Suryaputra Karna

FRIEND DURYODHAN

To display the skills of the Kuru princes, guru Dronacharya arranged a friendly tournament. His student Arjun, third of the Pandava brothers, was shown to be a particularly gifted archer. Karna arrived at this tournament, uninvited, and surpassing Arjun's feats, challenged him to a duel. Kripacharya refused Karna his duel, asking first for his clan and kingdom; for according to the rules of duelling, only a prince could challenge Arjun to a duel. Due to his low standing, Karna was not allowed to fight Arjun. He was further insulted by Bheem by comparing him to a stray dog, for his mixed caste and lineage. This incident marks the beginning of a feud between Karna and Pandavas. Duryodhan, the eldest of the one-hundred sons of the king Dhritarashtra, knew that his cousins Pandavas were better at warfare. Seeing Karna as a chance to get on even terms with them he immediately offered Karna the throne of the kingdom of Anga, making him a king and hence eligible to fight a duel with Arjun. Neither of them knows that Karna is in fact Kunti's oldest son, born to (sun god) Surya. When Karna asked him what he could do to repay him, Duryodhan told him that all he wanted was his friendship. Karna later married Vrushali belonging to the Suta caste, as per the wishes of his foster father Adiratha.

Fight with Jarasandha

Karna was a loyal and true comrade to Duryodhan. Karna helped Duryodhan marry the Princess Bhanumati of Kalinga. Duryodhan abducted Princess Bhanumati from her Swayamvara ceremony in a chariot and Karna fought with the rest of the suitors. Many legendary rulers like Shishupal,Jarasandh, Bhishmaka, Vakra, Kapotaroman, Nila, Rukmi, Sringa, Asoka, Satadhanwan etc. attended the ceremony and Karna easily defeated the pursuing Kings, who dejected and abandoned their pursuing after seeing the fighting prowess of Karna to protect his friend. The ashamed Jarasandh, the king of Magadha later challenged Karna to a one-on-one fight. After Kamsa sent so many asuras to Vrindavan in an attempt to kill Sri Krishna and Sri Balaram they decided to invite them to Mathura for a wrestling match with great demons Chanura and Mustika . At that time Krishna came to Mathura. He and Balaram killed Cahnura and Mustika and then they killed Kamsa. After they killed Kamsa, Kamsa had 2 wives Asti and Prapti and they were the daughters of king Jarasandha who was a great demon of the Magad provience. They went back to their father Jarasandh and they were grief stricken and their heart were broken and weeping and weeping and they began to proclaim to their father that Kamsa was such a a nobel pious righteous man, this Krishna such a rouge, he came and when our husband Kamsa was minding his own business he was not aware Krishna jumped on him and killed him by all unfair means and we will not be satisfied until the death of our husband is avenged. So Jarasandh made a vow to destroy Krishna and destroy the entire yadu dynasty. He was a very very powerful asura so he mobilised soldiers, all of demons from all over the world to help him to conquer Krishna. Krishna killed all of his army, deeply uprooted it and destroyed everyone except Jarasandh.
He allowed Jarasandh to escape. Jarasandh again went and mobilized all the demons from all over the world to come up with a huge army and again attacked Mathura and Krishna destroyed all his armies he did this 17 consecutive times. kalayavan(a very popular demon) comes with his armies from one side of Mathura an challenging Krishna to fight, and Krishna realized that while he is fighting with his armies, Jarasandh would come form other side, then the citizens of Mathura will be in a very very difficult postion. It would be very uncomfortable for them so He spoke with Balaram about this and He made a plan. While all the citizens of Mathura were sleeping Krishna called for Visvakarma, the arthetic of the demigods. He told him to build a beautiful city within the sea. The city had a boundary wall around it which was 96 miles and Visvakarma may built such a wonderful, beautiful, uncredible palace that nobody would have seen, beautiful wide high way lanes they imported many beautiful flowers like Parijata from the heavenly places, beautiful beautiful palaces all bedecked with marble and all precious jewels and gold and silver and they even brought the Sudharma the administrative parliament building of the heavenly planets of Indralok, they brought it down to be the capital of Dwarka.
Karna and Jarasandh fought continuously with different weapons and Karna defeated Jarasandh by trying to tear him apart during a wrestling fight. Jarasandh concedes defeat and Karna spared his life. Jarasandh gifted the city of Malini to Karna as a token of appreciation. Jarasandh accepted and declared Karna as the greatest warrior in world and thus Karna become the king of both Anga and Malini. The victory over Jarasandh made Karna famous all over the world. Later following his accession to the throne of Malini, Karna took an oath that anyone who approached him with a request, when he worshipped the sun, would not leave empty-handed.

Hostilities with the Pandavas

Upon prodding by his uncle Shakuni, Duryodhan goes forward with a plot to kill the Pandavas through treachery, apparently succeeding. Throughout the planning and execution, Karna tries to convince his friend to call it off, desiring to defeat the Pandavas with honor on the battlefield.

Though a monogamist, Karna was a suitor for Draupadi at her Swayamvara, attempting to win her for Duryodhan. Unlike most other contenders, he was easily able to wield and string the bow, but Draupadi refused to allow him to take part, rejecting him for being a "suta-putra".The entire kings and the assembled people insulted Karna for his low birth; only Duryodhan supported and argued for Karna, saying Great Sages, Philosophers, and Warriors have no source. They are made great, not born great. Having escaped Varnavat, the Pandavas were also present in the swayamvara, disguised as Brahmins. Following the failure of the other princes,Arjun stepped into the ring and successfully hit the target, winning Draupadi's hand. The assembled kings in the Swayamvara argued that a Brahmin was ineligible and they took their weapons and attacked the disguised Arjun. Arjun fought with all the assembled kings and defeated them with ease. Karna entered the battle to protect his friend Duryodhan; a terrible battle was fought between Karna and Arjun, but Arjuna recognized Karna and the two Maharathis fought each other. The battle was so intense that sky was filled with arrows and visibility was lost in the cloud of arrows. With both archers not gaining upper hand, they turned to use celestial weapons. With the battle deadlocked, news came to Karna that his nine-year-old son Sudama (not to be confused with the more well-known Sudama, Krishna's childhood friend) was dying. Karna praised the skill of the Brahmin and compared it with the skill of Drona or Bhishma. Not being interested in committing Brahmahatya, Karna withdrew from the fight and rushed to his son. It was then revealed that Sudama was hit by an arrow sent by the Brahmin warrior when fighting earlier with the other kings. The bystander Sudama died in the hands of Karna. When Arjun's identity was later revealed, Karna's feelings of hostile rivalry with him further intensified and he swore to kill Arjun and his family.

After Shakuni won a game of dice by trickery,Draupadi, now queen to all five Pandavas, was dragged into the court by Dushasan.Duryodhan and his brothers attempted to strip her. Karna insulted Draupadi by saying that a woman with more than four husbands is nothing but a whore. Arjun subsequently swore to kill Karna for that insult.