Concept of Justice in Cilappatikaram
Cilappatikaram is
a classical Tamil epic in verse interspersed with prose, of uncertain date,
composed between the 3rd and 6th centuries C.E. It is ascribed to Ilanko
Atikal, a prince of the Ceral dynasty who became an ascetic, abandoning
the prerogatives of wealth and power. One of the most common, perhaps even universal, concerns of human
societies is justice in one form or another.
Ilanko provides a viable religious solution to the experiences of suffering and
ideas of salvation, in the apotheosis of his protagonist, Kannaki and the
administration of justice by divine means as well as by the Ceral king
Cenkuttuvan.
The Epic is set in thirty
chapters organized into three cantos or kantams, "Pukar Kantam", "Maturai Kantam", and "Vanci
Kantam", each named for a city in which the major events take place.
These three cities were the three capitals of the Chola, Pantiya, and Ceral
kings, who ruled the east, south, and west in the Tamil country of the period.The first book explores love in its various forms. The second book
retells the myth of transformation of Kannaki into goddess Pattini and the
third book complies with the convention of the Tamil poetic tradition. In the
final book, i.e. “The Book of Vanci”, all three aspects of the poem come
together and conclude to give a coherent narrative and thematic structure to
the poem.
Cilappatikaram is the poignant
tale of a chaste wife who, though faultless, suffers grievously through the judicial
murder of her husband, whom the civic authorities think to be a thief. Though a
sheltered woman throughout her life, Kannaki rises in fury to the occasion,
challenging the authorities to do justice, if they can, to her innocent husband
and to herself so newly widowed. This is a tale of the subjection of a just,
innocent, and virtuous woman to husbandly neglect and kingly injustice,
resulting in atraumatic release of retributive power and eventuating ultimately
in the heroine's own demise. A kind of justice is wonfor her in the end, however,
by the actions of both gods andhumans.
In
Cilappatikaram we learn about the ancient Tamil system of justice as a
royal function and prerogative.The royal parasol represents the king's
protection of the people and the country.The king's staff, or sceptre, is
straight and unbending so long as his rule is righteous. Itbecomes crookedwhen
the justice of his rule fails.Cenkuttuvan, himself, makes clear the king's duty
to protect the people from injustice.The toppling of the parasol and the
bending of the sceptre are symbols of justice gone awry. So also is the absence
of rain which is believed to follow from unrighteous rule as a direct
consequence.By rashly failing to give Kovalan due process of justice, Netuceliyan
condemned himself. This may also to be part of Cenkuttuvan's motive for giving
special recognition to Kannaki. It seems that Kannaki's modesty and forthright devotion
to her marriage are the measures of her eventual manifestation of devastating
power and the symbols of her ultimate sanctity. The Tamil term ananku denotes
a divine,furious, and potentially retributive force, while also stands for
feminine purity.
Kannaki's
transition from the young, innocent and loving wife to the alienated, fearsome
and death-dealing widow-becoming-goddess is summed up in the dynamic between her
anklet, an outward ornament of special richness and fit for a royal ankle, and
her breast, an inward sign for motherhood. The hopes of Kovalan and Kannaki are
placed in her anklet which becomes the instrument of their undoing.With
Kovalan's death, the anklet becomes meaningless in a material sense and
Kannaki's attention turns to her now useless fertility. She has lost her
husband, and therefore all possibility of mothering. Kavunti, who professes
ascetic detachment, accepting the reverence of passersby, becomes so wholly
involved with Kannaki and her fate that she eventually starves herself to
death. Netuceliyan believes, he is dispensing justice in the unsullied
tradition of his dynasty when he orders the innocent Kovalan’s execution.Seeing
the guilt is his own, he dies. While destroying Maturai, Kannaki believes she
is acting free from the constraints of fate and heaps guilt upon herself when
she learns otherwise. She is distraught to learn thatshe has been duped, through
her own deeply rooted sense ofjustice, into becoming the willing instrument of
a larger and unknown purpose.A dramatic change takes place when, in the 29thChapter
Kannaki appears before Cenkuttuvan, Tevanti, and othersand declares her
reconciliation with the Pantiyan King
whom she says is "now a good guest in the palace of the king of
gods".
Finally
one might also note the function of the Ceral king Cenkuttuvan in the
administration of justice in punishing the northern kings who had spoken ill of
the Tamil kings. In theVancikantam an account of the pragmatic and brave
monarch Cenkuttuvan is ready to utilize the cause of Kannaki as a potent
symbolwhen he finds one.Hepasses the problem of Kannaki to his consorts who
recommend that Kannaki be duly honoured as goddessPattini. Once it has been established that Kannaki is
to be honoured, councillorssuggest the customary means - in accordance with the
shastras, a stone is to be procured
from a mountain, bathed,carved, consecrated to her, and regular worship
commissioned. After winning the battle and achieving unprecedented glory he
rises above pettyconcerns, performs great yajnas for his own welfare and the
welfare of his subjects. Whereupon, Cenkuttuvan declares a general amnesty for the
prisoners,including the Aryan kings,and has the stone for Kannaki installed in
a shrineconstructed and decorated in accordancewith the shastras.
It
is important that Ilanko closes Cilappatikaramwith an affirmation of
benevolence and forgiveness while atonce maintaining that fate will,
nonetheless, have its way.
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