The final blow to Pandavas by Duryodhana.

The final blow to Pandavas by Duryodhana.

As Duryodhana was lying in death bed Aswathama and his uncle Kirubar met him. Aswathama was already seething with anger thinking about the death of his father by deceit and now seeing his friend Duryodhana dying slowly in the pond and swore to kill all the Pandavas on that night.

Duryodhana was very happy and made him the commander of whatever of left of his army and his kingdom. In the night both Aswathama and Kirubar went to the tents of the Pandavas and killed all in their sleep except the five Pandavas, and burnt their tents. They went back to Duryodhana and told him about the killing and destruction they have carried out. Listening to their infamous and cowardly act Duryodhana was so happy and appreciated their deed by saying that what they had accomplished was not done by any of his generals and died as a happy man.

The next day he Pandavas came to terrible grief and went and found the hiding Aswathama and brought him for justice. Then Krishna said that killing him is not worth but remove the precious stone from his head and let him go and live like a SANDALA (a devil) wandering the world for ever. And from that day Aswathama is wandering the world alone without death.

Death of Duryodhana

Death of Duryodhana

After the death of Karna Duryodhana was terribly  sad and was crestfallen . Defeat was staring at him. At that time Kirubar, the brother in law of Drona came and advised him to stop the war and come to agreement with the Pandavas as he has lost everything and is more or less left alone.  All His ninety nine brothers and his brother in law Jayathradhan and all his friends and relatives had been killed. He had only Salliyan and His uncle Sakuni who were also successfully killed one after the other when they led the army of the Kauravas. Finally Duryodhana was left alone defeated and humiliated.   He was left with nothing as no warrior, no army and no single soldier was left for him to fight. So he took his mace and went to a pool and hid inside it. But the Pandavas came there in search of him and called him out of the pool to come and fight.

Duryodhana was completely defeated and said that he came to cool himself from fatigue and did not run away like a coward and he asked Yudhishtra to take the Kingdom and rule it as he had lost all his desire to live and rule.

But Yudhishtra did not agree as he said “since you  refused to give us even a place on the end of a needle to live and you disgraced Draupadi, got her pulled by her hair when she was on her periods  and who was your own cousin’s  wife whom you should have respected and so you have to come out and fight for your life and honour.”

As he has no other way to defend himself Duryodhana got up and called the Pandavas to come and fight him one by one and go to hell. He also said as he was wounded and tired all should not join and fight him.

Then Yudhishtra asked him”if fighting one by many is not justice then how you all joined and killed an unarmed Abhimanyu? So justice will come only for you? So come and fight and die like a true warrior. You select one among us to fight and die”.

Duryodhana finally came out of the water and chose Bheema to fight  with mace as the chosen weapon as both were famous fighters with mace. They started fighting and the fight went on for some time.

Then Krishna said “Beema would kill Duryodhana by hitting him at his thighs as he had taken a vow to kill him so when Draupadi was asked by him to sit on the thighs of Duryodhana, there by hinting to Bheema to do so as hitting at the thighs was against the rules of mace fight.

Hearing Krishna’s words Bheema hit Duryodhana on his thighs and wounded him seriously and he fell down to die a slow death. Bheem danced on his body and stomped on it. Duryodhana wriggled in the mud with pain and Krishna stopped Bheema saying that “being your own relative and from the royal family you should not do this “ and stopped him from further humiliating Duryodhana.

They left Duryodhana to die in the pool. He died but before dying got a promise from Aswathama to kill all Pandavas when they were sleeping.

Death Of Karna

Death of Karna.

After the  death of Dronachcharya, Duryodhana made Karna as the Commander  of his army to lead it against the Pandavas.  

Karna and Arjun fought a very fierce battle.  Karna fired a very powerful arrow which went like a poisonous snake and Lord Krishna pressed the chariot down and saved Arjun from this attack. Salliyan who was the Charioteer  of  Karna had an argument as his advise to Karna about fighting was not agreed to by Karna and hence he left the chariot and went away. Arjun also attacked Karna and made him suffer. At this time Karna’s chariot got stuck in the mud and did not move. Karna got down from his chariot and tried to lift it. He told Arjun not to continue fighting as he was lifting the chariot out of the mud.

But Lord Krishna chided him saying “Karna now you are talking of stopping the fight and wait for you to recover your chariot. But did you and the other warriors like Drona, Duryodhana, Dhussadhana and others  waited and where  did your dharma went when you all joined and killed Abhimanyu when he was on the ground without arms and ammunition and was so tired after fighting many of you? He was a little boy and you all were grown up men. When did you respect Dharma when you killed him? So when you want Dharma you should get it?” “You asked Draupathi to come and sit on  Duryodhanas lap and helped him to dishonour  Draupadi. You also abused her. You along with Sakuni and Duryodhana cheated Yudhishtra in the play of Sadhuranka (chess).  You also helped Duryodhana when he refused to give back the Kingdom to the Pandavas after their thirteen years of life in the forests.  You also helped Duryodhana to murder the Pandava brothers when they were sleeping in the house of wax. Where was your talk of Dharma then?” . 

Karna had no answers for this. Krishna asked Arjuna to continue to fight.

Karna wanted to use the holy weapons of Parasurama, but he could not recall them due to the curse of Parasurama. Karna went to Parasurama to get his sacred weapons. But Parasurama took only Brahmins as his disciple. So (Karna duped Parasurama by lying and learnt  the use of his weapons. But Parasurama discovered his lie and cursed him that, at the time of war he would forget the use of those weapons.)

Listening to this Karna has no reply to Krishna’s outburst and he continued fighting from the ground. He tried to lift the Chariot when Arjun was wounded by his arrow and then Krishna asked Arjuna to kill him. So Arjun  fired an arrow which killed Karna, one of the greatest  warriors of that time and history.

So Karna was killed by again deceit. Karana was the most pitiable of all characters in the Mahabarata as he was  deserted as a baby by his own mother Kunti as she was not married at that time, adopted by a low caste man and had to live the infamy of that caste stamp, cheated by the curse of Parasurama, deserted my his own charioteer Salliyan in the battle field, again his mother Kunti came and took a vow from him to not to kill any of the Pandavas  except Arjun as they were his own brothers and  also a promise that he would not fire the famous arrow of Lord Shiva on Arjun more than once.  Devendra the celestial father of Arjun took away his armour shield and ear studs which was born with him and were such famous protection against his death and were  given by his God  father the SURYA. All this has joined and killed Karna.

But as a last wish of him Kunti came to the battlefield after learning the death of Karna and cried over his body as it was the last wish of Karana which made the other Pandavas to realize that Karna was their own elder brother.

Death of Dronachcharya by lie

Dronachcharya’s death.

Drona  (Dronachcharya) was the commander and general of the Kauravas after the death of Bheeshma who was killed by Arjun with Sikandi as a shield, as Bheeshma could never be vanquished because of his holy birth and his prowess as a great warrior. Sikandi being a woman in his previous birth , Bheeshma did not attack him as he could not fight a woman even in the previous birth. In addition Sikandi as Amba in his previous birth had took the new birth to avenge her shame by Bheeshma. So Bheeshma was killed by the relentless arrows of Arjuna and  fell down in the battle ground. He could  die as per his wish and hence he waited for the auspicious time to die in the battle field.

Dronachcharya took the leadership of the Kaurava army and led it to destroy the Pandava’s army and many were killed by him and he could not be stopped by even Arjun. So lord Krishna devised a plan to kill him. Dronachcharya was very fond of his only son, Aswathama and told Yudhishtra that “this Brahmin (Drona) would not die as he had powerful arms and also he was so talented a warrior and hence could be killed only by deceit. Hence he told Bheema to tell a lie that Aswathama was killed in the battle field. Yudhishtra was initially not willing to tell this lie and did not agree but Krishna said that if Drona had to be killed this lie had to be told. 

So Bheema killed an elephant named Aswathama and loudly cried ‘Aswathama was killed”.  Hearing this Drona was shocked and asked Yudhishtra whether this was true as he believed that Yudhishtra would not tell a lie? Yudhishtra said “Yes it is true and that Bheema killed the Aswathama, the elephant.” But when he said ‘the elephant ‘ he just mumbled the words so that nobody heard it.   Yudhishtr’a chariot  which was always going a little up on the ground by a few inches suddenly touched the ground after he uttered this lie. Hearing the words of his son’s death from none other than Yudhishtra who was not supposed to tell any lie to anyone and never said lies in his life, Drona was astounded with grief and dropped his bow and arrow and sat on his chariot. Then Lord Krishna asked Arjun to continue the fight and Arjun went on shooting arrows on his former Guru (teacher). In the mean time  Dhrishathumnan who was born to kill Drona climbed his chariot and killed him by stabbing him with his sword. Drona died on the battlefield in a treacherous manner. Drona, the son of the famous sage Bharadwaja  died and his athma (soul)  went to the heaven.

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The death of Jayathradhan

Jayathradhan was the son of  Vruththrashathran who was the king of Sindh. He did lots of penances and yagha and got a son and named him as Jayathradhan. When  Jayathradhan was born a voice came from heaven which said that “ this boy  would be very famous and well-known warrior but would be killed by his head removed from his body and would go to Heaven by a very famous Kshatriya warrior.” 

Vruththrashathran even though knew that all those who were born had to die got angry and cursed “The man who kills my son and throws his head on the earth would have his head blown to pieces and would die.”

After Jayathradhan attained age his father  Vruththrashathran gave him the kingdom and went to forest to do penance.

When Jayathradhan came to know of the vow Arjuna had taken to kill Jayathrathan the next day before sun light goes, he remembered the the Voice from above and was frightened of death. He went to Duryodhana and said that he would go back home and would not fight. But Duryodhana consoled him and assured him of the power of Drona, Bheeshma, Karna and many other warriors  generals of his who would do anything to protect him from Arjuna and would save him as Arjuna, if he could not kill Jayathradhan on that day’s evening, he would commit suicide. This was good news to Duryodhana, as if Jayathradha was protected for that day, the death of Arjuna was sure. This had made Jayathradhan  brave and agreed to fight .

Duryodhana called Drona and told them to do everything to protect Jayathradhan in any way so that if Arjuna could not kill him within that evening he would die of his own. 

Drona did arrange his army and chariots under the able leadership of Karna, Poorsivaras,  Asvathama, Salliyan, Kirubar and other generals  and a lot of soldiers under their command so that nobody could come near Jayathradhan.

First  Duryodhana’s brother  Dhurmarshnan called out to Arjuna to come and fight him. Arjuna took the call and fought with him . He and another brother of him Duchchadhanan were defeated by Arjuna and they withdrew. Drona now faced Arjuna. Arjuna asked his permission to move on and kill Jayathradhan but Drona did not allow him and asked him to fight him. Arjuna just went past him thus avoiding him as he could not defeat him in war. 

  Arjuna went on defeating many which included Krudhvarma, Sudhatshinana , Surudhayitha and many others.  Surudhayitha threw his mace on lord Krishna and it turned back and came and hit him as he used it to kill a man of no armaments as per a curse. His mother Parnasai  had requested  Lord Varuna to protect her son from all enemies and could never be killed by anybody. Varuna liked her but said “I would give a very powerful  mace to him but if he used it on any man without any arms or ammunition it would return  back and kill him.”

Duryodhana fought with Arjuna and wearing the shield of Drona he was not getting hit so Arjuna hit him where the shield was not protecting him and he was injured heavily and moved out. One by one all the Generals of Kauravas came and fought Arjuna including Karna, Poorisavasu,

 Aswaththaama,kirubar,salliyan,salan, Virushsenan and  Jayathradhan came in their chariots and fought Arjuna. The fighting went on for a very long time. Then it was getting dark and evening was approaching with sun getting set. Duryodhana and the Kauravas were very happy as they knew that If Arjuna could not kill Jayathradhan that evening then Arjuna will kill himself. Jayathradhan was hiding behind the other generals.

Seeing this  Krishna made the sun disappear in clouds and thinking that the sun had set Jayathradhan came out and challenged Arjuna and all Kauravas cheered him. Immediately Krishna  allowed the Sun to be seen again. Then Arjuna sent an arrow and killed him by beheading him and Lord Krishna asked him to sent the head to his father as the head if falls on the floor of the earth then the person who dropped the head would have his head blasted. So Arjuna sent another arrow and took the head and carried it to the lap of Vruththrashathran who was doing penance. When Vruththrashathran saw something falling on his lap he got up and the head fell down and immediately Vruththrashathran’s head blasted into many pieces. Thus Arjuna’s vow was achieved and his life saved and Jayathrathan was killed.Duryodhana felt very sad as he lost his trusted friend, general and his brother-in-law as his sister was married to Jayathradhan