Bhīma Kills Duḥśāsana

Classical

The vow goes back to the dice-hall, where Duḥśāsana dragged Draupadī by the hair and tried to strip her. Bhīma swore before the whole court that he would one day tear open that body and drink the blood of the man who had done it. Seventeen days into the war, in the middle of the fight with Karṇa's army, the two finally meet.

Duḥśāsana fights bravely. He cuts Bhīma's bow with one arrow, wounds his driver with six and hits him with nine more, and when Bhīma throws a spear he cuts it down with ten shafts. Bhīma warns him that he will drink his blood that day and takes up his mace. Duḥśāsana hurls a spear like Death itself, and Bhīma's mace shatters it and strikes him on the head.

The blow throws Duḥśāsana from his chariot a distance of ten bow-lengths. His horses are dead, the chariot is splintered, and his armour and ornaments are scattered as he writhes on the ground. Bhīma remembers everything: the hair seized, the disrobing, the insults while the Pāṇḍavas sat silent. He calls out to Karṇa, Duryodhana, Kṛpa, Aśvatthāman and Kṛtavarman to protect their friend if they can.

Then he jumps down, puts a foot on Duḥśāsana's throat, draws his sword, and rips open his chest. He drinks the warm blood, cuts off the head, and drinks again, slowly, as if tasting it. He says it is sweeter than his mother's milk, honey or wine. When he sees that Duḥśāsana is dead, he laughs quietly, and says death has saved him from more.

The soldiers who watch flee in terror, crying that this is no man but a rākṣasa. Bhīma then lists, in a roar, all the wrongs the Pāṇḍavas have suffered: poison, serpents, the house of lac, the dice, the forest, Draupadī's hair, the exile in Virāṭa's house. He tells Kṛṣṇa and Arjuna that one vow is kept and the other, the breaking of Duryodhana's thigh, will follow. Ten more of Dhṛtarāṣṭra's sons attack him in rage at their brother's death, and Arjuna kills them all.

Told by Sañjaya → Dhṛtarāṣṭra

Who: Bhīma, Duḥśāsana, Karṇa, Duryodhana, Draupadī

Bound to

Gita Mahatmya: Dushasana reborn as an elephant mirror

Duryodhana's thigh: Maitreya's curse and the Danava armour origin

Karṇa Made Commander (Karṇa-senāpatya) origin

The Mace Duel: Duryodhana's Thighs Broken mirror

Places: Kurukṣetra

Where this comes from

read for this telling · Mahabharata, Ganguli translation (text as scanned on archive.org; mahabharataonline.com section pages could not be opened from the working environment) Karna Parva, Sections LXXXIII-LXXXIV

See it on the tree · All stories

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