Her will is to keep the Pandavas together to regain their lands and she’s also able to influence the way the epic unfolds. She knows that it is in the birth of sons that one can have real power, so she accepts her role within this patriarchal system, and wields this power to shape her destiny. When destiny works against her and her sons die, she sends Bheeshma to abduct the princesses of Kashi and gets her son from Parashar, Vyasa, to impregnate them. The way she’s able to articulate her ambitions and desires is extremely inspiring. When King Shantanu wants to marry her, she says I’ll do so only if my sons become king – that’s a huge thing for a poor fisherwoman to ask of a ruler. Satyavati, for example, knows what she wants. Being openly ambitious, to openly set out to get what you want is not encouraged in women even today.
What stands out about all of them is their will and the force of their ambition. How important are the other women’s voices in shaping the story? This was the challenge – to make it accessible to the girls and women of today.
I wanted readers to see how women were able to shape their destinies even 2500 years ago. The idea was to present a different ideal from the perfect image of Sita that we’re always given. I wanted to look at the epic through the eyes of the women, so I left out the wars and fighting, and only follow the women’s lives and how they’re shaped in a deeply patriarchal society. I looked around for sources that present complex and nuanced images of women – and the Mahabharata does that. She’s humiliated, tortured and can even be killed. I thought then, no matter how perfect a woman, the patriarchy of Indian society doesn’t allow space for her. Around the same time, the horrific Nirbhaya incident took place. How could I explain this level of perfection in a woman to my kids? This was a challenge for me on a personal level. She was humiliated and sent into the forest. I wondered how I would tell my daughters that this woman – the perfect, loyal, submissive wife who truly loved her husband – was berated by those around her including Ram, the perfect man.
The scene where it ends in popular representation – where Sita is happily enthroned next to Ram – always bothered me. I used to take them to watch Ramayana productions in Delhi every year. I hardly reworked anything the book was completely ready.Īny challenges you had to overcome writing your first work of mythological fiction?Īt the time the idea came to me, my daughters were quite young. It was only recently that we decided to revisit and publish it. Why don’t you consider writing historicals?’ So he put me on the track of writing history, after which I wrote Heroines, Daughters Of The Sun and Akbar The Great Mughal, and put this on the back burner. When my publisher David Davidar saw it, he said ‘I love what you’ve written – the setting, the research you’ve put in. This was a completed manuscript when I wrote it around eight years ago. Song Of Draupadi was the first manuscript you wrote but it’s your fourth published book. Here, Ira Mukhoty explains why Draupadi is a role model. From Gandhari’s decision to blindfold herself so she can join her husband in eternal darkness to Amba’s refusal to marry a Kuru prince, each woman speaks of her choices. In Song Of Draupadi – her first mythological novel – author Ira Mukhoty gives a voice to these women, focusing on the epic from their points of view. But it’s the seldom spoken-of women who really tie the story together. The first image that comes to mind when the Mahabharata is mentioned is that of a battlefield, or of the Kauravas and Pandavas caught in verbal duels and games of dice.