Bhima comes upon the scene and inquired as to what was the matter. Finally, their second son agreed to go with Ghatotkacha and asked his permission to first bathe in the river Ganga. The Brahmin offered himself but his wife insisted that she would go. Ghatotkacha approached them and asked which one of them should come with him to be his mother's sacrifice to Kali. On his way to do so, he spotted a Brahmin and his wife traveling with their three children. Like his father, Ghatotkacha's weapon of choice was the mace.Īccording to folktales, Ahilawati married Ghatotkacha and their sons were Barbarika, Anjanaparva, and Meghavarna.Īccording to a folktale (not mentioned in Mahabharata), one day Hidimbi asked Ghatotkacha to fetch a human to sacrifice to Kali Mata. Ghatotkacha grew up under the care of Hidimbi. You should always be their support." To this Ghatotkacha replied that he would return to them whenever there was a need for it. When Hidimbi and Ghatotkacha bid farewell to him, Kunti said to Ghatotkacha: "You are the eldest son of the Pandavas. Ghatotkacha grew up and became a good friend of the Pandavas. Indra, the king of deity bestowed on Ghaṭotkacha prowess enough to be a suitable opponent to Karna. Later, Ghatotacha was the son born to Hidimbi and Bhima. The Pandavas agreed to the proposal on the condition that Bhima and Hidimbi should enjoy their marital life in the woods and mountains, but Bhima should return to them every evening. Hidimbi then approached Kunti and requested her to ask him to marry Bhima. Impatient at the delay, Hidimba ran towards the Pandavas, and in a duel between him and Bhima, he was killed by Bhima.
She was attracted to Bhima and prayed for the return of her love, which Bhima refused. Hidimbi went to the Pandavas in the guise of a beautiful woman. While they were sleeping on the ground, the demon chief Hidimba in the forest saw the Pandavas from the top of a tree, and he appointed his sister Hidimbi to bring over the Pandavas to him for food. On the burning of the ' Lac Palace', the Pandavas escaped through a tunnel and reached a forest. He was very powerful and fought valiantly from the former in the great war between the Pandavas and the Kauravas, and courted a hero’s death in the great war.īhima with his wife Hidimbi and Ghatotkacha with the rest of the Pandavas and their mother Kunti in the background Ghatotkacha killed many demons like Alambusha, Alayudha and many gigantic Asuras. He was an important fighter from the Pandava side in the Kurukshetra war and caused a great deal of destruction to the Kaurava army on the fourteenth night. His maternal parentage made him half-demon, which granted him several magical abilities such as the ability to fly, to increase or decrease in size and to become invisible. His second son Anjanaparvan participated in the war. He is the father of Anjanaparvan, Barbarika and Meghavarna. Ghatotkacha was the son of the Pandava Bhima and the demoness Hidimbi. His name comes from the fact that his head was hairless ( utkacha) and shaped like a ghatam, or a pot. Ghatotkacha ( Sanskrit: घटोत्कच, IAST: Ghaṭotkaca, literally: "Bald Pot") played a very important character in the story of Mahabharata.