The Slaughter of an Innocent
Illustration to the Bhagavata Purana
Kangra, Punjab Hills, c. 1790
J.K. Mody collection, Bombay
Following the expansion of Indian miniature painting in the early seventeenth century, illustrated versions of the tenth book of the Bhagavata Purana began to be produced in parts of Hindu India. It was in the Punjab Hills, at the end of the eighteenth century, however, that romance and religion achieved their most delicate expression. The artist chiefly responsible was a certain Nainsukh who had arrived at the State of Guler in about 1740. His way of painting had marked affinities with that of Basawan (Plate [1]) and represents a blend of early Mughal naturalism with later Hindu sentiment. The style founded by him influenced members of his own family, including his nephew Kushala and ultimately spread to Kangra and Garhwal where it reached its greatest heights. The present picture, together with Plates [5], [6], [8], [9], [11] and [16], is possibly by the Kangra artist Purkhu and with others of the series illustrates perhaps the greatest interpretation of the Bhagavata Purana ever produced in Indian painting.
In the picture, the tyrant ruler Kansa is sleeping on a bed as a courtier prepares to break the fateful news of Krishna's birth. To the right, Devaki, Krishna's mother, nurses the baby girl whom her husband, Vasudeva, has substituted for the infant Krishna. Kansa is wresting the baby from her in order to dash its head against a boulder. As he does so, she eludes his grasp and ascends to heaven in a flash, being, in fact, the eight-armed goddess Devi.
PLATE 4
