Kacha and Devayani A tale from the Mahabharata

The story of Kacha and Devayani appears in the first book of the eighteen that are contained in the Mahabharata. The central theme of the Mahabharata is the I8-day war between the cousins, the Pandavas and the Kauravas, and their respective allies, on the battlefield of Kurukshetra.

Devayani, the daughter of Shukracharya, Guru to the Asuras, is an ancestress of the Yadava clan to which Krishna the champion of the Pandavas, belongs.

Kacha is the son of Brihaspati, preceptor to the Devas. The story of Kacha and Devayani centres round the battle for supremacy between the Asuras and the Devas. How Kacha goes to the city of the Asuras and learns the secret craft of Sanjivani (reviving the dead) from Shukracharya and how his sense of duty triumphs over the pleas of the charming Devayani is retold in the following pages.