The road less taken
Why revenge is not the answer
‘They would avenge me later, yes, but only when they felt the circumstances would bring them heroic fame…. I would have thrown myself to save them if it had been in my power that day.”
- Palace of Illusions, the Mahabharat seen through a woman’s eyes.
Every child knows the story of Draupadi’s vastraharan — how her husband Yudhishthir gambled away his wealth, his kingdom, himself, his brothers, and finally his wife. We all know she is ‘rescued’ when she remembers Krishna, her saree becoming an endlessly unfolding garment.
But in the epic, as reimagined by Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni in ‘Palace of Illusions’, Draupadi has a realisation. In her mind’s eye, she sees Krishna sitting beside her on a cool stone bench. His glance is bright and tender. No one can shame you, if you don’t allow it.
“Let them stare at my nakedness,” she thinks. “Why should I care? They and not I should be ashamed for shattering the bounds of decency”.
This is exactly the message of the moving and brilliantly made film, “The Little Girls We Were… the Women We Are”. The film features five women who talk about the experience of being sexually abused as children aged as young as 2. One was molested by a neighbour, another by her own older brother.
They were too young to comprehend, so they buried these memories.But they had been deeply scarred. Shame, guilt and anger corroded them from the inside, and eventually surfaced. Many years of counselling and healing from Rahi Foundation allowed them to heal and emerge stronger.
They spoke on camera, openly, freely, without hiding their identity. Because I am not to blame. It is not my shame.
Like Draupadi, they ask, “Why did nobody protect me?” Some parents were oblivious but others knew. Yet they chose to stay silent. Anuja Gupta, founder of Rahi, says in the film, “Worse than the sexual abuse is the fact that the child felt alone and helpless. No one believed her, no one took action…”
The day that Draupadi was disrobed, she swore vengeance against the Kauravas. And this, ultimately led to the Great War which destroyed both the clans. In the book, over the entire 12 years of exile, it is Draupadi who keeps the flame of revenge alive. Taunting her husbands for failing to ‘do right’.
At one point, Krishna counsels Draupadi using a half-burnt stick. When he thrusts the stick toward her, she flinches back. He says, “See, in trying to burn you, it’s consuming itself. That’s what happened to a heart…” She knows what he is alluding to but cannot give up her deepest desire.
An eye for an eye, tooth for a tooth…
In the end, she got what she desired but the moment was empty. And she paid a tremendous price for it. Was it the only choice?
A line from the Rahi foundation film comes to mind , “I am not just a survivor, I am a thriver.” These women have risen above events which robbed their dignity, memories which once haunted them, emotions which cut like a knife. They have chosen the path of self-growth, of healing.
The Great War has been fought and won in the ultimate battlefield. The battlefield of the mind.
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