Gandhari: Duryodhana’s Mother
At a glance
- Who is Duryodhana’s mother? Duryodhana’s mother is Gandhari.
- Who is Gandhari’s father? Gandhari’s father is Subala.
- Who is Gandhari’s husband? Gandhari’s husband is Dhritarashtra.
- Who are Gandhari’s children? Gandhari is the mother of Duryodhana and 100 others.
Queen who binds her own eyes. Mother of the hundred, from a mass of flesh divided into jars.
Who Gandhari is
Duryodhana’s mother is Gandhari. She is Subala’s daughter, sister of Shakuni, married to the blind king. Hearing that Dhritarashtra cannot see, she binds her own eyes before the wedding and keeps them bound.
Vyasa promised her a hundred sons. After two years she strikes her womb and a mass of flesh comes out. He divides it into ghee-jars. Duryodhana is born after Yudhishthira. After the war she lifts the cloth once, and her glance hurts Yudhishthira’s toe. Then she curses Krishna.
Names and spellings
The name used here is Gandhari. Common Mahabharat spellings stay in the aliases rather than being repeated in every heading.
Parents
Spouses
Children
- Duryodhana
- Duhshasana
- Duhsaha
- Duhshala
- Jalasandha
- Sama
- Saha
- Vinda
- Anuvinda
- Durdharsha
- Subahu
- Dushpradharshana
- Durmarshana
- Durmukha
87 more on the family tree.
In the recitation
- Krishna — her curse after the war
Narrative role
Adi Parva — the jars She hears Kunti has already borne a son. She strikes her own womb. Vyasa says his words are never futile. A hundred sons and a daughter, Duhsala, from one ball of flesh.
The war She does not stop her sons. She does not pretend they are other than they are. Sanjaya’s report reaches the blind pair together.
Stri Parva On the field she sees the women. She curses Krishna: his kula will die as hers has died, thirty-six years on.
How Gandhari is related
How is Gandhari related to Dhritarashtra? Husband whose dark she chose to share. The hundred are theirs; Yuyutsu is his by another woman. Dhritarashtra
How is Gandhari related to Duryodhana? She is his mother, the first of the jars. She loves him and cannot make him take five villages. Duryodhana
How is Gandhari related to Krishna? The curse after the war. It is how the epic joins Kurukshetra to the later end of Dvaraka. Krishna
How is Gandhari related to Shakuni? Brother from Gandhara. The dice are his craft, played in her married house. Shakuni
Source notes
Mahabharata text (Adi Sambhava, Stri Parva), Ganguli. The jars are the epic’s birth-account, not a later invention. Last reviewed 12 September 2026.
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