The Onset of Marginalization in Kavita Kane’s Karna’s Wife: The Outcast Queen

                                                                                                                                                                                                                     

The Onset of Marginalization in Kavita Kane’s Karna’s Wife:

The Outcast Queen

E.Kalpana

                                                                       Assistant Professor of English

                          V.V.Vannia Perumal College For Women, Virudhunagar-1

            The epics are a much familiar topic to the people of India. But writers like Mahaswetha Devi, Girish Karnad, Kavitha Kane still prefer to write about the twin epics namely Ramayana and Mahabharatha. Their attempt is not to generate new epic out of it but their strand in narrating the same old epic marks all the difference. The writer Kavitha Kane has done the same. She has attempted to tell Mahabharatha from Uruvi, Karna’s wife’s point of view. As for her strand, she has taken the side of the deprived in narrating the tale. The seed of marginalization was strewn throughout the human history and the consequence of which we ripe in the name of casteism. The present study has aimed at validating the point that epics are the onset of marginalization in Indian scenario. The area of study has been further narrowed down, taking up the epic narration of Kavita Kane in Karna’s wife: The Outcast Queen. Attempts have been made to substantiate the point by quoting the humiliations of Karna” the eternal pariah”( KW13).

The first few chapters of the novel depict the introduction of Karna and the humiliation which he undergoes as a sudhaputra, a low-borne. The remaining chapters depicts the humiliation and the power of resilience of  Uruvi  who chooses Karna as her groom in  her swayamwara against all odds.  The very first chapter is a recollection of Uruvi of the splendid day when she saw Karna for the first time. It was the day of the Archery contest.  Karna, the more skilled archery was about to defeat Arjuna in the contest where the question of identity was raised. Perhaps they could have sensed that his identity would pull him down. The words of Kripacharya stressed the point that only a kshatriya, a high-born can fight another Kshatria in a tournament. The radiant face of Karna dimmed, his proud head bowed in despair. Though Duryodhana proclaim him as the king of Anga, he was denounced by others as the son of a charioteer. This is the first instance of humiliation occurred to him. Karna who “accepts other for what they are and accepts himself as well. He makes no secret of the fact that he is a sutaputra and is not ashamed of it”( KW:62) felt the agony for the first time of being a low- born.

            As it is known that Karna is born out of wedlock to Kunthi and the sun God- Suryadev. It is also a known fact that the childe was abandoned and brought up by a low-born charioteer. He had been raised in his household like a king. Not knowing the least humiliation. But he was besmeared and disgraced when he aspired to excel the so called high born. The second incidence of great humiliation occurs to Karna at the swayamwara of Draupadi. When Karna, the master archer ventures to participate in the contest she protested telling “I am a king’s daughter … a bride won by the worthiest and the very best. I will not allow a low-born sutaputra to participate in the challenge. Please do not proceed.”(KW,31). Draupati words agonize Karna as nothing else had ever done. The memory remained a raw lesion that festered him throughout his life.

But the decision of Uruvi came as a great medicine healing his wounded self.

            After the wedding of Uruvi and Karna there is an instance where she visits Bishesma pitha Who has always been her favorite. He expressed his pain of Uruvi’s choice but assures her that she has married a worthy man calling him as an “extraordinary man”. All she could receive was a gentle accusation against Karna. At the end, on an  impulse  she dared to ask few questions before she leaves .she  asked him - why is there a merit added to Arjuna when there is a mention of both of them. She emphasized the point that in the archery contest, Arjuna won not because of his merits but by the merit of his noble birth. She asks him “is that not so unfair that it has blown up a huge wrong?”(KW, 62). The reply of Bhishma was not an answer but a rhetorical question which was so utterly blunt because he knows as a learned man what it is meant to be righteous. He asks her “Have you ever wondered why such a fine man like your husband joined with the Kauravas?”(KW,62). Thus he hushed her hunger for justice.

            Many of the earlier epic renderings were only an eulogy of the deeds of Kauravas. But the latest generation has started using their rational intelligence in discerning righty and wrong. They dared to portray he lopsided part of the epics too. What the epics have done is not a worthy massage of peace as it is expected of but the absurd idea of marginalization instead. The incidents quoted above are few evidences of the Epics’ proliferation of varna sastra. Here it may be necessary to quote Sashi Throor’s  mentioning of Hinduism in his book India from Midnight To The Millennium And Beyond:” I am prepared to concede that Hindu fanaticism –which ought to be a contradiction in terms, since we have no dogmas to be fanatical about--- its partly a reaction to other chauvinism”(59).  What more fanaticism did a religion need than what is called the varna sastra. It is perhaps the Hindu religion which has the worse dogma namely a varna sastra which the epics advocate. No religion belittles and segregates their fellow beings so adversely like the Hindu religion said in the epics.  It says a person’s merit is determined by his birth .The aim of the research article is not to find fault with the Hindu religion altogether but what the religion has been turned out to be. If the epics were real incidents that happened in some remote past, there is no doubt that it initiated the present practice of marginalization. If it were mere myths even then it marks the onset of marginalization. For it is earliest known record evidencing the idea of social hierarchy.

Primary source:

Kane,Kavita.Karna’s Wife:The Outcast Queen.New Delhi:Rupa Publication,2013 print.

Secondary source:

Tharoor,Shashi.India From Midnight To The Millennium And Beyond. New Delhi:Penguin Publishers, 2007print.