Introduction
The tragic and heroic figure of Queen Kuntī emerges from an explosive era in the history of ancient India. As related in the  Mahābhārata , India's grand epic poem of 110,000 couplets, Kuntī was the wife of King Pāṇḍu and the mother of five illustrious sons known as the Pāṇḍavas. As such, she was one of the central figures in a complex political drama that culminated fifty centuries ago in the Kurukṣetra War, a devastating war of ascendancy that changed the course of world events. The  Mahābhārata  describes the prelude to the holocaust as follows:
Pāṇḍu became king because his elder brother Dhṛtarāṣṭra had been born blind, a condition that excluded him from direct succession. Some time after Pāṇḍu ascended to the throne, Dhṛtarāṣṭra married Gāndhārī and fathered one hundred sons. This was the ruling family of the Kaurava dynasty, of whom the eldest was the ambitious and cruel Duryodhana.
Meanwhile, Pāṇḍu had taken two wives, Mādrī and Kuntī. Originally named Pṛthā, Kuntī was the daughter of Śurasena, the chief of the glorious Yadu dynasty. The  Mahābhārata  relates that Kuntī "was gifted with beauty and character; she rejoiced in the law [ dharma ] and was great in her vows." She also possessed an unusual benediction. When she was a child, her father Śurasena had given her in adoption to his childless cousin and close friend Kuntibhoja (hence the name "Kuntī"). In her stepfather's house, Kuntī's duty was to look after the welfare of guests. One day the powerful sage and mystic Durvāsā came there and was pleased by Kuntī's selfless service. Foreseeing that she would have difficulty conceiving sons, Durvāsā gave her the benediction that she could invoke any demigod and by him obtain progeny.
After Kuntī married Pāṇḍu, he was placed under a curse that prevented him from begetting children. So he renounced the throne and retired with his wives to the forest. There Kuntī's special benediction enabled her to conceive (at her husband's request) three glorious sons. First she invoked Dharma, the demigod of religion. After worshiping him and repeating an invocation Durvāsā had taught her, she united with Dharma and, in time, gave birth to a boy. As soon as the child was born, a voice with no visible source said, "This child will be called Yudhiṣṭhira, and he will be very virtuous. He will be splendid, determined, renounced, and famous throughout the three worlds."
Having been blessed with this virtuous son, Pāṇḍu then asked Kuntī for a son of great physical strength. Thus Kuntī invoked Vāyu, the
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