Recently, RSS chief Mohan Bhagwat spoke on LGBTQ rights, saying Indian civilisation has traditionally acknowledged the community. In an interview to RSS-affiliated magazines Organiser and Panchjanya, Bhagwat gave the examples of Hamsa and Dimbhaka - two generals of king Jarasandha, who had waged a long war against Lord Krishna - saying they were “in that sort of a relationship”. ". yeh LGBT ki samasya hai. Jarasandha ke do senapati they Hamsa aur Dimbhaka. Woh itne mitra they ki Krishna ne afwaah failayi ki Dimbhaka mar gaya hai, tou Hamsa ne atmahatya kar li. Do senapatiyon ko aisehi maar dala. Ab yeh kya cheez.yeh woh hi cheez hai. In dono ke waise sambandha they (When Krishna fanned the rumour that Dimbhaka has died, Hans committed suicide. That is how Krishna got rid of those two generals. Come to think of it: what does the story suggest? This is the same thing. The two generals were in that sort of a relationship," Bhagwat said. "It’s not that these people have never existed in our country. People with such proclivities have always been there for as long as humans have existed. Since I am a doctor of animals, I know that such traits are found in animals too. This is biological, a mode of life,” he added. Who were Hamsa and Dimbhaka, and what is their story? Hamsa and Dimbhaka in Mahabharata Jarasandha had attacked Lord Krishna's Mathura a total of 17 times. In the Mahabharata, the reference to his generals Hamsa and Dimbhaka comes in a dialogue between Krishna and Yudhishthir, when he is telling the eldest Pandava brother about the 17th battle. Professor Jawaharlal, of the philosophy department of Shri Lal Bahadur Shastri National Sanskrit University, New Delhi, said the story of Hamsa and Dimbhaka is narrated in the epic's Sabha Parv 14th adhyaya, in shlokas 40-44. “Lord Krishna tells Yudhishthir that it was difficult to vanquish Jarasandha, because his two generals, Hamsa and Dimbhaka, were as strong as devtas (gods), and had a boon that they could not be killed by any weapon. In fact, Jarasandha, Hamsa, and Dimbhaka together were brave enough to face all the three lok (worlds),” said Professor Jawaharlal. Lord Krishna then reveals how the two died. “There was another king named Hansa who was fighting on Jarasandha's side. When that king was killed by Balrama [Lord Krishna's elder brother], the news quickly spread that 'Hamsa' had died. When Dimbhaka heard this, he jumped into the Yamuna, deciding he could not live without Hamsa. When Hamsa heard of Dimbhaka's action, he too drowned himself in the river.” Professor Jawaharlal said the words 'saathi' (companion) and 'premi' (lover) have been used to describe the relationship between Hamsa and Dimbhaka. However, in other traditions, mention can also be found of a Hamsa and Dimbhaka pair described as brothers. Jitamitra Das, a senior preacher at the ISKCON temple in New Delhi's East of Kailash, said the Krishna Parva talks of brothers Hamsa and Dimbhaka, sons of King Brahmdutt of Shal Pradesh. “Brahmdutt had no sons, so he prayed long and hard to Lord Shiva, after which Hamsa and Dimbhaka were born. These two brave men were themselves great devotees of Shiva, and thus two 'bhoot' of the God were always protecting them. They had committed a series of misdemeanours when Lord Krishna finally decided to kill them,” Jitamitra Das said. Das described that the brothers had once vandalised the sage Durvasa's ashram, insulting the ascetics and saying grihasthashrama (the householder life) was the best way to live. Durvasa then complained about them to Lord Krishna. “The two had also held a rajasuya yajna (a yajna conducted by a very powerful king), in which they had sent a disrespectful invite to Lord Krishna, addressing him as an inferior king,” Das said. Das, too, however, described a similar end to Hamsa and Dimbhaka. “When battle was raging in Govardhan, Hamsa fell into the Yamuna, where Krishna kicked him to death. Hearing of this, Dimbhaka decided he could not live without his brother and drowned himself,” Das said. What did Bhagwat say about the third gender? Bhagwat said the transgender community is a part of “our everyday life”. “We have a transgender community; we did not see it as a problem. They have a sect and their own deities. Today, they have their own Mahamandaleshwar too. During Kumbh, they are accorded a special place. They are part of our everyday life,” he said. There are 13 akhadas, or religious orders of Hinduism. All akhadas nominate Mahamandaleshwars to propagate sanatan dharma as the representative of the akhara. The Prayagraj kumbh of 2019 was the first time that the Kinnar Akhada, formed in 2015, participated in the ritual shahi snan, or royal bath, led by transgender rights activist Lakshmi Narayan Tripathi. Tripathi had then told The Indian Express, “This is the first time that Juna Akhada, considered one of the most rigid and orthodox custodians of the Vedic Sanatan Dharma, have accepted us. we signed an agreement with Juna akhada – we agreed that kinnars deserve their own akhada. We are taking part in this as a separate group, not as part of another akhada.”
