Amba the Warrior Woman (part 01)



Long ago there lived three princesses in the Kingdom of Kashi who went by the names Amba, Ambika and Ambalika. Amba, the eldest, was a beautiful tomboy who was madly in love with the you King of Shalwa. She convinced her father to arrange a sayambara, the choosing of the groom, for her and her sisters, with a plan to choose the King of Salwa, an effeminate guy who wouldn't have been chosen by her father as her groom in any other way.

Catastrophe
But, the sayambara went terribly wrong as Bhishma, the regent champion of the mighty clan of Kauravas, appeared at the ceremony. He was looking for girls young enough to be married off to his young step-brother Bichitrabirya. When everyone laughed at Bhishma, he took the three sisters by force on to his chariot and drove off. When the gathered kings and princes, merchants and priests tried to stop him, he defeated them all. The King of Shalwa was defeated most disgracefully, and he left as a butt of joke to his kingdom.

When Bhishma reached Hastinapura, the Kaurava capital, and started arranging the marriage ceremony, Amba stood up to Bishma. She declared that she was in love with the King of Shalwa and that they were married in their hearts, an
d that it would be unethical for Bhishma to marry her off to his brother. Consulting his priests, Bhishma immediately let her go.

Dejection
Amba went to the court of Shalwa to break the good news of her release to the king. But, the King of Shalwa, a humiliated and tormented soul, refused to accept her. He told in rude terms that he can't entertain someone abducted and thus turned unclean. Heartbroken and humiliated, Amba went to her parental home. But, the King of Kashi refused to take her back as he considered how his subjects would react to him taking a daughter already taken by Bhishma and the King of Shalwa.

Dejected, heartbroken, humiliated and homeless, Amba leaves for the forests and there she starts crying. Hotrabahana, a maternal uncle of Amba and a kingly sage leaving in the forests, took her to his ashrama and sheltered her there. He summoned for Akritabrana, a follower of his friend and Parashurama, to have Parashurama visit the ashrama and listen to the plight of Amba.

Failure
Parashurama, the mighty warrior saint who was engaged in a long raging battle against the warrior class wielding his mighty battle axe, came and listened and proposed two ideas to Amba - he could make the King of Shalwa take her back or get Bhishma to do something about it. A woman scorned, Amba didn't want to go back her lover who refused her in the times of trouble, and asked Parashurama to take an action against Bhishma.

Parashurama sent Akritabrana to fetch Bhishma. Bhishma came armed with weapons handed over to him by his mother, Ganges, a princess of nomads of the rivers. Parashurama asked him to do justice to Amba, and marry her. Bhishma refused, as he was oath-bound to his father not to marry ever. They fought each other for days and nights, and finally both fell exhausted. Unable to prevail over Bhishma, Parashurama asked for Amba's forgiveness. Amba declared, she would seek her revenge on her own.

Parashurama agreed to help her, and took her to Drupada, the king of Panchala.