#about being insane about the Mahabharat again

[incorrectmahabharatquotes]

Recently I saw this post by @god-has-adhd (I'm not reblogging it because I saw the people they tagged and realised very quickly that it's quite likely that us reblogging the post will be unwelcome, to put it mildly. I'm tagging the OP here anyway since it's a direct response to the post and it seemed only fair to engage in the conversation. I hope they don't mind.) OP urged everyone to watch the video regardless of the political leaning so in the spirit of giving everything a fair shot, we watched it. 'We' here refers to both me and Mod G. There are things we agree on with the guy speaking in the video and there are things we disagree with/think he didn't properly research. However, there is one thing that's most relevant to this blog and to me, personally so I'll be talking primarily about it. This is your long post warning, I'm afraid.

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"The Real Story of Eklavya"

The context for people who haven't watched the video is that the guy brings up two stories, one of Satyakama Jabali from the Upanishads and that of Eklavya from the Mahabharata. He brings up both these stories in the context of caste, he helpfully titles it and everything.

What I found interesting is that he frames himself talking about the story with the words "The real story of Eklavya". If you know even the basics of storytelling or filmmaking, you know that this is quite important. This implies that you, the viewer, do not know the real story and the one you know is either incomplete or false.

He begins, in a memorable instance, by asking ChatGPT for a summary to grasp the popular interpretation of the story of Eklavya and Drona. I have THOUGHTS about using a machine learning tool that is trained on data that is infamously biased and lacking when it comes to anything that isn't American, but that would be digressing from the point. ChatGPT provides him a summary that mentions that Eklavya was denied Drona's tutelage because he was of a lower caste. After this, the guy proceeds to recite the lines where Eklavya is mentioned in the Adi parva of the Sanskrit Mahabharat that we refer to as Vyasa's Mahabharat. He expresses surprise at how Eklavya is introduced as being the son of the "king" of the nishads (I think leader is a better word that should've been used but the Sanskrit text has a notorious habit of having just really questionable ways of referring to people, if you've read it you know.) Which is found HILARIOUS. Bro, what do you mean you're surprised? This is COMMON knowledge, I fear.

He mentions how being the son of the nishaad's leader/king effectively puts him on the same level as Arjun and that they're both princes. He says that this means Eklavya isn't shudra or dalit (there is a word that's curiously absent here that I'll mention in a bit.) Now, this one of those parts where the choice information he presents the viewer with is bizarre. Since I promised I'll give it a fair shot, I'm giving him the benefit of the doubt and assume this is a fault of him not researching enough and not willful omission. Maybe he just doesn't know. The information he's given here is correct, mostly. What he DOESN'T explain is who the nishads, as a group are. I'll fill in the blanks for him.

The nishad are said to be a group of tribal people who reside in the hills. The text he reads out even has the word "tribal" in it but the guy sort of glosses over it? The nishads are sort of like an aggregate grouping of different tribal populations and not the name of a specific tribe. Kind of. But the mention is still significant. See, the Mahabharata, especially the Sanskrit text, has this Thing™ that it does where it's incredibly rare to find a mention of tribal populations who are said to be human, many of the other mentioned tribal groups are demi-humans or non-humans or just straight up rakshahsas.

Eklavya is said to be the adopted son of Hiranyadhanus, the aforementioned king/leader of the nishads. The Harivamsa Purana part of the Sanskrit text (which is a giant-ass genealogy section where it traces the family line from the start of existence to the birth of Krishna) mentions that biologically he's the son of Devashrava, Vasudev's brother, which makes him Krishna's cousin by blood. Eklavya was abandoned by Devashrava in the forest and Hiranyadhanus found him and raised him as his own.

This makes Eklavya a tribal boy, I would use the word adivasi but people might disagree so I'll just say he has a tribal heritage, not by blood but by his upbringing. The man in the video says that Eklavya isn't a shudra, or dalit or untouchable, which is technically true. There's a missing word here that's doing a lot of heavy lifting for him, though. He says that Eklavya is a Kshatriya, which is DEBATEABLE because in the epic we've seen time and time again that blood doesn't matter and it's the society that does. With this, hopefully not to y'all, new information we might understand how the guy's assertion that Arjuna and Eklavya are on equal footing is shaky at best.

He continues to explain that in the text the reasoning why Drona refuses Eklavya is because he'd already promised he'd make Arjun The Best Archer. Since, he's bound by obligation to the Kurus, he can't afford to let Eklavya outshine his kuru students. The man proceeds to assert that in the text there is no caste-based discrimination happening here. Ergo, he concludes, the story of Eklavya doesn't have a caste aspect to it. If you believe otherwise, you're uneducated and need to learn the Truth and not fall into Propoganda. (I'm trying to be charitable to the guy but his tone when he says the word "propoganda" is dripping with disdain and it's making it very hard for me to remain charitable.) He ends this section this way.

This guy says he's given you all the facts. He's cited his source and he's said the complete truth. He hasn't. In this man's viewpoint, the complete and true Mahabharat is the Sanskrit text. Which, as you know, ISN'T what the entirety of the Mahabharat is and claiming that it is is a narrow perspective to see it. (Which is FUNNY considering this guy has a whole section towards the end of the video about Nuance and it's ironic that he's unwilling to provide the same nuance about the epic to his trusting audience.) Maybe he just isn't insane enough like me to know that it isn't the entire Mahabharat. It's possible.

There is a viewpoint that declares that the Sanskrit Text is the primary source and everything else isn't "canon". There's a SPECIFIC word for it but I will not say it because it's like a boogeyman word on hindublr, at least, so I'll omit the word in this post. This man, from what I've seen, shares this viewpoint.

I disagree.

The Mahabharat, is first and foremost a collection of oral traditions of storytelling that were written down much later. This means that the entire corpus of work that is this mammoth of an epic consists of the thousands of written texts, poetry, plays, songs, folk tales, recently it also includes cinematic adaptations, bedtime stories that your elders might have told you, and lastly, popular culture for better or for worse. This is my viewpoint and I feel it provides for a much better lens to engage with the story. Otherwise, you're denying the story of the rich tradition and heritage it was forged in.

The guy in the video wonders why the story of Eklavya is more popular than Satyakama Jabali and there are a lot of reasons for it. First is that the epic is simply more popular and, in many ways, more fun than the upanishad stories. Second is that the story of Eklavya captured people's minds because it's a story that has strife and the ending is unsatisfactory. Tragedies inspire emotions and connection in a way that comedies do not. There are many more reasons but I'll stop listing them.

It's not a coincidence or happenstance that there are caste dynamics added in the popular interpretation of the story. There are even seeds of this in the Sanskrit text, if this guy is truly only looking at that alone, Eklavya being a tribal kid, the way his physical appearance is described in the text, the way he's stopped from sharing a space with the kuru princes etc. If a variety of people who have historically faced similar things especially when it comes to education and find themselves mirrored in Eklavya? That's not Propaganda, as the guy puts it. It's just how stories naturally evolve and grow. It's people reading between the lines. There's no conspiracy at play. Just people finding something to relate to when they cannot relate to any other character.

I can write essays on how caste and varna show up in the Mahabharat (and I might, if even ONE person asks me for it) but to sum it down, it's a task of examining exactly who and what KIND of people are absent from the story. The Invisible People, if you will. You can count on your fingers how many shudra, dalit and adivasi figures are in the Mahabharat.

Drona is a teacher who fails at being a teacher in this instance. (The Mahabharat in many ways is a story of people failing to do their Duty. There's a certain peacock feather wearing guy who does a whole song and dance about it. It can cover a whole book. It's quite popular. Maybe you've heard of it?) Even if you ignore the caste dynamics reading of it, you cannot deny that the man just sucked at being a teacher in that moment when he denied education to a student, whatever his reasoning may be. He brutally asks for the kid to maim himself and again, even the Sanskrit text describes this action of Drona as cruel. He creates a barrier for Eklavya to stop him from continuing to practice his archery.

It's not surprising that Drona is read as a stand in for an education system that sucks at being an education system that does its job. Again, it's not a conspiracy or propaganda. It's people trying to connect to a story through the prism of their life experiences.

It is not my place to tell people what to believe and what not to believe. It's not the guy in the video's either, despite what he says. People's interpretations are personal to them. What is my place is to remind people that it's wrong to deny people their interpretations. There are versions and interpretations of the story that I hate or dislike but I'm not standing here and telling you they're not the Truth. This is the nuance that Mahabharat requires that the guy lacks. This is also why I believe his sources and research is lacking in this department.

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Beyond Eklavya

There's a lot of other thoughts and things I want to share about the rest of the video. I'll try to summarise the highlights.

There's a part where he doesn't understand what systemic patriarchy means, exactly, even though he himself gave an EXCELLENT example of it towards the start of the video with Satyakama Jabali's mother's heritage not being considered when it comes to his gotra. It was frustrating because he SAID it. He said the perfect example himself. I almost thought he set it up as a complete circle moment but he hadn't.

I appreciate him bringing a Shaivite perspective because I'm honestly tired of so much Vaishnavism at all times. I love to see different schools of Hinduism actually being practiced and not just one dominating and subsuming the others.

Towards the start of the video, Mod G predicted that the man would go on a "Periyar sucks" rant and I was so delighted that G was so right.

The guy in the video neglects to look at any contemporary research and scholarship about the linguistics and the Aryan migration theory(which he calls the invasion theory, obviously) including the genetic studies.

There's a funny bit where whenever the guy mentions Ambedkar he has to assert that he thinks Ambedkar is anti-hindu. Even when he's praising him. It happened multiple times.

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TL;DR The man in the video fails to provide his viewers with the full picture about the story of Eklavya even when he claims he is.

- Mod S

ALSO

The structure of his arguments are poor especially in the section where he talks about why the North-South divide came about. Does he not know about the field of linguistics and how root languages are established? Telugu as a language has a 'Dravidian' (he seems to hate that word, even though Dravida is not just the anglo word for the southern parts of India) root because of certain features it has. Notice how North Indian languages use Gender. And then, notice how Southern/central or even Adivasi languages use gender. One main reason why Dravidian languages have been speculated to have another root language different to Sankskrit is the counting systems. Its not wrong to say Telugu has sanskrit INFLUENCE, but again, look at WHICH people within the language group use that type of Telugu (spoiler alert, its the 'proper' upper castes). He dismisses that entirely and makes it a whole issue about how the North South divide happened.

Its very clear to me that he has no intention of representing any of the counter arguments to his premise in an honest manner and is instead single mindedly trying to create more propaganda.

-Mod G

#is this the longest post on this blog #EVER? #possibly #I'm sorry #about being insane about the Mahabharat again #but I would argue that you all signed up for it #when you started following us #eklavya #hindu mythology #mahabharata #Mahabharat #hindublr #I'm tagging specifically because the original post was in the tag #desiblr #not an incorrect quote #mod: s #mod: g

[stxrrynxghts]

Have been reading your analyses since I've returned to Tumblr. Please make one of the Draupadi that we see in pop culture and the canon Draupadi, if you haven't already. Thank You so much :)

Okay! So, here I go!

So, Draupadi in pop culture is mostly two things, the shows, and the books. Let me start off with the books. I am taking three main books as base:

Karna's wife- The outcast queen: This book is based on some fictional girl named Uruvi, who is the Princess of Pukhya (ig?). She and Karna are the typical Wattpad OCs here. Draupadi here happens to be the female Arjun in Karna related stories, someone who is "jealous" of Uruvi. Uruvi happened to be involved with Arjun, beforehand, idk, am not much aware about this book. Uruvi seems to believe that the disrobing of Draupadi is a private moment b/w Karna and Drau, and that Drau is in love with him. Ugh.

Arjun-Without a doubt: DK much about this one, but apparently, Draupadi is jealous of fucking GANDIVA of all things. Oh, pls, do u srsly think that she has that to be jealous of? If I were this book's Draupadi, then I would be jealous of Nakul, for his insanely good looks-

Palace of Illusions: again, IDK much, but IK this much, that this book as well, loves to show the DrauKarn agenda. Plz. Draupadi does not need to be in love with the man who wanted her disrobed.

My conclusion, with these 3 main books, is that these authors love to degrade a perfectly fine female character. Pop culture Draupadi has ruined her image. Close your eyes and think about Draupadi, and think what you get in mind. Is she angry/short tempered? Is she always raving about her revenge? Is she being blood-thirsty? Is she being well...self righteous? Is she being jealous of her co-wives? If yes, then that is NOT her. That is a shadow, an insult. And trust me, these pop culture influences ruin your image of her to the extent that you CANNOT differentiate at all b/w the real her and the fake her.

Now, part 2, is Draupadi in the shows. *Rubs hands* now, if you like any shows, I shall tell u, this is gonna be BRUTAL. No hate is meant to any actress who has played Draupadi.

BR Chopra's Mahabharat: The first mainstream adaptation of Mahabharata on screen. In my opinion, their portrayal of Draupadi WAS , IS and WILL BE....in the finest of words, shitty. She says the word "andhe ka putra andha", she refuses to marry Karna as he is a sutaputra (We will get on that soon), and she raves about "mere kesh", and is clearly bloodthirsty. Draupadi is not even mildly disgusted or shaken by the fact that her hair is drenched in someone's blood, and it makes her come off as inhumane, arrogant and selfish. Draupadi did have a heart, and canonically, was moved by the destruction of the whole Kuru dynasty. Roopa Ganguly could have been a fantastic Drau, IF, the directors did not do this. Her friendship with Krishna receives a plus point, as does the scene which SHOWS that she is in her periods during the game of dice.

Dharmakshetra: Draupadi here is just straight up...bitchy? She is being blamed by both Kunti and Gandhari for "causing the war". Oh pls, if someone should be blamed, it is your SONS. She was the victim there. But then, honestly, this Draupadi deserves it. She roasts Arjun for not loving her, but then does the EXACT same thing with her other husbands. She roasts Yudi for "loving his brother's wife". Plz, shut your mouth bae.

Kahaani Hamaaray Mahaabharaat Ki: Yup, this was the OG spelling. They have Anita Hassandani as Draupadi, and she is....well, acting like she is a part of some random nukkad naatak. I watched one episode, and that was enough for me. If you want your sanity intact, then don't watch it.

Draupadi: This show has quite the pretty Draupadi, but here, the other Pandavas are literally getting horny over Draupadi. They show her "wedding night" with each one of them, and Arjun actually says that he was jealous of the fact that Bhima got to sleep with her. And I am jealous that you get to rest your head on Krishna's shoulder and sob, Arjun, but do you see me complaining?

Suryaputra Karna: Draupadi is fucking weird here. The scenes are copied from StarBharat, clearly, and well ah. What do I say? This show is clearly not watchable for man kind.

RadhaKrishn: eh. Copied again, from StarBharat, and they showed the andhe ka putra andha wala thing, and my feelings are terribly hurt. *sigh* if I could get this director to gamble off the whole Production House to me, then the world would have been a different place.

will need full blown two reblogs, one for the canon, and one for StarBharat to cover this-

#mahabharat #mahabharata #hindu mythology #draupadi

[viralstation]

#1YearOfBaahubali2: How this non-Hindi film provided invaluable changes in Bollywood!

New Post has been published on http://viralstation.org/1yearofbaahubali2-how-this-non-hindi-film-provided-invaluable-changes-in-bollywood/

#1YearOfBaahubali2: How this non-Hindi film provided invaluable changes in Bollywood!

#1YearOfBaahubali2: How this non-Hindi film provided invaluable changes in Bollywood!

I don’t think I can ever forget April 28, 2017. It was a rare moment when I went to see a film with tons of expectations and received a lot more in return. I don’t think such an occurrence happens often. As I came out of the PVR IMAX screen at Lower Parel, Mumbai, I knew this film is going to rewrite box office records. Yet, I don’t think anyone then could have guessed that this classic film would go on to earn Rs. 510 crores nett simply in its Hindi version!

There are so many lessons to be learnt from the mega success and insane popularity for this film. One of the reasons is that our film often fail in bringing people to theatres is because the language, the setting, the problems of the character, way of life etc. all seem alien to many of the moviegoers. Even today, a very big chunk of audiences are not watching American television or shows on Netflix. Their mode of entertainment is still the daily soaps. Even in films, many of them prefer watching south dubbed films. No wonder almost all major movie channels are showing south dubbed remakes on a daily basis. This is because these films are pure entertainers – simplistic, dramatic and action-packed.

Baahubali 2 – The Conclusion was also on the same lines but much better than all these South remakes. The setting might not be relatable but it’s nothing new to the audiences as they have been exposed to period films involving kings, politics over usurping the throne etc. Also, B R Chopra’s epic TV Show ‘Mahabharat’ had made the whole setting very popular. Moreover, the exhilarating and whistle-worthy moments are aplenty. Right from Baahubali’s heroic entry to Devasena’s magnificent entry to Baahubali supporting himself in the midst of the bulls to Devasena getting into the boat with the help of Baahubali’s broad shoulders to the eye-popping intermission sequence to the sudden beheading sequence to the finale where Baahubali’s army use a novel trick to enter Mahishmati and a lot more – all these sequences made viewers broke into seetis and taalis! Some of these scenes also got brickbats and ridicule, but audiences had no reason to complain. It’s also important to note that director S S Rajamouli and his team treaded a thin line. If they had done a bit extra, it would have not worked. But they exactly knew where to stop and kudos for that understanding!

The character of Devasena, played by Anushka Shetty, was royal, beautiful, sensitive and brave. The women empowerment bit came out very nicely and that was also another reason why this film became all the more special. There was a bit of tu-tu main-main angle between the ‘saas’ Sivagami and ‘bahu’ Devasena. But again, the execution was just perfect and nobody said that it reminded them of any ‘saas-bahu’ TV show!

An analysis of Baahubali 2 – The Conclusion would be incomplete without the mention of the songs. There were only five songs and all of them were original compositions and fit very well in the narrative. The title track had to be exciting but what was unexpected was 'Soja Zara'. The manner in which a parallel was drawn between Lord Krishna and Baahubali was excellent. I must have seen the video of this song hundreds of times and I was happy to meet people who are also as crazy about this track. 'Veeron Ke Veer Aa' had a beautiful and VFX-laden dream sequence that made for a great watch on the big screen. ‘Shivam’ added a nice touch to the already excellent opening credits while 'Jay-Jaykara' made viewers smile and cry. It’s been a year and yet this soundtrack is still popular and that definitely speaks volumes after how much viewers have lapped it up.

Thankfully, the blockbuster success of Baahubali 2 – The Conclusion has opened the eyes of Bollywood. Films like Kesari, Brahmastra, Rannbhoomi and even Housefull 4 got green lit or got a boost somewhere thanks to the way audiences reacted to Baahubali 2 – The Conclusion. It might not be wrong to say that perhaps even Aamir Khan got motivated to make his dream project Mahabharat after witnessing the euphoria created by this film. And this is very good news for Bollywood that was really suffering from too many flops and films that had an urban, restricted appeal. Also, these biggies will have the required scale and grandeur that would make them ideal for big screen viewing. And this is very important in today’s times when footfalls have fallen drastically in theatres. Hollywood understood this long back and hence, it keeps churning out big-scale action extravaganza, Avengers: Infinty War being the latest example. However, mere scale won’t help – the film has to be entertaining and simplistic. Someone sitting in Juhu should also enjoy the film as much as someone sitting in Jaunpur. Baahubali 2 – The Conclusion achieved this incredible feat and hence, the makers have to be absolutely sure that the script is such before spending more than hundred crores on their ventures. And this is quite possible. Our mythology is full of amazing stories. Our heroes in the pages of history have achieved great heights. Most of these are popular among people. Or we can make a wholly original film- we have some of the best writers after all. Let’s not copy a Baahubali but let’s at least understand why it succeeded and use the same factors to our advantage. Let’s create more such big-scale king-sized entertainers in Bollywood. Let’s ensure that the film to cross the Rs. 1000-crore nett milestone in India in a single language is a Hindi film. As my college motto goes, we will and we can!

Also Read: Baahubali 2: The Conclusion to hit the screens in China on May 4Read Original Article

#Entertainment