Ghatotkacha

Ghatotkacha as a Boy

Ghatotkacha has always had to deal with the humans disliking him.  It began with how he was even named by his parents!  Ghatam means 'hairless' and Utkach means 'pot.'  Who names their child hairless pot?  This is just asking for everyone to pick on a child, even if Ghatotkacha actually does look like a hairless pot.  It's simply unfair!  His father is the great warrior Bhima, who is a Pandava, and his mother is the giantess Hidimbi.  Due to this unusual mixing of parentage, Ghatotkacha is a half-rakshasa.  This makes it even worse for Ghatotkacha.  Not only do the kids pick on him because of his name, they also pick on him because of his status as a half-rakshasa.  Then he can't even retaliate, because of the stigma about rakshasas, how they're bloodthirsty beasts constantly wanting to maim and destroy.

As Ghatotkacha grew, he learned more and more about how to deal with the humans.  It helped that he was so much bigger than they were.  He had inherited his mother's size, and his father's strength.  His father has been known to squeeze men and rakshasas to death, simply by hugging them.  Once Ghatotkacha learned of how much the humans were simply afraid of him, he mostly ignored them.  They just didn't seem that important to him anymore.  That isn't to say he wasn't still angry at the way he was treated, but he now took out his anger in training for war.  Ghatotkacha always presents himself as a humble and loyal figure, but at the same time, it is simply easier to appear humble.  He has learned that the best way to make the annoying people leave him alone is to act indifferent to them by not responding or even by being polite.

As Ghatotkacha continues to grow, he has gotten so large his father suggested he could even be a good fight for Karna and Arjuna, arguably the two greatest warriors of the age.  Ghatotkacha doesn't listen to his father when he says this.  While Bhima is his father, he truly felt no love towards him.  He didn't hate his father, but it was simply a matter of not caring since he was a human.  Ghatotkacha has long since stopped listening to humans, because of how they treated him.  Ghatotkacha has agreed to come to help his father and his father's followers whenever his father summons him, simply by thinking of him.  He does not do this out of love, but rather out of respect for his father as a warrior.

During the final battle between the Kauravas and the Pandavas, Ghatotkacha was summoned to fight for his father on the side of the Pandavas.  At this time, Ghatokacha unleashed all of his anger towards the humans, and slew many great warriors.  Eventually Karna himself was forced to face Ghatotkacha.  However, this battle was not easy even for Karna.  Despite being such a great warrior, he had to resort to using his sacred weapon that could only be used once.  Karna had been saving this weapon to use against his brother, Arjuna, in order to defeat him and finally defeat his rival.  However, Ghatotkacha was such a great force that Karna used the weapon in order to save the armies of the Kauravas.  While Ghatotkacha died in this battle, it can be said he was the winner of the war by forcing Karna to use his sacred weapon.  Even as Ghatotkacha lay dying from Karna's attack, he had never felt so at peace--due to finally unleashing his anger, he had been able to let go of petty words and had finally found peace in something other than the warrior's code.

Author's Note:  I found this story to be interesting because of how Ghatotkacha was a half-rakshasa.  We have had some half-rakshasa in the previous stories, but none of them have been important.  I enjoyed the previous writing style I employed so much that I decided to keep using it to see how well it works in other stories.  It is also a very useful writing style because it allows me to easily transition from one age to another.  These are such incredibly long lived stories at times that it can be difficult to think in terms of several centuries rather than several decades.  My goal with this specific story was to try and show the humanity of Ghatotkacha, and then the cruelty of the humans.  While Ghatotkacha was a rakshasa, he was frequently described as being very humble and incredibly loyal--not traits one would expect out of a bloodthirsty rakshasa.  However, humans are inordinately cruel towards things they do not like or understand.  Due to this, I wanted to show how Ghatotkacha was more of how a human should act, being humble and forgiving, whereas the humans were acting like a rakshasa, being cruel and malicious.  However, I didn't want to show Ghatotkacha to be a perfect being.  I wanted him to have anger, rage, and even hatred towards his life and perhaps even the lives of those around him.  This is why I decided to write him as kind of a pressure cooker mentality.  He will smile, and be nice to everyone around him, while the whole time it is simply building up to a massive explosion of rage that will quell even the strongest heart.  Unfortunately, I have little faith in the accuracy of this story.  This is without a doubt a complete re-telling in my words, and my words only.  The facts are the same: he was Bhima's son, he was at the final battle, and he was killed by Karna by forcing him to use his sacred weapon.  However, the story of how the humans verbally abused him is a creation all of my own.

Coverpage

Introduction

Story 1:  Ravana and Shiva

Story 2: Maricha

Story 4:  Karna and the Bee