TheDaak review

by Pankaj Kumar Bairwa

No group ever sets itself up as the One without at once setting up the Other over against itself.

This article examines the social and environmental history of early India through literary sources, particularly the Mahabharata by  critically engaging with an excerpt from the Adi Parva, giving insights into the societal structures, power dynamics, and marginalized voices within the epic. 

The story begins with King Vishvamitra embarking on a hunting expedition in a forest, where he meets the Brahmin sage Vashishta. Seeing the tired king, the sage generously offers him food and drinks, offering a variety of juices and delicacies. Surprised, the king wonders how a poor Brahmin in the wilderness can afford such luxuries. He soon discovers that the source of this abundance is a divine, sacred cow named Nandini (Kamadhenu). The cow is depicted with mystic body flaps, a horse-like form, large udders, and other remarkable features. ( celebration of such features as remarkable also helps one understands the standards set by the male gaze.) Curious and eager to possess such a valuable being, the king offers his entire kingdom or thousand ordinary cows in exchange for Kamadhenu. However, the Brahmin refuses. Hearing this, the king reminds the sage of his Dharma, emphasizing the need for submission to the social order. Ignoring the refusal, he attempts to seize the cow by force. At this moment, a dramatic conversation takes place between Kamadhenu and the distressed sage. The Brahmin, though saddened, instructs the cow to follow the king. However, Kamadhenu refuses, asserting that she is not masterless. In a moment of defiance, Kamdhenu transforms into a fierce, divine form and produces an army of Shakas, Mlecchas  and Kiratas ie. foreign tribal warriors from her excretion who wage battle against the king. Defeated, Vishvamitra ultimately submits to the Brahmin and renounces his Kshatriya identity, adopting a life of a Brahmin himself.

A critical reading of this story reveals more than just a power struggle between the upper varnas; it also sheds light on the process of ‘Othering’ in society. The narrative illustrates how certain groups—whether it be nature, women or non-human beings—are subordinated through ideological constructs. The struggle depicted in the story is not merely between individuals but between state and non-state entities, between civilization and the wilderness, between patriarchy and women. 

This period marked the transition from a pastoralist society to a society based on agricultural surplus, characterized by commodification of nature, women and forests, who hitherto seen as autonomous spaces, became areas to be controlled. Society started acting as a patriarchal force perceiving the wilderness as something to be tamed, foreign, and to be brought under subjugation. 

From a historical materialist perspective, Kamadhenu represents the uncultivated land, a contested resource within shifting class structures. The Kshatriyas, as representatives of the state, regulated and restricted access to land, facilitating the social formations necessary for empire-building. On the other hand, the Brahmins wanted to maintain control over sacred lands, proclaiming themselves as the most deserving for spiritual and economic resources. This conflict signified a crucial shift in the control of production and distribution, leading to growing inequalities in wealth and power. The story is set in a transforming phase from an agro-pastoral based economy to an agriculture based economy, bringing land ownership involving private property into focus. 

An ecofeminist lens allows us to examine the treatment of women and non-human beings in this story. Kamadhenu, a sacred cow, is portrayed not as an individual entity but as an object controlled by men through their  power. The cow’s plea of not being masterless echoes the absence of individualism in women’s consciousness where their existence is often defined in relation to male authority. However this doesn’t mean that women don’t have self consciousness , one should be careful using such texts since these voices of non humans echo the voice of male dominated society. Such texts were written by men for men.

Women, much like nature, are often depicted as sacred. This sanctity serves as a tool of subjugation. By elevating women to divine status, patriarchal societies (a result of emerging control over land that is hereditary in nature) deny them agency, autonomy, and ambition. They are reduced to roles that serve the needs and desires of men, rather than being recognized as individuals with their own identities; such sources help us to criticize Altekar’s view of invasive patriarchy, where patriarchy is made something new (that came with invaders and colonisation) in the context of India. 

As already noted, sacredness attributed to women and nature is not a form of protection but a means of control. By framing women as divine, society denies them individuality and autonomy, shaping them according to patriarchal needs, modifying ‘feminine animals into a womanly creature’. One must question why women are always taken as a scapegoat for wars and battle , whether it be Kamadhenu, Draupadi, Sita or Cleopatra. Stories such as this are part of an attempt to dethrone the women they earlier made sacred in fear of mystic powers, a common phenomena in transforming societies. 

Women/domestic animals are further reified as chattel; they  can be exchanged, this is evident from Vishvamitra’s willingness to offer a thousand cows in exchange for Kamadhenu. The divine cow was valued above all other cows, reinforcing the ideology of othering while imposing humanised social stratification within the animal cosmos. Domesticated animals, deemed pure and beneficial, were placed above wild animals, the others which were seen as threats to be hunted. 

What was the relationship between Kamadhenu and Vashistha? Was Kamadhenu the wife of Vashistha? Vishvamitra, by taking his wife by force, proved he is able to annex the riches of others and burst through the bounds of the destiny assigned to him at birth, a tendency patriarchs attain with the advent of private property.

But why does the Brahmin want the cow? The answer can be to get control over meat as an attempt to control society. By branding meat-eating as impure, the upper castes stigmatized socially marginalized communities, using diet to justify untouchability and occupational hierarchy, a way of reinforcing gender and class hierarchies in society. Controlling beef was an attempt to restrict the diet of those who consumed it, as a response against  the social/Jati-Varna crisis. Cows became synonymous with Yajnas(sacrifices), and their meat was made invisible under spirituality, shedding light on  what Carol J. Adams is described as an ‘absent referent’. The cow is identified with feminine beauty standards, for instance Vishvamitra is very much surprised with seeing Kamadhenu’s big udders. 

The control over cows had real consequences for lower castes, as it restricted dietary practices and imposed Brahminical dietary norms on diverse communities. These transformations were not merely ideological but had tangible effects on social hierarchies. Kamadhenu’s mythology can be seen as a Brahmanical construct that enforces caste-based vegetarianism while simultaneously allowing the exploitation of lower-caste labor for dairy production. 

The transformation of Kamadhenu into a warrior figure is accompanied by the summoning of tribal warriors such as Shakas, Kiratas and Mlecchas who are depicted as an extension of the cow’s power. This suggests a process of Brahminical assimilation, where marginalized communities were either integrated into the religious framework or were stamped out or depicted in ways that justified their subjugation. 

The story of Kamadhenu reveals how sacredness was used as a tool for control over women, nature, and marginalized communities. What appears as divine narrative masks deeper power structures, where myths legitimized patriarchy, caste hierarchies, and the commodification of life. Reading such stories critically helps us see how ideology shapes social order, both in the past and today.

Bibliography 

• Adams, Carol J. The Sexual Politics of Meat: A Feminist-Vegetarian Critical Theory. New York: Continuum, 1990.
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• Vyasa, Krishna-Dwaipayana. The Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa: Book I – Adi Parva, Section CLXXVI (Chaitraratha Parva). Translated by Kisari Mohan Ganguli. Calcutta: P. C. Roy, 1883–1896. Reprint, Project Gutenberg, 2004.

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Pankaj is an undergraduate History student currently studying in Hansraj College, University of Delhi.