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Gandhari (, ) is a pivotal character in the ancient Hindu epic Mahabharata. She is introduced as a princess of the Gandhara Kingdom, the daughter of King Subala, and later becomes the queen of the Kuru kingdom. Gandhari is married to Dhritarashtra, the blind king of Kuru, and in a symbolic gesture of solidarity, she voluntarily blindfolds herself for life. Through the miraculous intervention of the divine-sage Vyasa, she becomes the mother of one hundred sons collectively known as the Kaurava, with the eldest, Duryodhana, emerging as a principal antagonist in the epic.
Besides her hundred sons, Gandhari also has a daughter, Dushala. Her brother, Shakuni, becomes a central figure in aiding Duryodhana's schemes against his cousins, the . An ardent devotee of the god Shiva, Gandhari is portrayed as a woman of great virtue and moral strength, who nonetheless struggles to dissuade her sons from their destructive path. She speaks out at pivotal moments in the narrative, including during the humiliation of Draupadi and peace talks before the Kurukshetra War. Despite condemning the actions of Duryodhana, the longstanding rivalry between the Kauravas and the Pandavas ultimately leads to the catastrophic Kurukshetra War, where all of Gandhari's sons perish.
After the war, she becomes the voice of women who suffer due to the devastation caused by the conflict. While she refrains from cursing the Pandavas, recognising the righteousness of their victory, her overwhelming grief drives her to curse Krishna, the Pandavas' counselor, whom she holds accountable for the war's devastation despite his divine ability to prevent it. She foretells the downfall of his Yadava dynasty. In the aftermath, Gandhari retires to the forest with other Kuru elders—Dhritarashtra, Vidura and Kunti—living her final days in austerity until she perishes in a forest fire.
Gandhari epitomizes the ideal of pativrata (devoted wife) in Hindu tradition, her intense asceticism believed to have granted her great spiritual power. Though initially a silent presence, she transforms into a powerful symbol of the anguish endured by women in times of war. Beyond the epic, she features in various adaptations and retellings. Her legacy endures as a testament to maternal love, conjugal fidelity, and selfless sacrifice.
The Mahabharata manuscripts exist in numerous versions, wherein the specifics and details of major characters and episodes vary, often significantly. Except for the sections containing the Bhagavad Gita which is remarkably consistent between the numerous manuscripts, the rest of the epic exists in many versions. The differences between the Northern and Southern recensions are particularly significant, with the Southern manuscripts more profuse and longer. Scholars have attempted to construct a critical edition, relying mostly on a study of the "Bombay" edition, the "Poona" edition, the "Calcutta" edition and the "south Indian" editions of the manuscripts. The most accepted version is one prepared by scholars led by Vishnu Sukthankar at the Bhandarkar Oriental Research Institute, preserved at Kyoto University, Cambridge University and various Indian universities.
The Mahabharata centres on the intense rivalry between the groups of brothers—five Pandavas and the hundred Kauravas, culminating in the epic Kurukshetra War, which forms the narrative's core. A significant portion of the text is devoted to detailing the battles fought between the warriors of both sides during this conflict. The Mahabharata is structured into eighteen parvas or 'books', starting with the Adi Parva, in which Gandhari is introduced.
Gandhari's husband, Dhritarashtra, is denied the throne due to his blindness, despite being the eldest son. The throne is instead given to his younger brother, Pandu, but he later renounces the kingdom. As a result of these events, Dhritarashtra is crowned King of Kuru kingdom, and Gandhari becomes queen.
Gandhari attends the discussions and negotiations that preceded the war, hoping for peace, as mentioned in the Udyoga Parva. When Krishna, as Pandavas' envoy, urges peace, Dhritarashtra summons Gandhari, acknowledging her wisdom and foresight, and hopes she might persuade their son Duryodhana to abandon his destructive ambition. Gandhari criticizes Dhritarashtra for failing to curb their son's reckless ambitions and does not shy away from speaking against injustice. She delivers a stern appeal, condemning Duryodhana's pride, avarice, and defiance of elders. She stresses the dangers of wrath and the importance of self-control, urging him to listen to the counsel of respected elders like Bhishma and Drona and to make peace with the Pandavas. Gandhari warns that war will bring ruin to the Kuru dynasty and pleads for a just division of the kingdom, emphasizing that peace and shared rule are preferable to a devastating conflict. Despite her plea, Duryodhana remains unmoved, setting the stage for the catastrophic war to follow.
Soon after, Gandhari temporarily gains divine sight. With this 'divine eye', she surveys the battlefield from a distance and later visits the battlefield of Kurukshetra, accompanied by other family members. Gandhari emerges as a central voice among the bereaved women, expressing her sorrow and outrage over the destruction wrought by the war. There, Gandhari delivers a lament upon witnessing the devastated field strewn with the bodies of her sons and many other warriors. Upon witnessing Duryodhana's corpse, she momentarily faints. Standing beside Krishna, she describes the anguish of the bereaved women from both sides as they mourn their fallen kin, expressing profound sorrow over the ruinous consequences of the conflict. Seeing the vast destruction and death, Gandhari condemns Krishna, holding him responsible for the devastation. Though aware of his divine status—having been present when Sanjaya revealed Krishna's nature and when Krishna manifested his cosmic form—she accuses him of failing to prevent the war despite his divine powers. In a moment of profound emotional anguish, she curses Krishna, foretelling that thirty-six years from then, he will witness the destruction of his Yadava and die a lonely death, killed by trickery. Krishna accepts this curse, asserting that only he can bring about his end, but also admonishes Gandhari for shifting blame away from herself.
The Svargarohana Parva mentions that Yudhishthira performs the final rites for those who perish in the forest fire. After their deaths, the souls of Dhritarashtra and Gandhari ascend to , the celestial Loka associated with wealth and contentment.
Brian Black emphasizes Gandhari's narrative and interpretive authority within the Mahabharata, portraying her as a moral critic of the war whose presence as a listener to Sanjaya's war accounts establishes her as a witness to its devastating consequences. While often silent, Gandhari intervenes at key moments—such as criticizing Dhritarashtra, attempting to dissuade Duryodhana from war, and helping secure Draupadi's release—demonstrating subtle but effective agency. Her role culminates in the Stri Parva, where, granted divine vision, she becomes the primary speaker in a dialogue with Krishna. Here, Black argues, Gandhari transforms from a passive listener into a voice for collective female suffering, articulating the pain of the widows and the consequences of war with prophetic gravitas. Her condemnation of Krishna and the subsequent curse she places on him, which is later fulfilled, underscores her elevated moral and spiritual status. Black highlights that Gandhari's narration stands in parallel to Sanjaya's, but her position as a grieving mother and ascetic lends her speech a deeper emotional and theological resonance.
According to scholar James L. Fitzgerald, who translated the The Book of the Women ( Stri Parva), Gandhari is a poetic creation of Vyasa, representing an ideal of unwavering devotion, distinct from other women like Draupadi. Unlike Draupadi, who is drawn into conflicts between men, Gandhari exemplifies the faithful and ascetic wife, akin to Sita from the Ramayana. Her self-imposed suffering and ascetic dedication ( ugra tapas) accumulate spiritual power over time, giving her a formidable presence in the epic. Despite her anger, notes Fitzgerald, Gandhari consoles the , shifting from rage to compassion. She empathises deeply with Draupadi, who has also lost her Upapandavas, and their shared grief, mediated by Kunti, reflects the immense emotional toll of the war on women. Gandhari's lament—"It was my wrong that brought this eminent family to extinction"—reveals her sense of moral responsibility for the Kuru tragedy. Fitzgerald also examines Gandhari's sudden acquisition of divya chakshus (divine vision), which Vyasa grants, enabling her to see the battlefield and mourn the fallen warriors. This vision, Fitzgerald suggests, is rooted in her asceticism, raising questions about whether Vyasa's intervention diminishes her autonomous power. He posits that the epic's attribution of her clairvoyance to Vyasa may reflect the discomfort of the Brahminical with the spiritual power of non-Brahmins, especially women.
In Hebbya village, Nanjangud, Mysore, India, there is a temple called Gāndhārī temple dedicated to her. This temple honours her devotion and loyalty as she epitomized the goodness of a mother and a loving wife.
Urubhanga by Bhāsa (c. 1st - 2nd century CE) is one of the earliest attempts to evoke karuna rasa (pathos) for Duryodhana, and as part of this transformation, Bhāsa expands the relationship between Duryodhana and Gandhari. Here, Gandhari and other family members of Duryodhana are depicted visiting the battles while he is dying. For Gandhari, Duryodhana symbolises all her hundred sons and stands as the "golden pillar" of her sacrificial world, conveying that his downfall plunges her into symbolic darkness. Even in death, the maternal bond persists; Duryodhana requests that Gandhari be his mother again in the next life, to which she responds with affection, affirming that he had spoken the very desire of her heart.
In Jain retellings of the Mahabharata, a narrative emerges concerning Gandhari's early life and marriage, which, though absent from the canonical Sanskrit epic, provides a background that facilitates the later victimization and justification of the antagonist Shakuni. When astrologers predicts a brief lifespan for her future husband, Subala, to avert this, arranges a symbolic marriage between Gandhari and a goat prior to her wedding with Dhritarashtra, after which the goat is sacrificed. When Bhishma later learns of this ritual, he condemns the act, considering Gandhari a symbolic widow, and takes punitive measures against Subala's family. He starves all the men of Gandhari's family until only one—Shakuni—survives. In a different variant, Gandhari is taken captive as a bride and her family is punished when they refuse her marriage to the blind Dhritarashtra.
In modern period, Rabindranath Tagore wrote a Bengali poetic play about her, named Gandharir Abedon (Bangla: গান্ধারীর আবেদন, Translation: Supplication of Gandhari). Gandhari, her husband Dhritarashtra and their son Duryodhana are central characters in the play.Sanchayita by Rabindranath Tagore Aditi Banerjee wrote a novel named The Curse of Gandhari, which depicts the story of the Mahabharata through the perspective of Gandhari.
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