ashvatthama

If you study Mahabharatham and the life of Ashvathama.. you can easily understand he was not an absolutely evil fellow like Ravana..
After all all his benefactors were killed.. some by unfair means..
Like Duryodhana who was hit on the thigh in a battle of maces..
And Ashvathama's father Dronacharya was killed because the Pandavas fabricated a lie that Ashvathama was killed in the battle..
and the epitome of truth Yudhistira himself told the lie..
And it was Drona's love for Ashvathama that ultimately resulted in his death..
Drishtadyumna beheaded Drona when the Acharya had abandoned his arms in grief .. because Drona had been falsefly informed that Ashvathama
(or an elephant by that name ) was killed..
So can you deny Ashvathama the right for revenge..?
The presence of Characters like Ashvathama, Shalya, Shikhandi... etc simply reveal and testify to the intellectual honesty of our civilization of that age..
We can easily get so many Krishnas and Arjunas..
But Ashvathama, and his ilk are so unique..
We cannot really place them anywhere in our likes or dislikes..
To comment of characters in our puranams, we require very deep study..
And the more we study, the more baffled we would be..