Women from purana

In Indian mythology, five women are often referred to as icons to venerate. They are Ahilya, Sita, Tara, Draupadi and Mandodari. Each has played an important role in the puranas or epics of Indian heritage literature and each is assigned qualities which have been held up to generations of women as ideals. Interestingly, the 5 women have been associated with the 5 elements, showing once again that Indian religious thought and culture are both indelibly identified with nature and man’s inexorable relationship with the environment.

Ahilya, wife of the sage Gautam, was turned into a stone because of a curse from her husband. She was brought to her original human form by a touch of Ram’s feet when he came upon the ashram of Gautam during his banishment to the forest. Ahilya is associated with the element of wind and her story is enshrined in the Ramayan. Sita, the heroine of the Ramayan, is the wife of Ram and the daughter of Janaka, the king of Mithila.

Legend says that she was found in a chest buried underground during a digging operation by the king. At the end of her story in the Ramayan, she rejected Ram’s offer to return from her unjust banishment to become the empress of Ram’s kingdom. Instead, she chose to return to her mother, the earth. The name Sita means ‘the one found during ploughing’. Tara, the daughter of space, is also featured in the Ramayan.

She is the wife of Sugriva, the monkey king. Sugriva’s brother, Vali usurped his kingdom as well as his wife until Ram, during his stay in the forest, killed Vali, rescued Tara and reinstated Sugriva as the king of Kishkindha. However, there is some confusion in the identity of Tara as one of the panchkanyas. Tara, the wife of king Harischandra, an ancestor of Ram is also considered to be an elemental woman. So is Tara, the celestial wife of Brihaspati or Jupiter.

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Draupadi, the heroine of the epic Mahabharat, was born of the holy fire and therefore is often called Yagnaseni. A fiery woman with a golden complexion, she had a temperament which denoted anger, revenge and total devotion to the path of virtue. She caused her husbands, the Pandavas, to kill all the Kauravas during the Kurukshetra war that destroyed the Kuru dynasty completely.

Draupadi’s humiliation, when the Kauravas disrobed her in their court, is the subject of many dance dramas, musical compositions and devotional songs. Her saviour, Krishna, who gave her divine garments which protected her during the ordeal, is always seen as her friend and protector. Mandodari is the wife of Ravan, the king of Lanka, who abducted Sita. Though married to a wicked tyrant, Mandodari, who represents the water element, stuck to what she thought to be right and was vindicated when Ram reached Lanka after a protracted war in which Ravan was killed and led her to self-realisation and salvation.

These five women, known as the panchkanyas, are remembered by all women and venerated in devotional gatherings.

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