When the founder of the Draupadi Dream Trust visited Chennai, she was shocked to learn of the many Draupadi temples in the south. Neither in Kampilya, where Draupadi was born, nor elsewhere in Uttar Pradesh and Nepal are there temples for this redoubtable wife of the Pandavas. Draupadi is the kuladeivam of entire families and villages in this region. There is a Draupadi Amman temple on my street.
How did this North Indian queen become a village goddess feted at festivals in Tamil Nadu, Andhra Pradesh, Karnataka, and even Sri Lanka, Singapore, Malaysia, Mauritius, Reunion and South Africa—wherever the south Indian diaspora lives? Such Draupadi festivals often involve fire-walking, for legend says she was born out of fire when father Drupad conducted a putrayaagam to be blessed with a child.
Megasthenes, ambassador of Alexander’s general Seleucus I Nicator, says in Indica that Heracles, as the Greeks called Krishna, “was held in special honour by the Sourasenoi (Surasena), an Indian tribe who possess two large cities, Methora (Mathura) and Cleisobora... He had numerous male children, but only one daughter, Pandaia… To her Heracles assigned that portion of India which lies southwards and extends to the sea… The Pandaie were the only race in India ruled by women.” Megasthenes adds that Heracles “found in the sea an ornament for women… the sea pearl… caused it to be brought from the sea into India, so that he might adorn with it his daughter”.
The Greeks identified Heracles with Krishna probably because of the adventures of the two heroes. According to the Vishnu Purana, Krishna killed demon Panchajana, who lived in the sea in a shell, and made his conch from Panchajana’s bones, naming it Panchajanya. It can be noted that Pandyanadu, whose capital was Madurai, was famed for its pearl fisheries.
Heracles was worshipped in the plains, says Megasthenes. In the Tamil tradition of aindu tinai or five ecological divisions of land, mullai is pasture land in the plains and presided over by Krishna. The inhabitants were the aayar or herdsmen. Further, “a large mound near Chingleput is surrounded by a number of megalithic graves believed to have been inhabited by the bearded race of Pandayar… the graves are known as Pandu houses”. British scholar Horace Wilson says an adventurer named Pandaya was the first to settle there, and that the land was named after him.
Did the Pandaia queen replicate Mathura in the south and make her ancestor Draupadi into a goddess? Mathura becomes Madura when written in Tamil. In the Tamil epic Manimekalai, the heroine refers to Madurai as Takkana (dakshina or southern) Madurai.
Pandya kings of the Tamil Sangam claimed descent from the Pandavas, according to the Silappadigaram and Puranaanuru. Vaishnava Alvars referred to Krishna’s Mathura as Vada (northern) Madurai. Andal, the great Krishna devotee, wanted to visit Mathura to see her Krishna.
There are other mentions too. According to Greek geographer Ptolemy, Madurai was Madoura, the royal city of ‘Pandions’ (Pandyas), and Mathura was also Madoura, a city of gods. Robert Caldwell, the renowned scholar of Dravidian linguistics, affirms that Madurai was named after Mathura. Grammarian Katyayana says Pandya is derived from Pandu.
That the Pandyas hosted the Tamil Sangam or literary conferences is mentioned by the Greeks, Romans and Ashoka from the 4th century BCE. They are celebrated in Sangam literature, coins and inscriptions. Some links are yet to be clearly established. The emblem of the Pandyas was the fish—was it in memory of the fish shot by Arjuna during Draupadi’s swayamvara?
In 1921, Henry Whitehead described Draupadi Amman as a benevolent deity, wife of a rishi in a previous birth. Yet, the goddess remains a mystery. Legend and history collide in the story of how Draupadi became a goddess in south India.
Draupadi’s name is also associated with the Rajput king Desingh, called Chenchi or Gingee Rajan, who built the Gingee fort in South Arcot district. A 1961 survey counted 38 Draupadī Amman temples in the South Arcot district alone.
Several temples around Gingee and farther south were built with a handful of soil from Gingee to commence the construction. It was said that if a Draupadi Amman temple was to be built, clay from Gingee was always brought before the construction began.
Draupadi Amman temples are also called Dharmaraja or Yudhishthira temples in Chennai, the northern districts of Tamil Nadu and in Andhra Pradesh.
Madurai was destroyed several times, by the sea and maybe even by a fire, according to the Silappadigaram. In the 14th century, Alauddin Khilji sent his slave-general Malik Kafur to the south to loot the famed wealth of the Pandyas. Kafur Madurai, which was called Mathura by the contemporary Amir Khusrau, burnt the Chokkanatha temple and destroyed some others. He plundered the temple of Meenakshi, looted its valuables and destroyed Madurai’s temple town.
Later, Muhammad bin Tughlaq appointed Jalaluddin Ahsan Khan as governor of Madurai. He seceded from the Delhi sultanate in 1335 and began the Madurai sultanate, demanding tributes from temples and towns. But the Madurai sultanate was short-lived. Bukka Raya of Vijayanagar took it over in 1378 CE, cleared the ruins and reopened the temples. Meenakshi Amman temple was rebuilt by the Nayaka kings in the 16th-17th centuries, making it the largest temple complex in India.
Draupadi is a legend in North India—but she and her friend Krishna’s Mathura live on in the south, too.
Nanditha Krishna
Historian, environmentalist and writer based in Chennai