Women MPs of the future, heard of queen Didda?

Sans the Sacred

In a rarity, the Women’s Reservation Bill was passed in the Lok Sabha with just two members dissenting, and then was passed unanimously in the Rajya Sabha as well! We don’t know if everyone felt so cooperative because of the upcoming elections, or because they all had their roles in drafting the bills, or because they assumed that power would stay in the family now if they could get their female family members to contest for the reserved seats. We know from history that the last idea can go disastrously wrong. Let me tell you the story of queen Didda.

Although many women in Sanskrit literature indulge in their machinations from behind the throne, not all women stay in the shadows. If you thought Medea from Greek mythology, who killed her own children to spite her husband, was quite a character, you should certainly hear the story of the Kashmiri queen Didda, who successfully gives the lie to the idea that women are weak and tender-hearted.

Didda appears in Kalhana’s twelfth century epic poem, Rajatarangini, which has the distinction of being one of the earliest historical and possible realist epic poems in Sanskrit. Rather than painting a rosy picture of kings with an impeccable sense of dharma, as other poets were wont to do, Kalhana tells us of graphic suicides, massive temple desecrations, and all the corruptions that absolute power can possibly bring. One of the rather terrifying figures in this gory saga is the queen Didda.

Didda was a princess of the Lohara dynasty of Kashmir in the 10th century, and she married a king called Kshemagupta, who played no significant role in history at all, and would barely be remembered if not for his queen. Didda was clearly influential in all royal matters, to the point that even during the king’s lifetime, coins were issued jointly in her name.

Kshemagupta died not too long thereafter when he contracted a fever during a jackal-hunt, and their son Abhimanyu II was too young to succeed to the throne. So, Didda made herself his regent. She immediately dismissed all those she did not get along with while her husband was alive, often inciting rebellions and even assassination attempts. Nevertheless, she managed to escape these with the help of a loyal minister, Naravahanadatta, and by bribing all her rivals’ supporters to quash the rebellions before they became serious threats.

After overcoming these dangers, she gave Naravahanadatta fancy titles and power, but she did not stay contented with him for long, eventually driving him to suicide! Soon after, her son Abhimanyu, too, died. This seems to have had a temporary mellowing effect on Didda, and she built some temples in his memory.

This tenderness of heart did not last long, though. She quickly had two grandsons killed one after the other, soon after they each took the throne. Finally, her only remaining grandson became king. But this is still not the end of Didda’s tale. She had a long-standing affair with a herdsman, Tunga, and had her last grandson killed by torture. Finally, she assumed the throne in her own name rather than as regent, and made Tunga her prime minister. They ruled together, presumably very happily, for the rest of her life. Before she died in her old age, she appointed her nephew from the Lohara dynasty, her natal family, Sangramaraja, as the prince, and passed away peacefully!

Let us hope that our women leaders to come take just the right amount of inspiration from queen Didda in not serving as anyone else’s mouthpiece. And hopefully, they will indulge less in palace intrigues and more in making sensible legislation.