Dūshaṇa

Dūshaṇa was one of the chief rākshasa generals at Janasthāna. He served under Khara, the brother of Rāvaṇa. He marched with Triśiras as one of the two foremost commanders in Khara’s great army of 14,000 rākshasas, which was sent to destroy Rāma. Rāma killed him in the battle at Janasthāna.

Role at Janasthāna

Dūshaṇa was one of Khara’s chief commanders at Janasthāna, the stronghold of the rākshasas. Khara called out his whole army of 14,000 to take revenge for the mutilation of Śūrpaṇakhā. Dūshaṇa marched as one of the two senior generals, together with Triśiras. He was among the most fearsome rākshasa warriors of the Janasthāna force.

Death in battle

Rāma killed most of the army of 14,000 rākshasas in the great battle at Janasthāna. Then he turned to the commanders. In the Vālmīki Rāmāyaṇa, Rāma killed Dūshaṇa before Triśiras, and before the last fight with Khara. The whole army, with Dūshaṇa, Triśiras and Khara, was destroyed in three ghaṭikās (a ghaṭikā is a measure of time).

The Tulasī Rāmāyaṇa account

The Tulasī Rāmāyaṇa tells the battle at Janasthāna with a detail that the Vālmīki Rāmāyaṇa does not give. In this account the rākshasas had received varas (boons). The varas kept others from killing them and let them rise again after being struck down. Rāma met their māyā (power of illusion) with his own divine māyā.

By his divine power, Rāma made each rākshasa on the field see every other rākshasa around him as Rāma himself. Deluded in this way, the whole army of fourteen thousand began to destroy itself. The soldiers of Khara, of Dūshaṇa and of Triśiras all struck down those they took for Rāma, who were really their own comrades. In a short time all fourteen thousand fell by each other’s hands.

The Tulasī Rāmāyaṇa names this method “śaṭhaṃ-prati-śāṭhyam”, which means using trickery against the tricksters. It presents this as Rāma using divine māyā against the māyā of the rākshasas.

Sources

• Vālmīki Rāmāyaṇa, Araṇya Kāṇḍa, Chapters 27–31
• Tulasī Rāmāyaṇa, Araṇya Kāṇḍa