Draupadi Berates Jayadratha for His Insults
Jayadratha insults the Pandavas and attempts to abduct Draupadi. Her face crimson with rage, she delivers a scathing rebuke — comparing him to a man who wakes a sleeping lion or kicks a serpent — and warns him of the wrath of Bhima and Arjuna. Jayadratha dismisses her, asserting his noble lineage and ordering her to ascend the chariot.
Jayadratha had come to the Kamyaka forest on a hunting expedition. He found the hermitage empty — the Pandavas had gone out, leaving Draupadi alone. He saw her and was struck. He approached her, spoke to her, and when she refused him, he seized her by the hand and forced her toward his chariot.
Draupadi's face turned crimson with anger. Her eyes reddened. Her knitted brows rose. She spoke to the king of Sauvira.
"You have insulted famous maharathas (great warriors) whose poison is virulent. O foolish one! Do you have no shame? Each of them is like the great Indra and is devoted to his own task. They have not wavered in battle against yakshas and rakshasas."
She told him that only dogs speak ill of ascetics. That he would descend into the mouth of hell that had now opened. That there was no one in the assembly of kshatriyas who could hold him back from what he was about to do.
"You hope to defeat and kill Dharmaraja. The rutting elephant is like the peak of a mountain and roams around in the valleys of the Himalayas. You are like a man who wishes to chase it from its herd, armed only with a stick."
She told him what he had woken. The immensely strong lion was asleep. He had tried to pluck eyelashes from its face. When Bhimasena saw him in wrath, he would have to run. The terrible lion was asleep in its mountainous cavern. Like a man who had kicked it, he wished to counter the angry and terrible Jishnu (Arjuna).
"You are like a mad man, who has stamped with his feet on the backs of two dark, fork-tongued serpents, virulent in their poison. You are seeking to battle with two brave men, the youngest of the Pandavas."
She told him that the bamboo, the reed, and the plantain bear fruit — but then they die and do not grow in size. A crab conceives only so as to perish. Like that, he wished to grasp her, although she was protected by them.
Jayadratha answered. "O Krishna! I know all this and I know what those sons of kings are like. But you will not be able to frighten me with those threats now. We have all been born in the seventeen noble lineages. We possess the six qualities. We think that the sons of Pandu are devoid of these. Therefore, swiftly ascend this elephant or this chariot. You cannot dissuade us with words alone. Hope, by lamenting piteously, that you are able to obtain the favours of the king of Sauvira." Aranyaka Parva, Chapter 549