjun and Bhimsen. He couldn’t recognize Arjun but impressed by his might. Arjun(disguised as a Brahman) advised him to fight but Karna said that he is impressed by ‘Brahma Tej’ that the Brahman(Arjun) was exhibiting and he left the duel. The point to be noted is that Karna abetted the Kshatriyas who, despite of losing the competition and instead of showing sportsman spirit, took up arms against just two individuals.
• Pandavas survived ‘Lakshagriha’, won the ‘swayamvar’ competition and were guests in Panchal. In Hastinapur, Bhishma suggested Dhristarashtra to partition Kuru kingdom so that Duryodhan and Yudhisthir can be independent kings. Drona seconded Bhishma’s opinion. Their objective was to avoid a war between Kauravas and Pandavas. Karna criticized this policy and encouraged Dhritarashtra to not give anything to Pandavas. This angered Drona who blasted Karna for giving an advice detrimental to the interests of both Hastinapur and his friend, Duryodhan.
• After Pandavas lost the game of dice, Dushasan dragged Draupadi to the court, holding her long hair. She was menstruating(रजस्वला).
  • When Dushasan mocked her as ‘daasi'(दासी: female slave), Karna became hysteric and congratulated Dushasan for his deed.
  • When no one in the court answered Draupadi’s questions regarding the validity of Yudhisthir’s betting Draupadi, Vikarna expressed his disapproval of that betting. This agitated Karna who mocked Vikarna as ‘an old man’ and criticized him for trying to reverse the gains of Duryodhan.
  • In addition to mocking Vikarna, Karna openly referred to Draupadi as ‘ वैश्या ‘(whore) and claimed that it’s immaterial if she is wearing a single cloth or is naked, it is all right to drag a whore and slave.
  • It was Karna who ordered Dushasan to strip both Draupadi and the Pandavas. Later, when Yudhishthir didn’t answer Draupadi’s question even on Duryodhan’s insistence, he(Duryodhan) exposed his left thigh to Draupadi.
  • Karna encouraged Dushasan to drag Draupadi to his(Dushasan’s) harem and put her with the ‘daasis'(female slaves).
  • Karna deliberated that since Pandavas were slaves of Kauravas, Draupadi was ‘owned’ by Kauravas, hence, she should follow the orders of Duryodhan and his family.
• When Dhritarashtra nullified the outcomes of the game of dice and returned Pandavas everything they had lost, Karna, Shakuni, Duryodhan and Dushasan chalked a new conspiracy – replaying the game of dice.
• When Pandavas left for a 13-year exile, Karna(as per Dhritarashtra, this was Karna’s idea. Even if it was Duryodhan’s idea, undoubtedly, Karna and Shakuni were involved as Duryodhan lacked the skills to execute plans.) and Duryodhan started to chalk a plan to eliminate them but Vyas figured out this(how?Spies, may be!), walked straight to Duryodhan and not only condemned him but warned him of the dire consequences.

Open Questions:

• Which version of Mahabharat says that Karna succeeded in even lifting the bow, tying the bowstring and fixing an arrow? As per the book that I have mentioned:
  “कर्णके द्वारा प्रत्यंचा और बाण चढ़ानेकी बात दाक्षिणात्य पाठमें कहीं नहीं है। भण्डारकरकी प्रतिमें भी मुख्य पाठमें यह वर्णन नहीं है। नीलकण्ठी पाठमें भी इससे पूर्व श्लोक १५में तथा उत्तर अ० १८७ श्लोक ४ एवं १९में भी ऐसा ही उल्लेख है कि कर्ण धनुषपर प्रत्यंचा और बाण नहीं चढ़ा सका था|“
• What stopped Karna(who was an independent king) from challenging Arjun for a duel? Why did he wait all the way till Kurukshetra war for a duel with Arjun?
• When the quartet(Duryodhan, Karna, Shakuni and Dushasan) went to Dhritarashtra with the scheme of replaying the game of dice, the latter was alarmed at this replay idea but Duryodhan insisted. He said that there is no archer better than Arjun and it would be a suicide to let the wounded Pandavas go back to their kingdom. So, didn’t he trust Karna’s skills?

Disclaimer:

1. I am interested in factual history, rather than novels or fictional depictions of historical entities and with this hat on, I have started to read Mahabharat.
2. My primary goal is to slice-and-dice the epic on several parameters – it’s characters, geographical listings, specific events e.g. boons and curses, facts lesser-known to the masses(that includes me), and so on.
3. I have tried to reproduce the facts as mentioned in the original epic, in other words, AS-IS. I have also tried my best to avoid expressing my own guesswork & opinions but wherever I couldn’t avoid, I have marked the text in grey.
4. Related to point 3. – I have refrained from commenting/skipping/justifying/opposing facts that seem unrealistic, unscientific, improbable, etc.
5. Errors in translation, interpretation of metaphors, geographical entities might have crept in. Constructive corrections are welcome.
6. The posts should be read and interpreted with the above points in mind, otherwise, I have no intentions and capabilities to evaluate or criticize a timeless legend like Mahabharat and it’s characters.
7. As an epic, I doubt there would be any Indian who is unaware of Mahabharat and I belong to that humongous population. My intention was/is to gain, at least a brief, understanding of the political and social events during that era. I wish to learn about the simultaneous and sequential events that occurred in the then known geographical areas.
8. I am completely aware of the rule of reading History – one should not judge the past based on the present standards, paradigms and situations.
9. I dislike the English language’s norm of appending ‘a’ to Indian epic names(Rama, Ravana, Ganesha, Shiva, etc.), hence, as far as possible, I have deliberately avoided the English language interpretation of ‘schwa‘. This is not always possible though e.g: ‘Kaurav’ and ‘Pandav’ are terms that designate lineage, not a number. So, plural reference, it is necessary to use ‘Kauravas’ and ‘Pandavas’. Another deviation from English language rules is spelling words as per their phonetic sound in Hindi e.g: ‘यज्ञ’ has been written as ‘yagya’ and not ‘yajna’.
10. The readers can be of diverse backgrounds, especially, in terms of their knowledge about Mahabharat. My posts are written based on my ( limited)knowledge of facts, which may differ from the readers. Constructive feedback is welcome. For discussions, please drop a personal message.