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The Tales in Mahabharata
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the Pauloma demons,142 and drives back the entire Kaurava army single-handed in. the VirP,143
But our author is entirely impartial. He does not hesitate to show the blots on the escutcheon of this most glorious hero of the war of MBh. After Kṛṣṇa's passing away in the MauP, Arjuna, a seasoned victor of many a battle, could not hold his own against the mere abhira robbers and failed miserably to protect the Yadava women-folk from being forcibly carried away by them.144 Vyasa's observation is prophetically passionless: "Strength, intelligence, glory and achievement all appear at their proper time and retire when their time is over. Time is the source of this entire world; Time, when He so desires, takes it back into Himself. Time becomes strong and Time, again, becomes weak. He becomes the Lord, and then He is commanded by others."145 As our popular saying goes it is Time, not min, that is powerful. Arjuna, with the same bow and the same arrows, was robbed by Kābā.
It is, indeed, not impossible to reconcile to this situation philosophically. But the other two incidents where the hero stoops low are almost irreconcilable to the glorious picture of this hero. The incident of Ekalavya146 is too famous to need any reiteration here. Had Ekalavya not dutifully surrendered the thumb of his right hand and his entire future as an archer with it to Drona in satisfaction of the latter's designing and preposterous demand of the Guru's fee, the chapter of Arjuna's. glory as an unrivalled archer would have been differently written. But the simple young man was ensnared with wrong ideals. The story shows that vested interests had always adopted questionable means to retain their rights to superiority.
With this goes also the episode wherein Indra approaches Karna at the time of the latter's daily worship and demands the latter's solar armour and earrings knowing well that the latter would not refuse anything to anyone at that particular time.147 Without the crafty helpers like Drona and Indra, one does not know, where the great archer Arjuna would have stood. And even after this, he had to shoot. arrows at Karṇa when the latter was trying to lift his chariot-wheels sinking in mire! What a great hero Arjuna is!
We, of course, do not wish to sound political, but the similarity of the social situation, to which both the episodes of Ekalavya and of Karna point, is too insistent to be missed. Persons of lower strata of society have to struggle hard to come up, have to fight against a number of odds erected by the vested aristrocratic interests and often have to lose the battle. Even after they succeed in coming up, the
142 VanP. 170.
143 Adhyayas 24-62. Cf. VanP. 48.1.
144 MauP. 8.48-61. 145 MauP. 9.32-34. 146 AdiP. 123.1-39. 147 VanP. 284-294,
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