The Upside-Down King Read online

  Balarama, who stood by his brother’s side, said to him, ‘I may have been your sibling in this lifetime, but I have always been your companion. I am Adishesha, the serpent king. Please allow me to leave this world before you do.’

  ‘You may go, Balarama. I will finish my work here and leave this worldly form.’

  Balarama waded into the sea and vanished from sight.

  Krishna then called his charioteer Dharuka and said, ‘Please set forth to Hastinapur and apprise Arjuna that I am going to end my avatar. He must come and take the women and the old back with him.’

  With tears in his eyes, Uddhava approached him and said, ‘My dear Krishna! I will perform my duty with a heavy heart. It is hard for me to face your old parents. I really do not know what life is. When an avatar of dharma can suffer like this, what is the essence of life?’

  Krishna smiled, and even in that moment, he patiently taught Uddhava processes and lessons of life—the importance of detachment, love, recognition of self, transience of life and true knowledge. These are known as the Uddhava Gita today.

  Then Krishna made his way to a forest nearby and lay down under a tree when he became tired of walking.

  A hunter named Jara was busy fishing in the sea. He caught some fish and cut open one of them only to find a small piece of metal covered with wood. Sensing that he could turn this into a strong weapon, Jara decided to use it as the head of an arrow and sharpened it.

  Later, he went to the same forest where Krishna was lying down. By then, Krishna was in deep meditation. From a distance, Jara saw Krishna’s foot and mistook it for a bird. He shot an arrow, and it pierced Krishna’s foot. When Jara approached, he realized that it was not a bird but the foot of a human. He begged Krishna for forgiveness, and Krishna consoled him. ‘This isn’t your fault, dear one. It is my destiny. I am meant to die this way.’

  Krishna recalled his previous birth as Rama, where he killed Vali by shooting him unethically from the back. Vali had said, ‘O Lord, how could you do that? It is not befitting your stature.’

  Krishna, in his avatar as Rama, had replied, ‘You will shoot me from the front in my next life, Vali. I promise you.’

  Another story also goes about Jara, the son of Ekalavya. He was an infant when the war of Mahabharata took place. Ekalavya wanted to join the side of the Kauravas, since he had a grievance against Arjuna. That’s when Krishna had visited Ekalavya and said to him, ‘You are a hunter, and your art is solely for the purpose of hunting for food and for the protection of your tribe. Do not join the war or take sides.’

  Ekalavya, however, did not heed his words.

  That’s when Krishna killed him with an arrow and quietly left so that nobody would find out what had happened.

  Later, Ekalavya’s wife found her husband dead and cried, ‘I curse whoever has killed my dear husband. The murderer has fled quietly like a bird, and he will also die like one.’

  At the time, Ekalavya’s son, Jara, was a baby. His mother raised him to hunt birds, telling him, ‘Your father was killed by someone who was as quiet as a bird. Always look for birds and hunt them down.’

  With that recollection, Krishna left his mortal body and went back to his abode in the heavens.

  Meanwhile, Arjuna received Krishna’s message about taking the women and the old back to Hastinapur. By the time Arjuna rushed to Dwarka, Krishna had already passed over and left his human body.

  People mourned Krishna’s death deeply, and for some, like his wife Rukmini, it was a precursor of their own death. Rukmini died of deep shock after hearing about her husband’s unexpected demise. Vasudeva, Krishna’s father, is believed to have passed over during meditation, while his mother, Devaki, also met a sudden and unexplained end. As instructed, Arjuna began relocating the remaining people. While on their journey, Arjuna and his travelling companions were attacked by the people of the Abhira tribe. Arjuna tried to use his bow Gandiva, but the bow had lost its power without Krishna’s presence. No matter how hard he tried, he couldn’t save all his companions and lost some of the women to the Abhira tribe, who stole them away. With great difficulty, Arjuna brought the remaining people to Hastinapur.

  Thus, Krishna’s avatar ended in a tragic manner, and signified the end of the Yadava dynasty. The place where Krishna died is known as Bhalka, and lies on the western coast of Gujarat.

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  First published in Penguin Books by Penguin Random House India 2018

  This Collection Published by 2018

  Copyright © Sudha Murty 2018

  The moral right of the author has been asserted

  Cover Designer: Neelima P Aryan

  ISBN: 978-0-143-44233-2

  This digital edition published in 2018.

  eISBN: 978-8-184-75417-9

  This book is sold subject to the condition that it shall not, by way of trade or otherwise, be lent, resold, hired out, or otherwise circulated without the publisher’s prior consent in any form of binding or cover other than that in which it is published and without a similar condition including this condition being imposed on the subsequent purchaser.