RASHMIRATHI

Ramdhari Singh "Dinkar" (23 September 1908 – 24 April 1974) was an Indian
poet. He remerged as a poet of rebellion as a consequence of his nationalist
poetry written in the days before independence which also included veer rasa
and mythology. Rashmirathi- Sun’s Charioteer - The work is centered on the life
of Karna, who was son of unmarried queen Kunti (Pandu’s wife) in the
epic- Mahabharata. Here the poet is describing the particular incident in
Mahabharata where karan challenges Arjun and how the caste difference
prevalent at that time effects the life of karan and how he overcomes it. The
author creates an imagery of conversations and disagreements taking place
on the grounds where the crowd has come to see Arjun’s capabilities of bow
and arrow. The narrative also shows 3 dimensional character of people and
their different shades according to different situations. The author at various
places has used metaphors to describe Karan’s situations. The rhythmic pattern
created is ‘aabb’, but also rhyme is happening between the lines.
In first stanza the poet uses the metaphor of ‘flowers in forests’, stating that
people don’t really look at the plant on which the flower grows, it’s the flower
that attracts our attention and we appreciate its beauty, smell or uses .Similarly
the person’s capabilities should not be judged on where he comes from. In
second stanza the poet goes on telling that intelligence is only reflected where
you do not see superiority or inferiority based on place of birth but by
capabilities. In first 3 stanzas the poet puts forward his views on caste difference
happening at that era, also this caste difference issue seemed to prevail in pre-
independence era also.

From 4th stanza, he starts describing about karan saying that he was born to
the union of sun god and rani kunti, but he had to adjust to the fact that his
swing was the river and not swing of palaces. He was the prince but then it was
the river which cradled him. He belonged to the family of weavers and he
never tasted his mother’s milk. The poet states that in spite of all the odds, he
emerged as the bravest of all warriors.

In the 5th stanza rhyme is not only at the end of the line but also in between the
lines. ”shil ka, paurush ka, jatti-gotra ka”.One line is divided into 3 parts and
those 3 parts are integrated by the way of number of sounds.

In 6th stanza the poet again has used the metaphor of flower blooming in the
forests, implementing that karan was not leaving in a large palace or a large
city but actually blossomed away from the preying eyes of urban people, way
deep in the forests.

In 7th stanza the poet again compares karan to a flower, stating that it is not
that flowers can blossom only in a very well cared garden belonging to a king.
Flowers can also blossom even in forests. The poet compares karan to a ruby
stating that a dirty cloth belonging to a poor person ,you don’t expect to find
a ruby inside that cloth, similarly from the vicinity in which karan grew one
couldn’t really imagine a person with such princely attributes could live in such
a surrounding.

In 8th stanza the poet compares karan to the sun, saying that beyond the
surface of clouds the sun can only hide for a moment not forever, similarly
karan being a brave warrior would shine one day. From here the poet leads us
to the entire episode of karan challenging Arjun.

In 9th and 10th stanza karan says to Arjun that please don’t be so proud of your
achievement and that I can do everything as well as you have done it, so you
need a competitor of your calibre then prove your excellence to the
audience. The entire public is shocked, everybody is tensed including guru
krupacharya and Arjun himself, only duryodhan encourages karan.

In 11th and 12th stanza karan challenges Arjun for a competition of bow and
arrow but guru krupacharya interrupts and tells him that “Arjun is a warrior and
is a prince thus he is not going to fight with anybody or everybody and that if
you want to compete with Arjun you should tell your name and caste you
belong to.”

In 13th and 14th stanza, karan in his defence says that “if you ask my caste, the
abilities that I possess of a warrior is my caste”. He says that caste is only a cover
of all the short comings that people have and all though who are standing
under golden umbrella are the one who are ruining the society by talking
about caste.

In 15th and 16th stanza karan says to guru krupacharya that this how petite you
are, that you don’t even want to leave the world competitive for your students
and the same you did with eklavya. He keeps on saying that “if you have the
courage then allow me to compete with Arjun and let me tell my caste through
my abilities.”

In 18th stanza, gurukrupacharya giving response to Karan says, “if you want to
fight with Arjun, you yourself have to be a ruler of somewhere.

In 19th and 2th stanza duryodhan takes stand of karan and makes him the king
of angdesh, so that karan can compete with Arjun and says that” It’s
impossible to know where river originates, therefore where bravery also
originates. His caste his faith is bow and arrow and therefore that is what we
should judge him for. People who are coward and cruel take refuge in caste
and hierarchy otherwise everybody else speaks about bravery.
In the concluding stanza dhrodhyan says karan might be sootputra but have
you not seen all the princes are actually pale in comparison to the absolute
fire and energy that karan has brought to the gathering and therefore he
should be given a chance to prove his capabilities.

In the poem “ I wandered as lonely cloud” the poet about a particular scene
of nature, whereas in the poem rashmirathi the poet talks about a particular
incident of Mahabharata.dinkar narrates an entire episode where Karan
challenges Arjun for the competition of bow and arrow but how due to the
caste difference existing during that era ,Karan was being opposed to show his
skills to the people by guru krupacharya in order to keep Arjun’s skill best of all,
the poem depicts the struggle and pain faced by Karan in order to learn the
skills.

Dinkar’s poem is more about depicting the issues that were happening at that
particular era of caste difference and how so much importance was given to
caste such that a person was not allowed to pursue any other career field
outside his caste field, whereas William words worth poem is more about
Romanising a flower and how his sad mood was changed to happy one by
seeing the beauty of them.

Dinkar gives human quality to the flower that blossoms in forest by comparing
it with Karan, depicting how Karan grew his skills so well on his own despite of
any facilities available to made him, whereas worth worth compares daffodils
to milky way giving flowers a larger than life quality of being infinite. William
worth also gives daffodils the human quality of tossing their heads and dancing
in glee. Both Dinkar and William wordsworth connect nature and human
repeatedly by using metaphors.