DILEMMA BETWEEN DESIRE AND FAMILY HONOUR: REREADING OF CHITRA BANERJEE DIVAKARUNI’S 'THE PALACE OF ILLUSIONS' (Pages 180-190) by Mr. Balu. R in THE ENGLISH RESEARCH EXPRESS / ISSN:2321-1164 (Online); 2347-2642 (Print)

The epic Mahabharata provides the Indian culture as well as the moral values to society. At the same time it reflects negative capability among people. Those values reflect through different epic characters for people. Many Indian writers and even Indian- diaspora writers also have retold the epic through their favorite characters from the epic by making them the centric of the epic narration. In the same way, Indian-American writer Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni has written The Palace of Illusions, which is a retelling of the story of Mahabharata from Draupadi’s point of view. Drupadi is a prominent as well as controversial and complex character in the Mahabharata. This paper examines Draupadi’s struggle between her own desire and forced family honor. This mental struggle of Drupadi originates at the movement of the Draupadi’s unrequited love with Karna. Generally a person is recognized by his or her Social status and family honor in society. Here Drupadi is forced to hide her desire for Karna. Just because of the illustrious status. The society including her family has made her as scapegoat in order to preserve so called social values. Even other characters like Karna and Kunti also have been forced to sacrifice their wishes for sake of the same social status. Even though, Karna is a talented person in all fields than other characters, the society refused to recognize his potential. This issue have to confirm us that society expects social status along with honor. Likewise another character Kunti has lived for family honor, even though she secretly knows that Karna is her elder son. She hesitates to agree to openly claim Karna as her elder son in public. Here her family honor forces her to fear and hide the secret. Therefore, for both Kunti and Draupadi’s struggle are considered as an important point of discussion in the article. Especially, much focus is given on the mental struggle of Drupadi and her hidden love which she was nurturing for Karna without expressing it just for the sake of family and social honor. Keywords: Suppressed Desire, Forced Family Responsibility, Family Honor and The Loss of Individuality.