Kanyaka [Sequel to Durga] | ✓

22. Kanyaka's Story

The trio rushed to the idol and found an inscription in Kannada. They quickly started reading it.

It is very unfortunate that Queen Sunaina had ran away with Prime Minister’s son. The tradition of matriarchal queenship was stopped when an enemy had killed Queen Sunaina’s mother. Before dying, she had passed an order that her husband would rule till Sunaina would be fit enough to rule the kingdom. Nobody ever knew that Prime Minister was a tantric.

He had given the king a magical potion due to which the tantric minister had control on him. His son was learning tantrism due to his father’s pressure. The lovebirds, Sunaina and the minister's son saw this as an opportunity to realise their dreams, to break from the shackles imposed to them.

When the search party found Queen Sunaina, she was eight months pregnant and her husband was nursing her. The Prime Minister was horrified of one thing- if a tantric has sex, they would end up losing their tantric powers. Since his son was still learning, he had no idea about it. The rage of tantric knew no bounds.

He was prepared the same potion and gave it to Sunaina. She was suspicious and threw the bottle on the rock. The rock, due to magic powers, became a big boulder and it rolled to crush the tantric. Before his death, he made the King curse his own daughter. But they say the spirits that die with a feeling of revenge, they cannot leave the mortal world until their desire is fulfilled.

The tantric decided to warn his son and his soul entered the body of a soldier. His son was shocked, but his mind was poisoned with the bad soul’s words, slowly. He killed the King, asked Sunaina to make him the King. But she refused and he, therefore, made his wife a devadasi in the temple that her mother had built. The temple was in the middle of the kingdom, more protected than the fort. From then, all her successors had been devadasis until Queen Kanyaka changed everything.

Queen Kanyaka had to undergo nine days of shudhikaran abhisheka so that her virginity could be restored. In these nine days, if any male touched her or if she touched any weapon, all her attempts would have proved to be futile. Suspecting an attack, she had made her trusted soldiers and Commander-in-Chief Omkara dug a pit in the middle of the room. The pit was filled with mud; concealed and the room was sprayed with special perfumes. The trap door could be opened by pulling a rope that was concealed behind the curtains.

As expected, Prime Minister Abhimanyu had sent ten men to rape her. She tricked all of them to stand on the trap door by placing bags of gold; she pulled the rope and they fell into the pit. They were arrested on grounds of treachery to the Queen and her Kingdom. After the shudhikaran abhisheka, she underwent the famed agnipariksha.

A thin long pit was constructed from Bhayankararanya to the Shakti Temple. The pit was filled with hot burning coal and the brave Queen had to walk on it, barefoot, with a brown earthen pot on her head that was lit. That fire was to be lit in the temple, in front of idol of Goddess Shakti. The people of Sahasyabhumi had gathered to the witness the spectacle. They had heard about Sita walking into the fire, Draupadi being born out of fire and now, their Queen walking on it.

After Queen Sunaina had died in the temple, the doors were shut for the common people. Queen Kanyaka came, draped in red saree, walking with an earthen pot on her head. Her eyes were kohled, yet there was no fear in them. Her hair was open, like the Goddess Kali. Yet her face was calm and serene like Parvati. She walked on the burning coal as if it were a path laid with soft flowers. The fire was restored, and the people accepted her. They had no doubts about it as she was backed by the most powerful man in the Kingdom.

She restored Commander-in-Chief Omkara’s honour and the ten men who had tried to assault her were punished. The nine men were bled to brutal deaths but the last one was severely injured yet he was kept alive only to deliver the deaths of others. Abhimanyu shivered and tried to escape. He was caught, proved to be guilty of treachery. He was thrown into the sea but he escaped.

She was the reason for downfall of the Sahasyabhumi Kingdom. But none of her subjects felt so. In her ten years of reign, she had closed all the alcohol shops. The withdrawal symptoms took its own sweet time to curb down, but the election procedure was renewed. Many of them wanted to have the power and they gave up. The village elections were opened to women also. She cancelled the deal with Portuguese and invited their anger. She fought with them and they had to run for their lives. The damage incurred was huge, but she somehow had settled it. Her daughter, Shakti, was brought up like a royal princess of good mannerisms and of sweet nature.

But the secret of Daivi Astras was revealed to Abhimanyu and he tried to procure it. Queen Kanyaka had pledged to the Siddhar that if the secret is revealed, Sahasyabhumi should be deserted and the secret would shift to new place. True to her word, she sent her people to the land next to Tulunadu and deceived Abhimanyu and his men by going deep into the land of Kannadigas until she was stabbed to death. Her daughter Shakti was taken care by Omkara until his death. The later generations shifted to the Chamundi betta to avoid impending danger of Abhimanyu’s progenies.

I, Nanjappa, the Chief Architect of the temple restoration, have written this inscription to remind the future generations that there lived a Queen who was no less than a Goddess. Her words were no less than that of Durga. She was Queen Kanyaka.

Durga sighed. “What a story! The secret was daivi asuras!”

“Yes, this is a story that happened years ago,” reverberated the voice.

Akhil screamed, “Who are you?”

“My identity is not important. It is suffice for you to know that I am the same Siddhar who backed Queen Kanyaka, five hundred years ago.”

***

About the Tantrik losing their powers under sex is described in Wikipedia too under Maithuna topic. The same concept is depicted in the movie, Anandabhadram (Malayalam).

Ping me if you have any doubts regarding it.

Thank you for reading.