Word

Kunti

Sanskrit

कुंती

IAST

kunti

In General

Kunti is a strong and ideal motherly personality from Great epic Mahabharatha. She was the mother of Pandavas and wife of Pandu, the Kuruvamsa king. The King Kuntibhoja adopted her as daughter and hence got the name Kunti. Kuntibhoja was son of Surasenas’s sister. She was actually born to Surasena, a Yadava king and was sister of Vasudeva, the father of Sri Krishna. She was known as Pritha at her childhood. She is loyal and fully committed to family, suffered and shared all pain with her sons. She is pious and opted for Vanaprastha at her old age.

Kunti brought up and supported the Pandavas in all their difficult days till the Mahabharata War. Pandu and his second wife died when the children were so young; she never discriminated among her children and that of Madri’s. Kunti’s greatness lies in her involvement in nurturing good qualities in her children. She developed her first son, Yudhishtira to be an expert in Polity, Dharma and second one, the Bhimasena to be a mighty personality to protect the kingdom from all evil forces. Arjuna the third one is adventurous; he can lead forces to any citadel and defeat them. The fourth one Nakula is an expert in Jyothisa and other branches of knowledge. The last son Sahadeva was an expert in healthcare and logistics. These kinds of experts are essential for a kingdom to run successfully. The Kuntiputras, in turn proved that they are the most dharmic, successful, renowned, prosperous and progressive-thinking kingdom in the world of their time.

Purana

Once, Durvasa with his follower visited Kuntibhoja, the adoptive father of Kunti, the young Kunti was in charge of taking care of the sages. As a gratitude to her service Durvasa gave her a Mantra, which while repeating one can attract any God to give birth a child. Without much thinking about the consequences, the young, unmarried Kunti chanted Mantra for attracting Suryadevata. Surya at once appeared. Kunti tried her best to send him back, but Sun God was helpless as he cannot disobey the Mantra. Understanding Kunti’s position as an unmarried young girl, Suryadevata gave her the special capacity to deliver child through ear and keep her virginity. She delived the child in due course but, feared of keeping the child as her own, thus abandoned the boy in a floating box in river. The child was later known as Karna (born through ear). After her marriage with Pandu she used the Mantra again with permission of Pandu, as he was incapable of having a marital life with Kunti because of a curse. She attracted three God in succession, and had three children. Thus she had Dharmaputra from Dharmadeva, Bhimasena from Marut and Arjuna from Indra. Later she shared this special mantra with Madri, the second wife of Pandu and Madri eventually had two sons.

War become immanent Kunti felt restless as her son Karna is going to fight with the other five. She went alone to the banks of the Ganga where Karna use to have his morning prayers. Kunti waited for some time after which they began to talk. With tears in her eyes Kunti told Karna that he was her son and implored him to return to the Pandava side to which Karna replied as follows : "Oh ! noble lady, that is quite impossible. I have vowed to kill Arjuna. But because of your request, I will not kill the other four Pandavas. You shall always have five sons alive. If Arjuna were to be no more I would be there for you in his stead." Kunti shuddered at those terrible words of Kama, and thus did both of them part with each other. During the war Karna got chance to kill four of the Pandavas but he did not killed them for the promise he made to Kunti. When war was over she asked the Pandavas to perform the obsequies for Karna and let out the secret that Karna was her firstborn child. Dharmaputra burst into tears and Bhima become angry against her; Bhima cursed the entire womanhood for keeping secrets.

When the Great War at Kurukshetra was over, Sri Krishna approached Kunti and asked whether she want any help from him. She at once praised him as God and said, " let me and my sons have some difficulties. It is for the difficulties we have been able to remember the Lord and are worshiping you as Lord; We have received your kindness abundantly. If we would not have troubles, we would just forget you".

After the Mahabharatha Kunti consoled the entire womanhood in Hastinapura for all of them had lost either husband, son, father or all of them. Then she went along with grief-stricken, Dhrtarastra and Gandhari who started for the forest. The Pandavas prevented their mother from going, but she did not yield. After 6 years life in forest with single meal a day, all of them died in a forest fire.