Date uploaded in London – – 23 March 2024
Contact – swami_48@yahoo.com
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Mahabharat story has been narrated in thousands of villages in South India and Sri Lanka by villagers. There are over 1000 Draupadi Amman (Goddess) temples and Dharmaraja (Yudhisthira) temples in the villages. They celebrate Mahabharata episode called Duryodhana in Battlefield (In Tamil Padukalam) during summer season. In almost all the villages one can see certain common factors:
1.A big colourful Duryodhana figure up to 120 foot long is made in the ground with mud and other stuff.
2.Mahabharata Story is told every day for 18 days before the final day.
3.The final day is 18th day ; all Indians know the 18 day war ended with the killing of Duryodhana by Bhima, the mightiest of the Pandavas. Draupadi, wife of Five Pandavas made a vow when she was undressed in the assembly of Duryodhana that she would not dress her hair until Duryodhana’s blood is used as oil for her hair. Her vow was fulfilled by Bhima. This is enacted on the final day where the villagers divide themselves and fight as Pandavas and Kauravas .
4.The interesting fact is the whole event involves non-Brahmins. In the cities, Mahabharata discourses, debates, dramas are mostly organised by Brahmins and other high castes.
5.Along with the Duryodhana battlefield event, Fire Walking Ceremony also held in most of the villages where men and women walk on a bed of fire.
6.All Tamil Newspapers report this event every year with pictures. English newspapers turn a blind eye to this event because English newspapers are rarely read in villages.
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What does it show?
Mahabharata is not new to Tamils. 2000 years ago Sangam period Tamils mentioned important episodes of Mahabharat in their poems.
Madurai Tamil Academy (Called Tamil Sangam) translated the whole story, the longest epic in the world with over two lakhs lines (200,000 lines)
Unfortunately we get only a very late work that too only in parts (Villiputturar Bharatham).
But the Mahabharata incidents mentioned by the Sangam Tamil poets and post Sangam Poets ( Tamil Kavya Silappdikaram etc) show that the story was known to both literates and illiterates in cities and villages of Tamil Nadu and Sri Lanka.
River Ganges, Himalayas, Arundhati, Saptarishis, Krishna- Gopi Sari episode on the banks of Yamuna, Indra- Ahalya episode and hundreds of such episodes are mentioned in 2000 year old poems. Later, around 7th century , we see thousands of references in Divya Prabandham and Thevaram. Even Saivite poets of Thevaram and later Thiruppugaz mentioned them.
Sangam Tamils were mostly Hindus. And their 2500 poems by 450 poets reflect Hindu values and Hindu beliefs. But the most amazing thing is that illiterate and neo literates of villages remember the story and celebrate it in their own ways.
In the villages of South India one can hear many Pandava stories which are not in Vyasa’s grandest epic. Arjuna- Allirani Love Ballad (may be Chitrangada of Mahabharata) and other ballads are very popular in Tamil Nadu.
They all proclaim ‘Truth alone Triumphs’. Evil will be destroyed completely.
(Pictures are taken from Tamil Newspapers; thanks)
We have archaeological records for Draupadi Amman worship from Pallava period.
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In Sri Lanka
Udappu is a fishing village near Chilaw in the North Western Province of Sri Lanka where the people are Hindus and observe the Mahabharatha predominantly as their holy text. The story of the trials, tribulations and finally triumph of the five Pandava brothers and their wife Draupadi will be enacted in various forms culturally at this festival, culminating in a village wide fire walking event, which is a popular tourist attraction.
The 18-day period is spent in prayer and fasting, with a priest reciting the Mahabharata epic to remind everyone of the story of Draupadi, the five Pandava brothers’ common wife, whose chaste and virtuous ways enabled her to recover the kingdom they been deprived of by King Duryodhana. The Draupadi festival comes to a conclusion on the final evening when the entire male population of Udappu walk barefoot over a bed of red hot coals without injury in a ceremony called Tee Mithi in Tamil language. Sri Lanka
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Thimithi Festival/ Fire Walking
Thimithi festival or Theemithi festival, known commonly as the fire walking festival, is celebrated in the southern state of Tamil Nadu.
This international Hindu festival is celebrated by Tamilian populations in Malaysia, Singapore, Sri Lanka and Mauritius, usually takes place in the month of Aipasi (or Aippasi) of the Tamil calendar (or October and November according to the Gregorian calendar)
Plays from the Mahabharat are performed during the two weeks prior to the festival, there is a symbolic marriage event of Arjuna and Draupadi along with the older rituals of using neem leaves (used for healing epidemics like smallpox) and wearing yellow clothes to denote prosperity for the rain to bring successful harvests.
The path which one has to walk on is made by digging a large pit and burning sandalwood (which has religious significance in the region) for hours to reduce it to burning embers.
–Subham–
Tags – Duryodhana , Battlefield episode, Padukalam, Tamil villages, Mahabharata, story, narration, Drapadi Amman, Yudhisthira, Dharmaraja
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