Book Excerpt from Duryodhana: Royalty is a full time job, starting rather early in life

Well, you may have heard of how my plan to eliminate Bhima finally played out and how Bhima escaped from the depths of the river which, if you believe some accounts, involved some snake-ladies sucking the venom out of his system, thus resuscitating him and such rubbish. The problem with the world is, when it wants to make a hero of someone, it concocts all sorts of absurd stories.

If you are interested in the first-hand account of what transpired that day, let me give you a 'ball by ball' account of the morning.

My plan had been working like a charm. The day of the picnic had arrived. We had all been camping overnight in the deep and thick forest of the Himalayan foothills. The idea was to commence our big-game hunting in the early hours of the morning. Early dawn, well before sunrise, is when the big predators such as tigers and their smaller cousins, the leopards, are most active. This is also the kind of light in which they enjoy a superior vision over their prey, like the bison, neelgai and other assorted antelope.

After a night of rest, the animals of prey are usually at their sluggish best, with their limbs still stiff from their overnight folds. As they rise to stretch their limbs and forage in the grass, they offer a perfect opportunity for the predators to stalk them, aided amply by the thick foliage. And for the hunter who understands the unspoken language of the jungle - the chattering langur, the screaming peacock, the fluttering jungle fowl and the slinking fox on the trot-they present a vast book to read and decipher.

It had been a long night of drinking and eating jungle meat. Roasted jungle fowl, bison meat grilled on neem branches which inject a gentle bitter-sweet taste into the meat, venison, peacock eggs poached in white butter, and just for novelty, black bear broth had all been washed down in equally impressive quantities of somarasa, a wine-beer hybrid of our times, made from ingeniously mixed fermented grains and wild berries. There had been much music and rowdy dancing. There was a stand-up comedian who did a great take impersonating my father the king, Bhishma, Vidhura, Drona, me, Arjuna, Bhima and many others, and kept us in splits. We slept fitfully, as the jungle seemed alive with a roar here, or a bark there, and barely managed to snatch a two-hour wink before some of us had to be up for the first part of the hunt, while a few others could catch another couple of hours of sleep, because they would participate in the second part of the morning's hunt.

Let me explain this bit about the first and second part of the hunt. Some of us, who fancied ourselves more brave or skilled than others, had decided, unknown to our parents, on a ground level hunt. This, we called part one of the hunt. This is a dangerous hunting method, for it involves hunting big game at ground-level on foot - the hunter's back supposedly watched by some select men at a distance with torches, while the hunter stalks the big predator as it is stalking its own prey. This part of the hunt involves waiting patiently for a predator to make a kill and then taking its kill away, either by killing the predator itself or driving it away-both equally risky. The hunter may also trail a large herbivore, like a pachyderm or a bison, or an omnivore like the bear, the encounters with all of which are every bit as hazardous as confronting a raging tiger, or worse.

This window of hunting lasts a maximum of an hour and a half, by which time the sun is well above the horizon and the asymmetry of sight between the prey and the predators begins to lessen. As the sun rises, the predators begin to retire to their resting places, while the prey animals begin to stir for grazing. Now the strategy of human hunters' changes. A gang of beaters - a seasoned crowd of young men-using drums, foghorns and the power of vocal chords, create enough ruckus to drive the devil out of hell.

Hunting an animal, be it even the king of the jungle, driven out of is hideout along well appointed pathways dotted with marksmen poses much less challenge. As the game runs through these pathways, the marksmen covering the path take aim from the safety of the elephant backs or treetops.

Bhima and I were in one group of part one, while Sushasana and Arjuna were in another, with the rest of our brothers and others assigned their roles only in part two. Of course those of us from part one would join part two as well, just for some additional excitement.

Bhima and I took to one direction with our team of back-watchers, while Arjuna and Sushasana took the other.  Tried to remain a step of Bhima. It didn't pay to bring up the fellow's rear, for he blocked out much of your view. We were marching excitedly and fast and soon lost our rear guard. Before long, we came upon a clearing where we spotted a herd of chital. We concealed ourselves behind a tree and observed the herd carefully for a quarter of an hour.

We noticed a large stag with majestic antlers, still covered by is velvet sheathing, two or three younger bucks whose antlers hadn't had time to grow beyond a palm span, about six or seven does, and three or four calves. The calves were jumping as if they had springs under their feet. The white spots on the pinkish coats of the fawn were quite visible. We were some fifty hands away. Fortunately, there was virtually no breeze; so there was little danger of our whiff being carried to the herd. The big stag was grazing with rapt attention on some figs on the ground, probably thrown down by some rowdy monkeys in the course of their treetop feast. One buck was standing with two front legs high up on a tree trunk, yanking some leaves off a low branch of a tree with its hard lips.

Another buck as clearly on guard duty. It stood erect and was looking to its left with a flick of its ears and a twitch of its short stump of a tail, and from time to time stroking the ground gently with one of its front legs. The does continued grazing without a care, knowing the guard on duty would give them ample notice of any approaching danger. The calves just kept jumping around, close to their mothers. Just as we were about to move on, we noticed the guard buck look in a particular direction raptly. It lifted its tail, showing its white underside, and farted; as it emanated a low pitched bellow. Clearly the young stag was looking at something that it was afraid of, but not so afraid as to give a clear warning of danger.

The rest of the herd noticed the sentry's reaction and went on with its grazing, secure in the knowledge that whatever it was that was drawing the guard's attention was not yet a real danger. However, they lifted their heads from grazing every now and then, looking in the direction of the guard a little more frequently. In a while, the sentry's guard relaxed a little.

And then a peacock called harshly at a distance.

Bhima and I glanced at each other. At that moment, there was no animosity between us. We were just two young hunters on a common mission. Without speaking we read the signals to mean that there was a predator approaching from the direction the buck was looking towards, but that whatever animal it was, it was still some distance away. Had the predator been close, the buck would have given the alarm call. So we backed up a little, lest we disturbed the herd, and confabulated briefly and decided to take a little detour so as to intercept the predator that was undoubtedly moving towards the herd, even if taking its time.

It took us about half an hour to go around to the other side of the herd, as we had to make a wary progress through thick undergrowth. No sooner had we reached about a hundred steps from the herd on the other side, a peacock called again in urgent tones, even as we heard a few monkeys chatter in panic. When a tiger is spotted, you have an unusual mix of alarm calls and silence. Except for the jungle fowl or the monkeys or the deer that keep up their intermittent alarm calls, chatter or barks, there is absolute silence around the predator. Even the day-time cicadas fall silent. It is as if no beast, bug or bird, except those on safe perches or those who trust the speed in their legs or wings, want to give themselves away by so much as breathing.

We knew that a large predator was close by, but it wasn't clear if it was on the move. However, it had to be a tiger or a leopard. We were between the chital herd and the predator, but much closer to the latter, whatever it was. Bhima and I quietly agreed to branch out a little so that we could go around the predator a little bit from either side, and stalk it. We were now entirely on our own as the men on our rear-guard duty had been left behind long ago. We had our bows loaded and our naked daggers ready for a quick draw.

We had barely walked some fifty paces when I heard some blood-curling caterwauling. I froze, trying to focus my gaze in the early-morning twilight to pinpoint the source of the devilish wailing. This was my first solo hunt on the ground. I felt an unfamiliar sense of fear run down my spine. Even at that early hour, I was beginning to sweat profusely, and yet I felt unusually excited, with each and every part of my body on high alert.

Before I could take a stock of the situation, I heard the heart-stopping roar of a humongous angry male tiger bounding towards where Bhima had been headed, while from a corner of my eye I simultaneously saw a tigress leap at me from the right. I was glad I had not internalized Guru Drona's lesson on focussing on one target to the exclusion of the peripheral vision.

From here on, things unfolded with lightning speed.

I had my thickest arrow already loaded on my powerful bow, the string stretched to my ears, and even as the tigress attacking me was mid-air, I spontaneously swung to my right and released the shaft, which met the tigress mid-leap in the centre of her chest. It was an unusually lucky strike, as the arrow apparently penetrated the heart of the beast and it fell four hands from me like a sack of potatoes. It had happened in less than the blink of an eye.

Clearly, we had disturbed a pair of tigers during their mating ritual, when they are famously at their irritable worst. Without waiting to celebrate my kill, I rushed towards where I thought Bhima should have been and, as I rounded a large bush, found the huge growling tiger and a fearless Bhima facing each other, about fifteen paces from each other. Tigers in the lower Himalayas usually attempt to get their prey in a single bound, as the forests are so thick that thy rarely have the space to chase their prey. Nor do tigers like to make frontal attacks for they prefer to attack from behind, just as they would while chasing a prey.  However, alerted by the loud roar, Bhima had clearly turned to face the charging tiger fearlessly, with his back pressed to a large tree trunk. Faced with this strange vertical animal, not showing its behind but  pair of eyes, a tad above its own eye level, the infuriated tiger stopped mid-stride, and stood snarling, looking a trifle confused, unaware of the fate of its mate at my hands, and even unaware of me.

It was clear that as long as Bhima remained motionless, pinned against the tree, the brute would not charge. But the slightest move on his part would lead to an immediate reaction. And if the tiger charged, Bhima stood no chance. He did not have the elbow room to manipulate his bow and arrow or even draw his dagger, assuming it could do any good, drawn or otherwise. True, Bhima was a six foot-six giant of a youth and weighed some 100 sers and was carrying a nine-inch dagger at his waist. But what we had here was a veritable sabretooth, eleven feet from nose to tail-tip, and not a ser less than 300, give or take. Add two pairs of four-inch canines and twenty switch-blade claws each three inches long, pitched against Bhima's solitary dagger (the bow being useless at that proximity), Bhima was in serious trouble. I stood absolutely still, lest an inadvertent movement from me provoke the beast to attack Bhima.

I am not sure if it was five seconds, five minutes or five hours, but time stood still, as did every life form in the deathly silence which pervaded the little clearing. The tiger, now crouching, was no longer growling. But it continued to inch closer and closer to Bhima on its haunches, in rapt attention and silence, as if compensating for the lost sexual pleasure with some cat-and-mouse play with Bhima, who remained absolutely still, waiting for the tiger to make the first move. I was still numb at the drama that had unfolded in the last few moments and my heart was still going like a blacksmith's hammer. Looking at Bhima, I detected not a trace of fear on his face. He seemed perfectly calm. How numb can you be, was my fleeting thought.

Ten paces from Bhima, the tiger stopped its advance, and then, as Bhima deliberately and slowly pulled on his dagger as if challenging the tiger to attack, the animal sensed the movement and leapt at him with a roar which would ordinarily and justifiably have the effect of its prey emptying its bowels there and then, making it easier to flee. Though the roar nearly had the same effect on me, it was all I could do to resist the natural temptation.

At the same time, I must have been loading my bow with another thick arrow unconsciously, making my own minuscule moves every time the crouching tiger made a movement. Let me explain this. In our well-taught theory of hunting, we had learnt that when a crouching tiger moves, its attention is so focused on its own noiseless movement that it is the best time for one to make a small movement unobserved. I was mighty glad that the lesson had stayed with me. The tiger focussed single-mindedly on Bhima to the exclusion of my presence, which may have gladdened Drona's heart, if the bird-on-the-tree test can be recalled, but it was about to cost it its life. I had the full flank of the tiger available to me-a large target at that range.

Bhima had his sight on the tiger and, just as it pounced, he moved aside like greased lightning. As the big cat was in the air, it presented me a large, if fast-moving and rising target, so that I spontaneously aimed my arrow at the armpit of the tiger. Today was my day. I had been lucky with the tigress and now I was hugely lucky with another prize. The arrow entered the soft skin near the elbow and, moving upward, found the heart once again, making short work of the big tiger. The animal slumped on to the ground. As for Bhima, he was looking nonchalantly at my handiwork.

Two glorious kills within half an hour of a single morning! End of part one. But if I expected Bhima to feel any gratitude for my saving his life, well, there was no evidence of that. He acted as if what had happened was no big deal, though I can say in all honesty, had the situation been reversed, he would have done no less. He was an honourable fellow that way. Anyway, secretly I was happy that he did not express any gratitude. Had he done so, it would have been a little more difficult for me to carry out my plan reserved for the latter part of the day.

(See interview: In defence of Duryodhana )