The Fall of Bhagadatta
Much of Bhagadatta’s strength was represented by Supratika, his elephant, huge and very strong, with the ferocious temperament of a lion and who had never been forced to retreat in combat; alone he wreaked the same havoc as his beloved master. Using his tusks, trunk and legs and trumpeting loudly, just like Airavata, Indra’s elephant, he spread terror wherever he passed.
Supratika seemed to have a particular dislike for Bhima. In fact, wherever he encountered him, he charged him immediately. And when they came near him, he attacked him, crushing the chariot and horses under his legs; Bhima only managed to escape for a split second, so much so that no one saw him jump away. So many said:
“Bhima is dead; Supratika killed him!”
Hearing the soldiers give that news, the king of Dasharna ran with his elephant and resumed the duel that was repeated periodically almost every day. But the result was no different from the other times: unfortunately he was forced to retire.
Then Bhagadatta, seeing that Satyaki was not far away, pushed the animal against him, which was saved by a miracle of agility.
When the rumors that he was dead had become quite insistent, Bhima emerged from the dust, with his club raised, determined to destroy the ferocious animal. This twist made the friends present breathe a sigh of relief.
And the two found themselves facing each other again; Supratika wrapped Bhima in his trunk and lifted him off the ground with the intention of throwing him down. The elephant bellowed with fury. But at the last moment the Pandava managed to extricate himself and jump down avoiding the deadly impact with the ground; after which, with very agile moves, he managed to dodge the paws and hit him repeatedly under the belly, making him exasperate with pain.
Bhagadatta intervened and managed to chase him away from that position, but then he saw Abhimanyu running against him and had to neglect his battle against Bhima. And Supratika managed to embarrass even the young son of Arjuna, who managed to save himself by jumping off the chariot.
Thus, while his elephant tormented those great generals down below, from above the glorious Bhagadatta, who for his greatness of soul and his valor was nicknamed “the friend of Indra”, slaughtered his enemies with spears and arrows. Those two seemed invulnerable, no weapon seemed to cause them real concern.
During those moments Arjuna returned from the front after having put the samsaptakas to flight. From a distance he heard the clamor of the terrible fight.
“Krishna, my friend, listen to these noises and screams of fear. These mighty trumpets belong to Supratika, the elephant of the king of Prajyotisha, Bhagadatta. I know both of them well. When they have entered the battle with an excited soul, they become practically invulnerable and capable of causing inconceivable turmoil. Our troops in that area are in very serious danger. We must hurry because they could exterminate them. I really believe that today, unfortunately, we will be forced to kill the elderly and noble warrior.”
Krishna spurred the horses to their maximum speed.
Arriving in the vicinity, Arjuna was about to invite Bhagadatta to start a duel against him, when they were joined by the samsaptakas, rearranged by Susharma. Worried about the fate of his brother, of whom he had never heard from and the damage that Bhagadatta could cause, Arjuna was faced with a dilemma: accept the challenge or not? Recommended by Krishna, the Pandava used the vajra, Indra’s favorite deadly weapon, with which he achieved a frightening effect on the enemy troops. He wounded Susharma, killed another of his brothers and decimated his soldiers, then Arjuna continued the race towards the enemy.
When the allies saw him coming, they greeted him with loud shouts of joy, confident that by now the danger posed by Bhagadatta would be averted by the latter. Obviously the mood of the Kauravas suffered a sharp decline.
After quickly making a vacuum around himself, the Pandava threw himself against Bhagadatta.
The duel between the two was wonderful, thrilling, truly spectacular. At a certain point, seeing every weapon fail, the king of Prajyotisha, angry, took the stick he usually used to guide the elephant and, having pronounced the mantra of Vishnu, threw it at the opponent; when everyone saw the weapon dart through the air with the speed and power of lightning, they said:
“Arjuna is dead.”
But at the last moment Krishna placed himself in the trajectory of the weapon that stuck in his chest, right where he had the wonderful kaustubha jewel: as soon as it touched the body of the Lord, the staff turned into a garland of flowers, which even seemed to increase his grace and his glory.
Arjuna was safe, but slightly annoyed.
“Krishna, why did you do this? You were not supposed to take an active part in the fight, so you promised,” he seemed to scold him.
“Maybe I shouldn’t have done that,” Krishna replied with a smile, “but this weapon once belonged to me. Also before throwing it, Bhagadatta offered it to me, so it’s only fair that I took it back. Only by accident the king of Prajyotisha had come into possession of this deadly weapon, which could have killed anyone, including you. But now that he is impulsively deprived of it, he and Supratika have become vulnerable. Now you can kill them”.
And the duel raged again with terrible violence.
Seizing a suitable moment, Arjuna applied all his strength to an arrow and hurled it at Supratika’s head, penetrating it. The blow caused a thunder-like noise and brought down the majestic animal, which fell lifeless to the ground. Very quickly Arjuna, taking an arrow with a crescent point, aimed it at Bhagadatta’s chest and hit him in full. The brave warrior fell dead next to his elephant.
Seeing him now lifeless, Arjuna got off the chariot and paid his respects to the noble monarch.
The death of Bhagadatta struck a severe blow on the morale of the Kauravas, who swerved dramatically.
In the wake of the excitement of victory, Arjuna returned to the center of the battlefield, where he was intercepted by two of Shakuni’s sons. Within minutes they were both lying in a pool of blood.
With tears in his eyes for that sudden and unexpected tragedy Shakuni, eager for revenge, ran. But he was only able to resist for a short time in front of the Pandava, before being forced into a stampede. In that vast area, only the shrill sound of Gandiva’s string and the hiss of his arrows slashing through the air could be heard.
Seeing him in what appeared to be a state of warrior grace, Bhima, Satyaki, Dhristadyumna, Abhimanyu, Nakula, Sahadeva, Shikhandi and the sons of Draupadi joined him and the destruction caused by those reinforcements became unspeakable.
Seeing that group of heroes gathered in the same spot on the field, Drona thought that the situation was becoming too dangerous for them, and tried to divide them. But Dhristadyumna managed to push him back.
In the course of those battles, another great friend of the Pandavas, the virtuous Nila, prince of Mahishmati, lost his life at the hands of Asvatthama.
Nila’s death saddened and angered the Pandavas, who launched a mass attack, unsustainable for the Kauravas. In the total chaos that ensued, the soldiers could not distinguish enemies from allies; it was even impossible to understand what the opponent of the moment was doing.
At sunset Arjuna and Karna, found themselves facing each other, engaged in a delicious duel, which had to be interrupted due to the darkness of the evening. It was Drona who gave the signal for retreat.
It had been a terrible day, many good warriors had fallen; but the one who had most impressed had been Arjuna. He had decimated the samsaptakas; he had succeeded in eliminating Bhagadatta and his elephant; alone he had destroyed entire battalions of fearless soldiers: in the Kaurava camp only he was talked about. Duryodhana was shocked by what he had seen. So Drona tried to pacify him.
“Don’t worry,” he told him. “Tomorrow will be our day. I believe that I will organize our armies in the most impenetrable of formations: perhaps the chakra-vyuha, or even the padma-vyuha. So no one will be able to penetrate our ranks and if Arjuna is removed again, I promise you that I will capture Yudhisthira. But it is essential to drag both him and Krishna away, because they both know the art of penetrating these formations, and if they are there everything for us will result in disaster.”
Susharma, despite still suffering from the wounds Arjuna had inflicted on him, wanted to keep faith with the oath he had made the day before. He courageously declared himself ready to challenge the Pandava as long as only one of the Trigarta was alive.
That night Duryodhana slept peacefully, hoping that tomorrow would be the last day of the war.
This is a section of the book “Maha-bharata, Vol. 2”.
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