(A Story)
(Rendered by the Author from Kannada)
The news that Savi had lost her life in battle in
Bagiyur was brought to the king in his camp at Bankapur by Madhav, Savi’s
brother.
It was nothing new to the king to hear news of
death. War and battle had filled a great part of his life, and death was an old
acquaintance. Yet the news of this niece’s death grieved him deeply.
Savi, born niece, had grown as daughter to
Marasimha. Marasimha lost his wife while still young and had developed
indifference to personal happiness. But being a king he had to perform his
duty; he had, therefore, remained as protector of his realm. In order that the
line might not end with him, he decided to take a child of his sister Jabavve
in adoption. Jabavve was then in child and bore this girl some time later. The
king adopted the girl as his child and brought her up.
In the hands of this ascetic and heroic uncle, Savi
had received a boy’s training. As a young girl, she lived with the foster-father
in his camps and grew up breathing the air of fights and skirmishes. As a girl
of twelve, she went out with young men of the royal clan and proved the equal
and superior of boys of her age, in riding horses, in shooting an arrow, in
slaying a wild beast. Marasimha would fill with pride to think, once that this
niece of his was a later incarnation of Chitrangada of Manipur, again that she
was Durga, slayer of the demon Mahisha, accepting birth in the lineage of the
Gangas.
When Savi was sixteen years old, the king desired
to see her married. There were several suitable young men in the king’s own
clan. Asked if she would marry one of them, Savi told her foster-father that
she would fight them in single combat and marry the one whom she liked best.
The king got these young men to the palace yard one
day, and told them that a young knight had come from a neighbouring province
and wished to joust with them, and asked them to be prepared for the fight.
They agreed.
Attired in man’s clothes and with a mask that
concealed her identity, Savi came from the guests house of the palace and stood
in the yard. Four of the young men fought her one after another and withdrew
beaten. Loka, son of a cousin of the king, alone of them, stood his ground
before the stranger knight and came off successful.
The very moment the masked stranger removed the
mask and walk towards the victorious Loka.
The elders who had assembled to see the fight were
astonished beyond measure. Marasimha alone showed no surprise. He walked up to Loka
and, pointing towards Savi, asked, ‘What do you say to marrying this girl?”
Loka had before this seen Savi and felt in love
with her. But how could he desire the foster-daughter of his king? So he had
remained silent. Now his desire was reaching fulfillment of its own motion. To
the king’s question he stated in reply: “What else can I say? You are gracious
and it is my good fortune.”
Lok Vidyadhar and Sravaki Devi were married. The
father celebrated the marriage with right royal splendour.
This was four years ago.
Just one month ago, news came to the king that two
enemy clans from the north had joined to prosecute their feud with him and had
started to move against his territory. Immediately on receipt of the news, the
king sent messages of warning to the camps guarding the boundary and appointed
commanders to lead the defence units. Loka had come forward to lead the unit
which moved to Bagiyur.
Marasimha was the hero of a hundred battles.
Fighting was to him like the breath of his nostril. As one who knew no fear
himself, he knew not what it was to fear for others. A fight brought its
chances and, whatever the issue, the good fighter won. So he had sent many a
youth to battle and never hesitated. He had before this sent even Loka to a
fight or two. But this time, unknown to himself, his heart sank from sending
him to Bagiyur. Marasimha knew at once the reason for this reluctance. Loka was
Savi’s beloved. But it would not be consistent with kingly duty to keep a
soldier back from the front because he was the king’s son-in-law. It certainly
was not the way of the Gangas; and even more definitely not the way of
Marasimha, famed for unshakable courage as the adamantine king. What then was
to be done? Loka having offered to go to the fight, the king could only agree.
By the time that Marasimha came to this conclusion, Savi came up to her father
and begged for permission to accompany her husband when he started for Bagiyur.
Like Loka’s going to a fight, Savi’s going with an
army was also no new affair. Yet the king hesitated before acceding to her
request. She would now be going with her husband, and that too when he had to
lead the fight. Might it not affect his conduct? If occasion arose to risk
death in the fight, might not the thought of the beloved wife in the camp
weaken the commander’s resolution? Supposing it did, what should happen to his
troop?
Almost as if she could follow her father’s thought
even as he was thinking it, Savi said, “I do not accompany your son-in-law just
to stay in the camp. I propose to go with him to the fight. You brought me up
as a son; send me out to the fight as you would a son. If we win, we both win.
If we do not, even that to us is, victory. Please send us both, and send us
cheerfully.”
The king could feel no cheer. True enough he had
brought up the girl to live as a boy. But had he brought her up to die as a
boy? The God of Fights took king’s sons as sacrifice. When did he ever take
daughters?
If the daughter had been some one else, the king’s
decision might have been different. But when that daughter was Savi? To be like
other women, why should a daughter be so high-souled? God knew his own plans.
He had got her brought up so. How would He end her? Let Him do as seemed proper
to Him. If it was open to save her in the fight, and send her back, well and
happy, He would even do so.
Marasimha thought for a while and decided in this
sense. He sent Loka and Savi with one troop to Bagiyur and himself started for
the boundary in the direction of Bankapur. This was one month ago, and today
this news had come.
Within a day or two of his arriving at Bankapur,
the king had bad omens. Not knowing why, he somehow connected them with the
life of his foster-daughter. Something within him made him expect bad news of
her one of these days.
The enemy did not approach the boundary on the side
of Bankapur. He kept at some distance. The king stationed Rachamalla, a
captain, at the boundary and, till such time as his personal presence might be
required there, stayed in camp at Bankapur and listened to the teachings of
Ajit Sen Bhattarak, the royal preceptor.
For one month he had listened to the truth about
pain and death, life and mind, path and goal, in the teacher’s exposition. He
had put questions and receive explanations and reached conclusions. Today those
conclusions were found to be of use.
The king asked Madhava to describe to him the
manner of Savi’s’ death. The brother told the story weeping, reluctantly
dwelling on the details.
Four days ago an enemy troop approached Bagiyur.
The Ganga troop moved from its camp and advanced towards it and attacked it. At
its head were Loka and Savi. Madhava himself was stationed on a side of the
moving column.
The battle waged for long, and it looked as if the
Ganga army should win. But, suddenly from the opposite side an elephant rushed
on Loka’s troop and Loka’s horse took fright. Loka had to restrain his horse,
and for a short interval could not guard himself; in that interval a man in the
enemy troop aimed two arrows at him and seriously wounded him.
Loka dropped down. A shout arose in the troop and
news ran to Madhava that Loka had fallen.
Though one captain fell down, the troop kept up the
advance and keeping the fallen leader and Savi in the centre, checked the onset
of the enemy.
Madhav reached the spot where Loka had fallen and
suggested to Savi that they might convey the wounded man to the rear of the
troops. Savi said, “If he were conscious, he would not agree to such a
proposal. Merely because he is unconscious, we cannot stain him with such
impropriety. Let the troop keep up the advance. You stay with your brother. I
shall go forward and push the enemy back and return.”
Madhav stayed beside Loka, and Savi moved on to the
front.
Again there was a shout of dismay. The very same or
some other elephant had made another rush on the Ganga troops. Savi’s horse had
taken fright this time and jumped back. Savi tried to stop it and encourage it,
but before she could do anything, it had come to where her husband was lying.
Savi was then able to sooth her horse and turn it
back and go forward.
Again on a sudden that elephant appeared in front.
The trooper seated upon it let fly an arrow at Savi.
Madhav involuntarily cried out, “Stay, you coward!
Should you not be ashamed to shoot at a woman!”
The shout should have reached the trooper’s ear.
For, he did not shoot another arrow. But the one he had shot earlier had
entered Savi’s side and was firmly fixed there. Savi fell from her horse, and
moving towards her husband’s foot, touched it with her hands.
Loka was not dead. But it did not look as if he
could live. Savi asked Madhav to come near and to give her a little casket,
which she had in the fold of her cloth near her waist. Madhav did not know what
the casket contained. He thought it must be some medicine which she wished to
give to Loka. When, however, she put the contents into her own mouth, it struck
him that it must be some poison.
In the meanwhile the Ganga, troop had rallied and
attacked the elephant and turned it back. The battle front had moved back a
hundred yards again.
Swallowing the contents of the casket, Savi turned
her eyes for just a moment towards where her husband lay and closed them;
touched her brother’s chin and put her hand to her lips; and made a last
gesture to him as if she would say, “Take care of Loka.”
The poison should have been very virulent; for,
within a few minutes Savi’s body had grown cold.
At the end of those minutes, Loka became conscious.
Opening his eyes, he asked, “Where is Savi?”
Madhav made no answer. He looked at Savi’s corpse
and wept in helplessness.
“Is she dead” asked Loka. Madhav signaled assent.
Loka pointed to the arrows in his body and said to
his brother-in-law, “Pull these out.”
Madhav said, “Let the Vaid come. He can stanch the wound.
Then we shall pull the arrows out.”
Loka said, “She thought I had gone, and died that I
might not be alone. If I do not go, she will miss me and grieve. Come, brother,
pull these out and do not delay. Pull them out and go with the troop. Return when
the enemy has been beaten back. Come, come, be quick.”
Madhav did not know how to disobey Loka’s behest.
He pulled out the arrows and his brother-in-law’s life.
The enemy was beaten and retreated. The Ganga army
won the battle. Only, Loka and Savi had died in the battle.
To this story which his nephew detailed with such
reluctance, the king gave ear in the deepest pain. He felt as if, in Savi’s
death, he himself had ceased to live. The child whom he had reared with his own
hand, the breath which he had tended, the life which he thought would one day
watch him close is eyes, alas! that it should thus have closed and made him
watch! For him to live longer would not be life.
The teaching that the king had listened to for a
whole month, of the truth about life and death, about joy and sorrow, about how
to live above life and death, and above joy and pain, bore its fruit today.
Savi, the child whom he had brought up, had shown the king, by the manner of
her death, the course that was proper to him in this hour of unbearable sorrow.
The Bhattarak had said, “In sorrow that knows no
relief, it is permissible to end one’s life.” Such sorrow had come to the king.
Marasimha decided on Sallekhana. He went to the Guru and told him of his
decision and received his approval. He began his fast to death very day, and
three days later placed his life on the lap of nature.
To Savi in heaven, with her husband’s love, the
love of her father also became available. On earth a monumental stone recorded
her heroic end for the admiration of mankind:
“In Shravakadharma she was like Revati who knew no
peer; in goodness she was Sita’s self; for beauty Devaki, and in dignity
Arundhati; in devotion to Jinendra, Savi Abbe was the equal of the tutelary
deity of the Jain agama.”