Dronacharya's act was shameful, says SC

NEW DELHI: Dronacharya, Guru of Pandavas and Kauravas in the epic Mahabharata, came in for some harsh contemporary scrutiny in the Supreme Court, with the apex court terming as shameful his action in seeking the right thumb of tribal Eklavya to clear the way for his favourite, Arjun, to emerge as the best archer of the times.

"This was a shameful act on the part of Dronacharya. He had not even taught Eklavya, so what right had he to demand 'guru dakshina', and that too of the right thumb of Eklavya so that the latter may not become a better archer that his favourite pupil Arjun?", asked a bench comprising Justices Markandey Katju and Gyan Sudha Mishra. For them, the episode in the Adiparva section of the immortal epic constituted the "well well-known example of the injustice" to tribals.

The scathing observation on Dronacharaya was part of an order by the bench that sought to do justice to a young tribal woman who was paraded naked. The bench lavished praise on tribals and proclaimed them to be superior to non-tribals in many ways, stressing that it was time the present generation stopped robbing them of their forests and hills and undo the historical injustice inflicted on them. The case before the court related to four persons beating up a young Bhil woman and then parading her naked in the village. They were convicted by a trial court in Ahmednagar, Maharashtra, and sentenced to one-year imprisonment. However, Aurangabad bench of the Bombay HC acquitted them. The SC bench, while allowing an appeal and upholding the conviction and sentence, expressed surprise over Maharashtra government's silence in not filing an appeal against such a incident.