Dance composition: Dr Ileana Citaristi
Script: Dr Prafulla Kumar Mishra
Music composition: Sri Gopal Panda
Date of composition: 2005
The episode of Arjuna and Chitrangada is described in the last canto of the Mahabharata, after the end of the great war.
Chitrangada, daughter of king Parbata, has been brought up as a son by her father who, deprived of any male issue, decides to make a courageous warrior out of her. Since childhood she is denied to play any girl games and spends her youth among the soldiers exercising her skills in handling different weapons..
When Arjuna's white horse reaches the kingdom of Manipura challenging the king to surrender or else to fight with his general, the king sends his daughter to the battle. She fights valorously and defeats the enemies with great strength and courage..
Arjuna from afar sees the valorous and handsome general and he is pleased to have found an enemy worthy of him. They challenge each others and after finishing the horse and sword fighting, the two warriors engage in wrestling. At the contact of each others' bodies, their eyes merge and lost in each other's sight, they fall in love..
Through the experience of love Chitrangada for the first time is able to discover the feminine part of her nature which had been denied to her since childhood.