Book Review – Draupadi: India’s First Daughter

Source – goodreads.com

‘She had been fighting battles since she was born; it was just the battlefields that kept changing periodically. But that moment, she strongly believed in avenging those lecherous men for the humiliation she was meted out.’

‘Draupadi: India's First Daughter' is a mythological fiction novel, based around the Mahabharata War. While there exists a decent number of books in the market on this subject, what makes this book stand out is how this shows the war from the main female protagonist's point of view.

‘Draupadi' signifies the inner turmoil, dilemma, and hardships the princess of Panchal faced during the Mahabharata War. This war is remembered as 'the war for a woman's honour'. But there is only a limited amount of literature from any woman's point of view on this war. The author has given his best effort to make that happen through his work.

About The Author

Source – amazon.in

Vamshi Krishna is a software engineer in Bangalore, who plays the part of a writer at night. Most of his time is spent coding or writing. He is an alumnus of IIT-BHU and hails from a small town in Telangana.

He claims that he came across 'Mahabharata' only a few months before penning down 'Draupadi: India’s First Daughter’. When he was gaining more and more knowledge regarding this epic, he found himself to be in complete awe of Draupadi and her story. The inspiration he drew from her story led to him starting to work on this novel.

His debut fiction novel 'Zero Not Out', is a love story inspired by his real-life incidents. Apart from this, he enjoys reading about cricket, love, women, and failure stories.

Draupadi: India’s First Daughter

This story, as mentioned earlier, revolves around the times of Mahabharata. The interesting twist here is that this book is written by a man from a woman's point of view, which gives the reader a general curiosity to know how well the author understood the female protagonist of this epic.

I tend to believe the writer has done a tremendous job in understanding a woman's point of view, not only limited to the epic but also extending to general happenings in our lives.

He depicted how she was caged with the terms like wife, daughter, mother, daughter-in-law, sister, friend, and so on. Yet, she managed to shine through it all, claiming her throne as a queen of the greatest kingdom of that time.

Where It All Started

While the story of Draupadi starts while her birth from the holy fire, the book starts its journey from the time when Draupadi got married to Arjuna after he won the Sawayamvara (a method of marriage in which a woman chose a man as her husband from a group of suitors), but the Pandav prince was ordered to share his ‘winning’ with his brothers like he always does.

By the time Queen Kunti realized her mistake, it was too late. Here, Draupadi stood, thinking about what went wrong in the past few hours. She thought about how she was a princess a few hours ago, and now she was in a small cottage, where everyone slept after putting a question mark on the life she will be living ahead.

While this is the starting point of this book, the author tends to circle back to various key moments of Draupadi’s life at certain intervals throughout the book.

Based On Instinct

As Draupadi is the female protagonist of the Mahabharata epic, it is hard for anyone to decipher what was going on in her mind during those times. But the author has tried his best to inculcate the element of female instinct in this book, to make it more relatable.

Most of the book is about Draupadi's conversations with herself, analyzing the family she's been married into, looking at and observing her five husbands, and so.

A very beautiful friendship has been portrayed between Shri Krishna and Draupadi in this book. It shows how Shri Krishna was her only comfort corner; he was that one person with whom she was able to have an honest talk.

Breaking Stereotypes

The author has tried to portray Draupadi to be a woman ahead of her time. While during the earlier ages, women were treated as secondary to their husbands, Draupadi seemed to have an identity beyond her marriage with the Pandavas.

She vocalized her opinions and beliefs, making her stand out from all the women from those times. While she was the center of all conspiracies of the kingdom, she was able to endure the pain and rise from it as a stronger woman.

The book showcases an interesting take on various events of the epic, making it a crisp yet fulfilling read.

The recommendation of this book goes to anyone with an interest in mythology and fiction. This book can be a good weekend companion, as it is not an elaborate read.

Overall Rating- 3.5/5

Written by – Simran Mahon