#Mahabharata#
Mahabharata is one longest epic ever written.
Here this project is trying to look at epic from the Data Science perspective.
Brief of History of Mahabharata
It one of the oldest scripture and part of Indian history. Some may say it once again story of Good vs Evil. But that would not justify the literature. It is a story where no one is bad or good. But based on time and decision taken that justify the future event.
Karma
Theory of Karma, chain of events based on what we do is describe in (Bhagwad) Geeta as part of Mahabharata. So, in whole story every event have reason and result (another event). And things go on and on. No one can escape from it. Even God or Goddess.
Popularity
The Mahabharata is the longest known epic poem and has been described as "the longest poem ever written".Its longest version consists of over 100,000 shloka or over 200,000 individual verse lines (each shloka is a couplet), and long prose passages. About 1.8 million words in total, the Mahabharata is roughly ten times the length of the Iliad and the Odyssey combined, or about four times the length of the Ramayana
It has been translated in almost all Indian and many foreign languages. And also tried to portrait as TV series again and again. One of the popular one is from 1989. One can still buy a copy from Amazon (subs can hurt.). Or can read shorter version by Devdutt Pattanaik. But again there are many books available to choose from including original translated script. That we are using here.
The 18 Parvas or Books
| Parva or Books | Title | Sub-Parvas | Contents | Comments |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Adi Parva (The Book of the Beginning) | 1–19 | How the Mahabharata came to be narrated by Sauti to the assembled rishis at Naimisharanya, after having been recited at the sarpasattra of Janamejaya by Vaishampayana at Takṣaśilā. The history and genealogy of the Bharata and Bhrigu races is recalled, as is the birth and early life of the Kuru princes (adi means first). | |
| 2 | Sabha Parva (The Book of the Assembly Hall) | 20–28 | Maya Danava erects the palace and court (sabha), at Indraprastha. Life at the court, Yudhishthira's Rajasuya Yajna, the game of dice, the disrobing of Pandava wife Draupadi and eventual exile of the Pandavas. | |
| 3 | Vana Parva also Aranyaka-parva, Aranya-parva (The Book of the Forest) | 29–44 | The twelve years of exile in the forest (aranya). | |
| 4 | Virata Parva (The Book of Virata) | 45–48 | The year spent incognito at the court of Virata. | |
| 5 | Udyoga Parva (The Book of the Effort) | 49–59 | Preparations for war and efforts to bring about peace between the Kaurava and the Pandava sides which eventually fail (udyoga means effort or work). | |
| 6 | Bhishma Parva (The Book of Bhishma) | 60–64 | The first part of the great battle, with Bhishma as commander for the Kaurava and his fall on the bed of arrows. (Includes the Bhagavad Gita in chapters 25[26]-42.[27]) | |
| 7 | Drona Parva (The Book of Drona) | 65–72 | The battle continues, with Drona as commander. This is the major book of the war. Most of the great warriors on both sides are dead by the end of this book. | |
| 8 | Karna Parva (The Book of Karna) | 73 | The continuation of the battle with Karna as commander of the Kaurava forces. | |
| 9 | Shalya Parva (The Book of Shalya) | 74–77 | The last day of the battle, with Shalya as commander. Also told in detail, is the pilgrimage of Balarama to the fords of the river Saraswati and the mace fight between Bhima and Duryodhana which ends the war, since Bhima kills Duryodhana by smashing him on the thighs with a mace. | |
| 10 | Sauptika Parva (The Book of the Sleeping Warriors) | 78–80 | Ashvattama, Kripa and Kritavarma kill the remaining Pandava army in their sleep. Only 7 warriors remain on the Pandava side and 3 on the Kaurava side. | |
| 11 | Stri Parva (The Book of the Women) | 81–85 | Gandhari and the women (stri) of the Kauravas and Pandavas lament the dead and Gandhari cursing Krishna for the massive destruction and the extermination of the Kaurava. | |
| 12 | Shanti Parva (The Book of Peace) | 86–88 | The crowning of Yudhishthira as king of Hastinapura, and instructions from Bhishma for the newly anointed king on society, economics and politics. This is the longest book of the Mahabharata. Kisari Mohan Ganguli considers this Parva as a later interpolation.' | |
| 13 | Anushasana Parva (The Book of the Instructions) | 89–90 | The final instructions (anushasana) from Bhishma. | |
| 14 | Ashvamedhika Parva (The Book of the Horse Sacrifice) | 91–92 | The royal ceremony of the Ashvamedha (Horse sacrifice) conducted by Yudhishthira. The world conquest by Arjuna. The Anugita is told by Krishna to Arjuna. | |
| 15 | Ashramavasika Parva (The Book of the Hermitage) | 93–95 | The eventual deaths of Dhritarashtra, Gandhari and Kunti in a forest fire when they are living in a hermitage in the Himalayas. Vidura predeceases them and Sanjaya on Dhritarashtra's bidding goes to live in the higher Himalayas. | |
| 16 | Mausala Parva (The Book of the Clubs) | 96 | The materialisation of Gandhari's curse, i.e., the infighting between the Yadavas with maces (mausala) and the eventual destruction of the Yadavas. | |
| 17 | Mahaprasthanika Parva (The Book of the Great Journey) | 97 | The great journey of Yudhishthira, his brothers and his wife Draupadi across the whole country and finally their ascent of the great Himalayas where each Pandava falls except for Yudhishthira | |
| 18 | Svargarohana Parva (The Book of the Ascent to Heaven) | 98 | Yudhishthira's final test and the return of the Pandavas to the spiritual world (svarga). | |
| Khila | Harivamsa Parva (The Book of the Genealogy of Hari) | 99-100 | This is an addendum to the 18 books, and covers those parts of the life of Krishna which is not covered in the 18 parvas of the Mahabharata. |
Mahabharata - As Project
As being so large and filled up with events and characters. It can be perfect play ground for data science experiments.
Including finding influence of one person on another or one event on another.
Many authors told story of this epic in their own way. Here is another retry from data science point of view.
To Do
- Extract all the possible characters and Places
- Separate places from characters
- Find the important ones
- Find the family tree / relation ship of characters
- Combine names based on their plural names. Means Veda and Vedas are same when it comes to count frequency
- Find multiple names for single person. Krishna called by many names like Vasudeva, Goverdhan etc. Same true for Arjun and others. So find out people who are same but called with different name.
- Find out relationship between characters. Who is son of who, who is mother of who, who marries who. Here is interesting thing is a person can have two father. One is real one and one is biological one.
- Set up killed - killer relationship. All text filled up with war stories including the main Mahabharata war.
- Sentiment analysis
Technology Used & Pull Request
- F# is used as basic programming language.
Thanks
Special thanks to