After the wedding ceremonies at Panchal were over, the Hastinapur palace invited the Pandavas and their bride back. Dhritarashtra made a great show of happiness on discovering that the Pandavas were alive after all, and he partitioned the kingdom, giving them a huge tract of barren land to settle in and rule over. The Pandavas transformed this land into a paradise. Yudhishthir was crowned there, and he performed a sacrifice that involved all of the kings of the land to accept - either voluntarily or by force - his suzerainty. The new kingdom, Indraprastha, prospered.
Meanwhile, the Pandavas had entered into an agreement among themselves regarding Draupadi: she was to be wife of each Pandava, by turn, for a year. If any Pandava was to enter the room where she was present with her husband-of-that-year, that Pandava was to be exiled for 12 years. It so happened that once Draupadi and Yudhishthir, her husband of that year, were present in the armoury when Arjuna entered it to take his bow and arrows. Consequently, he went off in exile during which he toured the entire country, down to its southernmost tip, and married three princesses he met along the way.
The prosperity of Indraprastha and the power of the Pandavas was not something that Duryodhan liked. He invited Yudhisthir to a dice game and got his uncle, Shakuni, to play on his (Duryodhan's) behalf. Shakuni was an accomplished player; Yudhishthir staked - and lost - step by step his entire wealth, his kingdom, his brothers, himself, and Draupadi. Draupadi was dragged into the dice hall and insulted. There was an attempt to disrobe her, and Bheem lost his temper and vowed to kill each and every one of the Kauravas. Things came to such a boil that Dhritarashtra intervened unwillingly, gave the kingdom and their freedom back to the Pandavas and Draupadi, and set them off back to Indraprastha. This angered Duryodhan, who talked his father around, and invited Yudhishthir to another dice game. This time, the condition was that the loser would go on a 12-year exile followed by a year of life incognito. If they were to be discovered during this incognito period, the loser would have to repeat the 12+1 cycle. The dice game was played. Yudhishthir lost again.
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