Ekalavya

Ekalavya
Eklavya's dakshina of his right hand thumb to his guru

Ekalavya (English: एकलव्य, ékalavya) is a character from the epic The Mahābhārata. He was a young prince of the Nishadha, a confederation of jungle tribes in Ancient India. He was offered as the son to Vyatraj Hiranyadhanus by Narayani Devi and possessed powers given by Bhumi devi . Ekalavya aspired to study archery in the gurukul of Guru Drona

Eklavya is called as one of the foremost of kings in the Starbharata Yajna where he honours Yudhishthira with his shoes. Though he didn't have his right thumb, he was noted as a very powerful Archer and warrior. He is said to be a great friend of Duryodhan. He brought Krishna's son to the court of Hastinapur when he kidnapped Duryodhan's daughter.

In the Mahabharata, Ekalavya was the son of Hiranyadhanus, who was King Jarasandha's army commander and leader of the Nishadhas. He approached Drona to teach him the arts of war, especially archery.

Deeply hurt by Drona's rejection, Ekalavya still didn't give up on his resolute will to master archery. He once stayed hidden in the forest while guru Drona was teaching the Kaurava and Pandava brothers, after they left to the ashram, Ekalavya collected the mud on which his Guru walked, as a symbolic gesture of want to follow his knowledge and foot steps, later he went into the forest and made a statue of Drona under a big old well grown tree. He began a disciplined program of self-study over many years. Eventually, Ekalavya became an archer of exceptional prowess, greater than Drona's best pupil, Arjuna. He accepted the statue as his guru and practiced in front of it every single day.

One day when Drona and his students were going out into the forest, Arjuna saw a dog that was unable to bark due to an amazing construction of arrows in and all around his mouth. This construction was harmless to the dog, but prevented the dog from barking. Drona was amazed, but also distressed: he had promised Arjuna that he would make him the greatest archer in the world. Drona and his students investigated, and came upon Ekalavya. Upon seeing Drona,Ekalavya came and bowed to him.

Drona asked Ekalavya where he had learnt archery. Ekalavya replied "under you, Guruji", and showed Drona his statue while explaining what he had done.