In this episode of Mahabharata, two important events are displayed - the budding friendship between Krishna and Sudhama, and the introduction of Dronacharya as the Kuru princes’ new teacher.
The story of Krishna and Sudhama begins at Sage Sandipani’s ashram in Ujjain. Balaram and Krishna are students there, as is a Brahmin boy named Sudhama. The sage and his wife dote on Krishna, considering him a replacement for their own son who went missing years ago. One day, Krishna and Sudhama head out to collect twigs of wood for their teacher. Sudhama is given a bag containing food for both of them. However, as sunset draws near, a storm hits. The boys climb up separate trees to shelter themselves from the rain and stay out of reach of any wildlife that may attack. Up on the tree, Sudhama gets hungry and starts eating. He realizes that once he eats his portion, he will fall asleep and probably fall off the tree. He then realizes that should he give Krishna his share of food, the same will happen to him as well. Sudhama proceeds to consume all the food, but in the process,keeping himself and Krishna awake till the storm subsides. A grateful Krishna quips that Sudhama owes him a meal.
Feeling guilty, Sudhama confesses to the guru that he ate all the food given to him, leaving Krishna to starve. The guru curses Sudhama to live in abject poverty until Krishna himself releases him from his debt.
Meanwhile in Hastinapur, the princes are playing with a ball, which falls into a well. The boys congregate around the well, stymied as to how to recover their ball, when a Brahmin passing by asks them what’s wrong. This Brahmin throws a bamboo twig at the ball so hard it rivets itself into the ball’s thread bindings. He then throws another twig so that it sticks to the previous twig. By similarly throwing twig after twig, he creates a long makeshift stick that he uses to scoop the ball back up.
An amazed Arjun runs over to Bhishma and recounts this incident to him. Bhishma and Vidhur come over, inquiring as to who this Brahmin is. Upon finding out that he is Kripacharya’s brother-in-law Dronacharya, Bhishma persuades Dhritharashtra to hire Dronacharya as the boys’ new teacher. The boys begin their weapon training.
Meanwhile, Kripacharya finds his twin sister Kripi in tears. It turns out that Dronacharya went to visit his childhood friend Drupad in the Panchaal kingdom after their three year old son Ashwathama asked for milk and they didn’t have any. He returned extremely angry, but didn’t come back home. He has remained that way ever since. Ashwathama is a young teenager now.
Tropes found here are
- Call-Back: Sudhama playfully brings up Krishna’s childhood butter stealing.
- Improbable Aiming Skills: Dronacharya displays them in his “ball retrieval with bamboo twigs” feat. It gets him hired as the Kuru dynasty’s teacher.
- Guilt Complex: Sudhama feels guilty about leaving Krishna to starve during a stormy night.
